I find myself on a boat, quite a large boat.
But it seems I have a corpse that has come with me, or is somehow part of what I am carrying.
I’m figuring there must be some paperwork that needs taking care of, some bureaucratic machinations must surely be done for the corpse, so when a few crew members pass by, I ask them : What needs doing?
“Oh, you can just let that go”, they tell me, “just let it go into the sea”.
It’s about a week after the dream that I find myself in waking life on a ferry, and it takes me maybe half an hour to realize I am in fact on a rather large boat and that it might be a really good time to let some shit go.
Dead shit.
I’m not sure I could define or articulate exactly what the dead element consisted of, but I did have a sense of patterns of behaviour, repetitive stories, relationships that aren’t necessarily working out.
So I opened my arms to the wind there on the upper deck of the ferry and tried to let it all go.
The next day we stood on a mountaintop and looked out.
High enough that the birds floated up to us on the currents of wind.
Mostly we just looked in awe, took in the expanse, the huge sense of space, but once in a while we pulled out the binoculars and tried to identify the flash of movement in the water.
Aside from the tankers passing, all remained elusive and mysterious.
It was the following day at the eastern point of the island that we saw the fins of what we guessed must be porpoises, small and agile, making their way across the strait.
Nope, sorry, I didn’t take a photo of them.
Right now I’m carrying only my phone, no big camera, and besides, those moments seem so precious it feels more important to breathe them in than take a fuzzy terrible picture.
Breathe in the moment, the sea, the wind, and let all the dead shit go…
follow your nose 
Katharine, I love how you wove your story into the challenge response! Great examples!
Oh John, I’m so glad. I’m a bit shy about how I tend to freestyle in response to the challenges, so I’m quite thrilled you like it 🙂
PS – I have so many line photos, there just might be a part 2 ! 😝
Looking forward to it!
Hello Katharine!
I don’t remember how I came across your blog but I think my first encounter was you post ‘On the Edge of Loss”. I’m one of your followers since then. But I haven’t done what I intended to do right after that first reading. I’m tardy but I think it’s never too late to tell someone that you really REALLY like the way they think and see. Warmly and with appreciation, Clarissa
Never ever too late!!!
Hope my reply is also not too late, as I am very grateful for your comment. And I am a big fan of The Stealth Art Collective and can see Leslie Spit from my waterfront haunt, and am a practitioner of outdoor art also, so it is truly wonderful to hear from kindred souls
❤ Katharine
Thank you Katharine! There is so much more material about The Spit for the Stealth Art Collective blog, but I think I’ve run out of energy for it. Since beginning of Covid I’ve been working in a by-the-sidewalk miniature gallery inspired by the Little Libraries movement. “that gallery on elmer” . I’m finding it daunting to run the two projects simultaneously (because it takes me forever to blog-write) . I have until next May to decide if I will drop the currently very neglected blog before Squarespace auto renews. LOL
Oh yes, I understand – the projects! I always have several neglected projects in the wings.
This summer I’ve been largely away so I’ve completely neglected my street art project, Downtown Critters –