LAND MAMMAL

I've started adjusting to a landlocked existence after three days. I spent the first two totally in shock at my new reality--shuffling in circles, not really sure where to begin. I don't really know anyone yet, and the secretary who is the only person in the yard that speaks English has been acting rather cold. Getting setup to work and live out of the water has been a job in itself. I hadn't thought about the fact that I can't use my 110-volt tools with the European 220-volt power until I plugged in my 110v mini vacuum. It growled fiercely, lurched out of my hands, and plummeted to its death on the cabin sole. A faint plume of smoke rose from it as a farewell salute.

So without a transformer, all my powertools are useless. Plus, my refrigerator is water-cooled, and hence doesn't work when Swell is on land. I share one grimy little bathroom and cold shower with everyone else in the yard. And there's some sort of electrical grounding problem that's allowing electricity to flow through things it shouldn't. I climb up and down a 10-foot ladder to board Swell. I butted the ladder up to one of Swell's stanchions (metal post) to hold while taking the first or last step on or off the ladder. It seemed like a great idea, but it's actually a dirty dirty trick because what should be a safe place to grab electrocutes me instead! It only does it once in a while, which is even worse because you're never sure!?

Yesterday morning I lost my balance on the top of the ladder and grabbed for the aforementioned stanchion. Of course this time it was live and the shock sent me spastically recoiling in the other direction. I fell backwards but LUCKILY caught the top rung of the ladder with my right hand. I dangled there by one arm, my shower bag in the other. Dazed and grateful NOT to have fallen to the same fate as the vacuum, I hung there for a moment. Pascal, a local marine electrician passed on his way to work.

"Bonjour" I said, my feet still suspended in mid air. He'd already seemed suspicious of the strange new solitary blonde girl.this was further confirmation that I was definitely a weirdo.

Fortunately with the help of my friends I should be setup soon. Teva can loan me a sander and a grinder, Aymeric will bring over a cooler this weekend, and Pacome's got a rusty old bike in his backyard that's yearning to be reborn (I gave my other one away in Kiribati). So soon work will commence, I'll have a place to keep a few cold food items, and I'll have two wheels to roam as I please in my temporary existence as a land mammal.

TRY AGAIN, THIS TIME SLOWER

"Aaaaaaaaaaayeeeeeeeeeeee!!" Called an old lady sitting over the side of a small bridge. She simultaneously whipped her bamboo shoot with fishing line attached, and a small brown and white fish went flying backwards over her head and landed across the road just ahead of me. My brakes squealed like a scared pig as I slowed and I leaned my bike against a tree. I picked up the fish and returned it to the grandma fisherwoman. She turned to thank me for returning her catch, then tossed it into a basket with about six others. Her purple flowered pareu fell in a wrinkled bunch just above where her stout brown thighs pressed over the bridge's edge. Her worn, oversized t-shirt commemorated an outrigger paddling (va'a) event long past. Long strands of gray swirled into her grapefruit-sized bun like smoke swirls rising from coal. The bun sat nobly atop her being as she looked down to where her nimble fingers worked to re-bait the hook.

"E aha to oe huru?" I asked, practicing the Tahitian greeting.
"Maitai roa!" She replied with a body quaking chuckle. Smiling broader now she revealed the empty sides of her mouth where teeth had rotted away. Her smile seemed to warm the air around her and the river valley before us reflected the gleam in her eyes. She didn't seem to mind my observation, so I sat beside her and dangled my legs over the swirling river water too.

The baited hook disappeared below the surface of the brown water.it hadn't been 10 seconds before the river bubbled with activity.the line tightened.she hooted with glee and another fish went airborne across the road. I fetched her fish a few more times until her grandson arrived to take over the duty...Finally, I said goodbye and mounted my rusty stallion once more.

With new tubes and a little paint, Pacome's old bike had hit the streets under its new authority. It felt good to cover ground on my own terms, rather than with the use of my thumb, even though I'd met a series of wonderful people getting around that way. Despite having been this route by car at least a dozen times, it felt as if I were seeing it for the first time as I peddled towards town. At biking speed, new details appeared. I saw the marlin tails nailed to the wall of a proud fisherman's house, the budding water lilies lining the drainage ditch, I smelled the fresh baguettes when I waved to the shopkeeper and heard the ukulele tune coming from inside a house. I noticed which coconut trees had good coconuts and saw that the mangoes were getting bigger on the trees. I heard the dogs bark and felt the strength of the wind as I pushed against it. Riding a bike added a whole different dimension to a trip into town. In the last year I'd noticed the same about my life in general, by slowing down, I discover things about myself and the world that I might never have noticed otherwise.