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Biography & Autobiography Personal Memoirs

Seeker

A Sea Odyssey

by (author) Rita Pomade

Publisher
Guernica Editions
Initial publish date
May 2019
Category
Personal Memoirs, Adventurers & Explorers
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781771833516
    Publish Date
    May 2019
    List Price
    $25.00

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Description

Seeker: A Sea Odyssey begins as a fairy tale dream of finding Shangri la, and transforms along the way because of unrealistic expectations and a disintegrating marriage. It's a story about venturing into an unknown and more exciting life, and the heartbreak and growth that comes with the risks. The adventure lasts six years, from the building of the Santa Rita to her sale to a drug dealer in Spain in the summer of 1986. Our live-aboard home takes us to Hong Kong, the Philippines, Borneo, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, India, Yemen, the Sudan, Egypt, Israel, Cyprus, Turkey, Rhodes, Greece, Italy, and Spain. And in relation to all that I had experienced, what I decide when offered by my ex-husband and best friend the possibility of sailing with him again thirty years later.

About the author

Rita Pomade, an intrepid nomad originally from New York, now lives and writes in Montreal. Her work has appeared in literary magazines and poetry reviews, and her monologue for auditioning actors was selected for inclusion in the Monologue Bank. An excerpt from her forthcoming memoir Seeker: A Sea Odyssey was included in two travel anthologies.

Rita Pomade's profile page

Excerpt: Seeker: A Sea Odyssey (by (author) Rita Pomade)

Hour after hour we tossed about in a savage ocean, the Santa Rita no more consequential than a speck of lint in a vast washing machine. There was no horizon. There was no sign of anything sentient. There was nothing out there but wave after wave of black, rolling water with its deafening roar, accompanied by loud cracks of thunder and sheet lightening coming from all directions. We dared not think about how long our thin-skinned hull could hold its own against the fury of the wind and the pounding of the waves.And then it all stopped. The rain tapered off. The wind died away. The ocean flattened. Bernard tumbled into the cabin. He collapsed on the floor next to Stefan and fell into a deep sleep. Almost two days had passed since this nightmare began, and then it abated as abruptly as it came. We were alive. We had not only survived the storm from hell, but we were nearing Indonesia where we would no longer have to face the threat from India's southwest monsoons. When Bernard awoke, I brought him a coffee and sat on the floor beside him. I loved this man so much. I stroked his back, his arm, his hair. Bernard never responded to words, never trusted them. But he understood touch. He put his free arm around me and held me against his still damp slicker. We drank in the warmth of each other's bodies until he was ready to get out of his wet clothes and re-chart our course.I went on deck and surveyed the ocean with awe and a newfound respect. I wondered at the tempest we had endured. It seemed as though the entire ocean was out of control. But it wasn't. Only the surface was in turmoil. The ocean by its very depth could not have moved. I felt the presence of a vast stillness that lay beneath the surface. There is a constant in the universe, I thought. Only the playbill changes. The stage set remains. Underneath there is something subtle and profound and eternal.