Ukiyo

In the sea of hours, we learn how to be carried.

At a fortunate moment, standing on a coast, the sea may take hold of you—offering not a destination, but the idea of one, something like Shangri-La. Here, it is the Pacific.

There is no solid ground to measure against—only water that refuses to hold a footprint, and a sky that keeps its distance. Nothing stays long enough to be claimed. To cross such an expanse would be an act of trust: in instruments that quiver, in stars blurred by cloud, in an inner sense that rarely speaks with certainty.

I sometimes imagine what it might be like to own a sailboat and slip away. A friend of mine lives in constant motion—meetings, negotiations, site visits, always scanning for the next opening. Once, he spoke seriously about buying a boat. “You sail, he said, “not because certainty is available, but because stillness is impossible.”

For me, the rest—the shimmer of possibility, the weight of what-ifs—must be released, like words carried off by wind over open water. We do not sail toward so much as through. The destination loosens its grip. The journey narrows to a single moment: the bow cutting water, salt stinging the skin, light breaking in the spray. Waves rise and fall in their old, indifferent rhythm. The crest is not a victory. The trough is not a defeat. They are alternating beats in the same long sentence. When one lifts us into light and the other lowers us into shade, both are the sea. Both are given freely.

Choosing—and living with—a sailboat becomes an apprenticeship in renunciation. Each choice closes a door. Each feature added carries a quiet farewell. No vessel, however elegant or carefully built, can hold the full weight of our wanting. The shipwright’s dilemma mirrors our own: a thicker hull steals speed; added comfort erodes simplicity. Every improvement has its cost. Every sail raised casts a shadow below deck.

To move through water is to accept limits. What you finally sail is not the sum of your desires, but the outline of your concessions—the shape of what you are willing to give up to remain underway. The ocean does not arrange itself for our crossing, just as time does not bend to our plans.

There is no final harbor where every question is tied off and doubt lies still. Progress here is uneven, negotiated moment by moment. The boat advances not by force, but by yielding—by letting what cannot be mastered move through it without breaking the frame. Without resistance, it is only a shape. Without wind, only an object.

In the end, all we can do is raise the sail we have, trust the imperfect boat we chose, and answer the wind in whatever language it speaks. To meet what cannot be governed—time, chance, mystery—with a steadiness that settles into the bones. Gratitude becomes not a reaction to calm seas, but a stance at the helm—the quiet acknowledgment that being carried is privilege enough.