I wish he'd sleep and I could sleep and dream about the lions, he thought. Why are the lions the main thing that is left? Don't think, old man, he said to himself. Rest gently now against the wood and think of nothing. He is working. Work as little as you can.
It was getting into the afternoon and the boat still moved slowly and steadily. But there was an added drag now from the easterly breeze and the old man rode gently with the small sea and the hurt of the cord across his back came to him easily and smoothly.
Once in the afternoon the line started to rise again. But the fish only continued to swim at a slightly higher level. The sun was on the old man's left arm and shoulder and on his back. So he knew the fish had turned east of north.
Now that he had seen him once, he could picture the fish swimming in the water with his purple pectoral fins set wide as wings and the great erect tail slicing through the dark. I wonder how much he sees at that depth, the old man thought. His eye is huge and a horse, with much less eye, can see in the dark. Once I could see quite well in the dark. Not in the absolute dark. But almost as a cat sees.
The sun and his steady movement of his fingers had uncramped his left hand now completely and he began to shift more of the strain to it and he shrugged the muscles of his back to shift the hurt of the cord a little.
Sometimes, falling asleep is a great escape from difficult circumstances. Santiago knows he needs to rest and prepare for the coming battle with the fish. Plus, the old man wants to be with the lions in his dreams. The problem with dreams, especially really good ones, is that, when you wake up, there are those few moments of leftover euphoria followed by intense disappointment.
I fell asleep on my couch last night, and I had a dream. A really good one. I rarely remember my dreams, good or bad. Upon waking, they hang in the air around me and then quickly evaporate into vague untethered emotions. I don't keep dream journals. I should, but the idea of sitting in my bed in the middle of the night, scribbling in my journal, is not attractive. I don't think I'd ever get back to sleep.
When I woke on the couch from my good dream, I shuffled into my bedroom, crawled under the covers, and prepared to sleep again. Then, I realized how cold it was in the house. I lay there, waiting to hear the heat kick on. I waited for five minutes. Nothing.
So, I crawled out from under the covers, stumbled back into the living room to check the thermostat. It was set at 70 degrees, and the temperature in the house was 65. I cursed a little and dialed the temperature up a little more. I got a "low battery" warning on the thermostat. I scrounged up a couple AA batteries and put them in the thermostat. I waited for the furnace to grind to life. Nothing.
Long story short (too late for that), I spent almost three hours trying to get a furnace person to come out and get our heat going, watching the temperature in the house slowly plummet with each phone call I made. All of the businesses that advertised 24-hour service weren't answering or had answering services that promised return phones calls within minutes. Those callbacks never materialized.
Finally, over two hours into this adventure, at about 3 a.m. and 57 degrees, Charlie from Trudell Plumbing and Heating called me. He sounded tired, asked a few questions, and then said he was on his way. An hour later, he was in our little furnace crawlspace, tinkering, checking, mumbling to himself. Twenty minutes after he arrived, our furnace roared back to life, like one of Santiago's dream lions. Charlie was kind, helpful, and didn't tell me I needed to replace my furnace.
I went back to bed, got about an hour-and-a-half of sleep, and then hit the ground running. Work and work. Lunch with one of my best friends I haven't really seen since the beginning of the pandemic. More work. Bubble tea with my daughter and her boyfriend. More work. A beer with another wonderful friend. Then, in the evening. I led a poetry workshop.
I am, to say the least, a little spent. But, as I sit typing this post, my furnace is purring out heat, and I have a three-day weekend ahead.
Saint Marty couldn't dream of a better start to his mini vacation.
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