Mermaid Purses

Sitting in the cockpit of a small white-and-green sloop, I waited huddled in muted agony beneath a leaden blanket.

The sloop was tethered in an improvised way to a busy pier used by working vessels of all sizes and condition; sailors of a fishing boat gliding past shouted their annoyances and insults to persuade me to relocate the puny leisure vessel to allow real seamen to work.

I paid them little mind. Their words couldn’t touch me.

Around dusk the night prior, a sturdy passenger ship called The Maribel had gone down in a violent tempest with all hands except for me. Despite being strong swimmer, I had struggled to keep my head above water for hour after hour until, for the first time in my life, my limbs reached the edge of my endurance and begun to fail; even as the storm abated I was sure I would drown…