Back to the Womb

We are out sailing on Lake St. Louis (Montreal, Quebec). The wind blows hard. I go down below to lie on the forward bunk. The boat charges through the water: sometimes rocking, sometimes ploughing, and sometimes skipping along.

The boat heels so far over that I am lying more on the side of the hull than on the bunk’s cushion. The water surges along the whole length of my body. There is only a layer of fibreglass, a membrane between me and the deep dark depths below. This is, I imagine, as close as it gets to being back in the womb.