Thank you

I wonder what it would be like to be a sailor back in the day when those huge, wooden ships that must have taken Pooh Bear's entire hundred acre wood to build had command of the sea. The kind Jim Hawkins from Muppet Treasure Island sailed on (I don't recommend watching that, by the way). When I imagine myself as a sailor on a large vessel, with billowing sails that look like bedsheets, bound for some foreign land, I think it'd be a pretty tough life. If you want some space for yourself, there's not much place to go. Only so much deck to roam, so much rigging to climb (that's what those rope things are called, right?). If you get into a spat with another sailor, you can't ignore it or hide away. You'd have to deal with it. Oh, and the food. I know what it's like to have food on a bus traveling for a week. But on a ship? With no refrigeration? No grocery stores to get fresh produce if yours goes bad? You're stuck with the sludge you got for months? Yuck.

I also think it would be really easy to feel lost. You're on the same hulk of wood for months at a time and all you can see is nothing but sea. Miles and miles of meaningless, cliche ocean. But the amazing thing is how sailors guided themselves by the stars. They navigated blank horizons by pinpoints of light in a dark sky. I don't know how that works. I know that if someone were to plop me in a boat on the ocean and say, "Find your way back home using the stars to guide you," I don't think I could do it (partially because home is in Colorado). I know the North star is supposed to be like somewhere around the Big Dipper. But is it on the end of the bowl or the end of the handle? Good grief. I would stink at sailing.

Life is kind of like sailing and people, I've found, are kind of like stars in a way. Not in the way that they both release gasses. Not in that they're both prettier when kept at a distance. But in the way that they both can serve as guides. I've found that Providence has often used people to guide me, especially when I feel lost, which is a feeling that seems to cling to me lately.

It really is comforting to have someone there who cares to ask how I'm doing or gives me his or her advice, pointing me in the right direction. I really appreciated when someone told me a week or so ago that if I ever needed advice, I could give them a call, text, email, whatever. And in a world where shallow relationships are as plentiful as pimples on a teenager's face (as my brother-in-law puts it), that meant a lot.

So I just want to say thank you to my friends. Thanks for being genuine and letting me know you care. It really means a lot.

Oh, yeah, if you have someone in your life who's been a "star" for you (yeahhh, I know that's pretty cheesy), just tell him or her thank you for me

Photo credit: my google searches

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