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Slower Than a Ripple: A Mule Rider Thinks of the Doldrums

Published May 28, 2004

I, Bernie Harberts, did not use generative AI to write or illustrate this article. Spell check and grammar check, yes. AI, no.

As I was walking up through Fort Bragg, I noticed the sand patterns and thought of Sea Bird.

The sand in these regions is almost white, sort of like the powdery stuff you see at the beach between the high tide mark and the dunes.

But it’s a long way from the ocean here. It’s rolling land where the Long Leaf pines reign supreme. It’s like the heaving swells I used to plow with my sailboat Sea Bird had been turned to sand and planted in pine.

I was leading Woody at the time, trying to save his back. That gave me even more time to look at the landscape passing underfoot.

I just happened to spot this clump of grass. I crouched down to enjoy how the wind had blown its blades in circles on the sand.

Wind circles in sandhills grass, Fort Bragg, North Carolina, 2004 — Circles in the grass.

It reminded me of the Doldrums. I’d been stuck out on the South Atlantic for going on a week. That was on my sailboat Sea Bird. To pass the time, I’d throw stuff overboard that I didn’t need anymore. Usually it was old produce. Things like old potatoes, onions, the occasional bad egg.

The water was dead calm and when I’d throw in a potato it would make a mini-geyser and then the ripples would spread out until they were re-absorbed by the ocean.

This clump of grass took me back to when I traveled slower than a ripple.

More about riding Woody and Maggie from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

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