"ALL ME ISHMAEL. Some years ago never mind how long precisely-having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen, and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off-then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me."
Hardcore Literature Book Club Host Benjamin McEvoy exhorts us to think about what our own Journey is; what our own trip to sea was all about. Who is our Moby Dick? Who is our Ahab? Are we Ishmael? Or are we The Whale?
My own trip to sea started in 2001 when I agreed to move with my then partner from Champaign, IL to San Diego. I've never had much money in my purse. But I owned my coop apartment and had a good full-time job that paid the bills and friends that had known me may years. Family wasn't too far away.
We set "sail" in two separate vessels; my 1997 black Mazda 626 and his white extended cab Ford F150 towing his livestock trailer stuffed with all of our belongs. Even though we "landed" in San Diego in August 2001, a few weeks before 9-11, I've never felt settled. I've never felt at home. I feel very much that I'm still on the voyage.
Moby Dick is my inner, higher self that I’m still trying to find, meet, get to know. He's the elusive one that takes the scenic way home and I wonder why I turned that way. He's the one that says things and I wonder why those words came out of my mouth in that tone of voice. He has feelings I'm disconnected from, passions I don't know. I don't know what he's good at, while I seem to be bad at so many things.
The White Whale is also Captain Ahabs higher self that he's at war with, that took his leg in an attempt to get his attention. Instead, Ahab's ego, that thinks it's in control of this life, declared war on his inner self. In his effort to prove his ego right, he lost everything. Like Javert in Les Miserables, he couldn't consider being wrong. Being in control was more important to him than being happy.
My Captain Ahabs are my father, who always smiled and was never happy. His smile was a wall of indifference we threw ourselves against until we were bloody, but never made a dent; my mother, who, as she got older, became more childish and self-absorbed; my brothers who have no idea who I am and refuse to learn; boyfriends who only wanted me to be their ideal; bosses who only saw me as a list of statistics in a folder.
In 2010 Moby Dick rammed my ship, blowing up my life. Stress, anxiety, depression, and HIV teamed up to land me in the hospital for 28 days with a years long recovery. I lost my job, had to move many times, learned to navigate the world of disability and assistance programs.
In the book, Ishmael survives the destruction of the ship and we know he makes his way back home. That journey would have taken almost as long as the one outward bound. I feel like I'm still on that journey, still trying to find my way home, not sure where home is or what it looks like.
In many ways, I'm still hunting Moby Dick.
