Sea Fever

That picture of Amelia was posted because she is entering a contest to win a trip to the new Harry Potter Themepark from the Ellen Degeneres show. The tag line for the contest is: "Do you have a precocious child who knows everything about Harry Potter?" Why, indeed I do. She wrote an essay immediately, and I've been trying to post her entry but am having trouble with the link.

She's absolutely, positively convinced that she will win, and I see no reason whatsoever to dissuade her.

The pond behind the vacation house was in a frenzy during this storm, but more than anything, it made me miss the ocean. I am not often overly nostalgic for my childhood home in Hull, but storms bring my spirit back there immediately. I think that when you're born to it, there's no removing the salt from your blood. I very nearly drove down there on Sunday just to watch the waves. (But went to see Percy Jackson instead...there's got to be some Poseidon connection in there somewhere.)

One of the few poems I've always had memorized is the one by John Masefield that goes:

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

I know there's a piece of my soul infected with Sea Fever, the gypsy in me, and she gets a little wound up when the Nor'easters come.