everything anyone could ever feel.

“I have been feeling very clearheaded lately and what I want to write about today is the sea. It contains so many colors. Silver at dawn, green at noon, dark blue in the evening. Sometimes it looks almost red. Or it will turn the color of old coins. Right now the shadows of clouds are dragging across it, and patches of sunlight are touching down everywhere. White strings of gulls drag over it like beads.

It is my favorite thing, I think, that I have ever seen. Sometimes I catch myself staring at it and forget my duties. It seems big enough to contain everything anyone could ever feel.” 
― Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See

Been on the ship a month now and I'm starting to feel settled, I've completed all my ship safety training which was … intense! I'm glad to have it out the way, although I'm yet to do my jump into the ocean in a life jacket which i've been dreading. I've learned my tracks for the shows so I have a little more free time now, been getting off the ship more and hitting the gym pretty hard when on board, i'll be using my time doing lights and maintenance once my probation is up so I'm trying to do more free time type stuff for the moment and making the most of this health kick (my squat form is still appalling though, someone please help). Food here's been great, there's so much to choose from and i've been really healthy for the most part, i've dropped three belt holes which I find pretty staggering, I don't have scales or a tape measure to confirm but I'm definitely fitter, so far this job is super physical, the scenery is made to last decades (no exaggeration) it's pretty heavy duty and mostly made from metal, sometimes we are doing 4 shows a day so it's constant scenery changes and ice makes, as well as setting up bands in various locations, and temporary stages which weigh a tonne, then there's rehearsals for shows and various extra duties like wheelchair assistance that have me pretty busy.

From my limited experience and several hours on Netflix back home, I've come to the conclusion that this is a little like a hybrid between Prison and University with slightly less rules, prison mostly because people are joining all the time and everyone has a ticking clock above their heads, anytime someone new joins everyone's trying to get the fresh blood which I've found hilarious to watch, and you're basically asking everyone how much time they have left because it's very rare that someone joined the ship at the same time as you. And University becomes of the freedom and community that comes with this. Time goes by differently here, I think it's something akin to dog years, relationships become super serious in a matter of days, people move in together in a few weeks and your colleagues become close in even less time, I could probably find more examples and graph it out hah.

Anyway im finishing up this blog on a bus back from a day trip to kuala lumpur, staring out the window at motorways that look the same at home and neighborhoods that look a little less like home because the cars on the driveway are all micro sized and the houses are painted too brightly, but they still have the same little signs of community and thankfully no hint of tourism so this feels quite a homely journey. My first month was a bit of a whirlwind, I wake up, eat and do the tasks I've been assigned for the day, gym and get off the ship if I have the time, and wait till midnight for my next rota and do it all over again, as much as it's frustrating not being able to plan ahead like most of the rest of the ship, there's something very comforting to me about taking each day as it's comes, 6 months doesn't feel too far away at this point, I feel I'm going to make it the whole contract at least, the biggest killer for me is going to be losing people I get on with really well. I seem to have made the majority of my friends in groups of people who are soon off home, or those who work the other side of the ship and different hours, so give it a week or two and I might find myself suddenly very lonely. Let's hope there's a fresh batch of people waiting to come on board that I click well with.