“So I have gathered,” said the purser politely. He need not have, I only said it out of a story telling habit that was hard to break after years of writing. All it served to do was to make me ashamed of having once more varied from my journals, if even for a second.
“My room is larger than I expected it to be,” now I wasn't even willing to change verb tense for fear that I might be tempted to make other additions. I could only help that the man wouldn't notice the oddity in my speech. “I was basing it off of the steamer room I had when crossing the Atlantic and when the captain said bunk I feared the worse. I thought I would be sharing a room with at least one other person, if not more. It was much to my relief when instead I was shown to my own private room, though it is still small. There is a sink, so I can do my toiletry in private, a desk that folds up so it doesn't get in my way, a chair, and a bunk that folds and latches onto the wall when I don't want it. Everything has been made so that it takes up as little space as possible which is just as well because once they bring my luggage into the room it seems much smaller than it did at first.” Here I did skip the details about where I was then sitting in my room and me writing in my journal as a way of relaxing. While I was sure now that the purser wasn't noticing my odd choice in verb, I was pretty sure that he would think I was insane if I started talking about doing things that I wasn't with things that weren't there. Instead I skipped completely over the details of me settling into my room and the things that I did that first day. They were all written in such a way that it would make me look very strange to retell them.
“It was after breakfast that the captain approached me, I have been on board for two days now and have spent most of that time in my room, trying to keep to his order not to get under foot. Anyway there is nothing to write about with us still on the ground,” I continued. “My first thought was that I had still somehow managed to get myself into trouble. The captain always looks so stern that it is difficult to tell what he is thinking. All he said though was that we were going to be taking off tomorrow, I have no idea why decided to tell me this, and in person. It isn't as if he was friendly to me our first meeting, and now all of the sudden he is trying to be helpful it seems. I have no idea what goes through this man's mind. Still if we are going to be air born it is good news for me because I am growing tired of my room, once we are in the air I have the excuse of journalism to wander around and ask questions.”
I stopped my monologue once again to let the purser catch up. He had fallen so far behind that he had to ask me to repeat the final part of my statement to him. I didn't mind the break, it gave me more time to think about what I was going to tell them, and I was at the end of that entry anyway. I asked the purser if I could have a drink of water before I kept talking and he asked one of the guards to go and get it for me. The guards were one of the reason that I was being as eloquent as I was, they kept me talking if only because I wanted to make them happy. They were a very threatening presence, clearly chosen for their pure muscle mass, and I couldn't be entirely sure what their orders were. Once the guard returned with a tin cup full of the same foul tasting water they gave me for my meals, I had no excuse but to continue.
“I've been completely under the weather for the last couple of days because of air sickness, never having been in the air before I had no idea that I would suffer like this. I have never been sea sick before so I don't know how to explain it, except that it was an entirely different feeling. Therefore there is nothing to report from my first two days in the air, I know very little about what has happened on the ship. The captain had them send me a thick soup from the kitchen to eat, which is another unexpected act of kindness. I was able to eat very little because of my stomach, but I probably wouldn't have eaten anything at all if the captain hadn't been so thoughtful. I guess I have grown to the motion now though, because I was able to venture out for breakfast, I think the captain nodded to me when I sat at my assigned seat in the dinning room, but I couldn't be sure.
To be continued...
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