by Serena

The eternal uniform of the sea has always appeared to be blue…

Today is no exception; blue skies dressed to match the likes of its blue twin sister, the sea. Retrieved from the sea are particles and article that too, tend to be blue. This afternoon’s mini Mahi Mahi, though initially gleaming gold, drifted into a state of ultimate blue, before succumbing into the solid grey of death. The sea has so much to give us, like these fish, and this voyage, and this day, as we slide thankfully across her surface. Is plastic and other human-created rubbish the only such gifts we can offer her for her blessings?

Today (actually simultaneous with the arrival of the Mahi Mahi) we trawled for more plastic bits in the crews research nets. Although the majority of pieces collected in the nets today were actually naturally supposed to be in the sea, and the blues of baby flying fish and jellies and plankton finally dominated the plastic particle ratio, it’s still heartache to behold. Sure, today and yesterday there have been less visible and less collectable plastic in the surrounding seas. That does not remove from my memory the images of days previous: herds of wild buoys, algae-weighted fishing nets, glowing green plastic pop bottles, disintegrating plastic crates and other various chunks of dissolving plastic drifted freely through the opposing currents.

I still cannot believe it to be true. It’s like discovering first hand that the man I love has cancer (knock on wood) or some other fatal disease. It is not charming, to state it mildly. The concept alone, accompanied by drooling words such as infected, contaminated, sickly sea – reverse the image of crystal blue health for me. Deform it in a most imaginative and realistic way. I do feel as though I’m forced to bare witness and act as assistant as I not only discover the man I love is ill, but I and all humanity are the ones pouring illness into him; to the point where his insides are infected and raw: diseased. I’d no sooner see that day as I’d see the sea become a pool of festering disease.

I look around, at all angles and I see blue, as I have in some form or another for the past two weeks. And despite the diagnosis, I can’t help but smile at this strong and radiantly beautiful body. She is carrying us on an able and willing surface to the ever bending, always slightly unreachable horizon. And with every particle within this body, be it fish, salt water, rain water, plastic scum, or sun diamonds; this ocean is alive.