I am probably sailing right now as this blog releases, forgive me but I delayed its release to give you time to read the last one. WildChild has now been happy safe and secure exploring beautiful Martinique for the last week now, and it is time to move on. This place was not boring and I have found interesting things to talk about. As a writer you know I just love finding delicious stories for you.

 

 

Shopping

If you have been following along you know that when we arrived we lost a fish because my line snapped. Well one of my new high priorities was to fix that problem but good. My boat parents were already anchored in here and guided us in to anchor right beside them. I love these wonderful human beings and my loyalty to them is absolute. I was so happy to see them again I could not stop crying and hugging them during the dinner onboard their yacht they invited us to upon our arrival.

That is the thing about this cruising life, is you can make wonderful friends you must eventually say good-bye to, but you never know when you might run into them again. Finding my boat parents again was an unexpected surprise, they had planned on moving on a week ago.

 

 

With their help they dinghied us into shore the next day and helped us figure out the check-in procedure and took me shopping. There were things on the to-do list that needed attention only a first world country could help with. Check-in was easy lovely happy smooth and so wonderful. Goodness I love the French. No more stupid questions like the english demand of me. Check-in was a fast simple affair that only cost 5 euros, no covid test required. No bullshit..!

Viva La France…!   🙂

After check-in my next priorities were to fix my fishing rod problem and try to find a shorty winch handle. It has been such a pain sheeting in the genny and having to make the 3/4 turn until the handle hits the solar panels then remove it and reset it and go another 3/4 turn again. One inch too long. Being in a first world country again has its advantages. We finally found a shorty winch handle to replace the one super strong Captain Lexi snapped in half a few weeks ago.

So yay for small miracles.

 

 

There was an old American TV sitcom with Tim Allen that made famous the idea that men just love   bigger… better…  more POWER…    then the masculine grunting begins. I think all my male readers will appreciate me going much bigger better more power on my fishing line. The lovely helpful man, Allan, at the store thought me a bit odd with my obsession for the heaviest line I could get. “your rod and reel will break before your line” he tells me.

But no more giving away free lures to Neptune.

ha ha ha… 

The next item on the agenda was new Captains uniforms. It is no secret I dress very poorly. I have no fashion sense and zero interest in what other people think of my clothes or appearance. It’s always hot down here and I figure as long as I am not showing nipples or bush it’s all good, who cares. I was not going to pay the english islands over $100usd for a bikini though.

 

 

All hail the french culture, I found wonderful pretty bikinis that actually look good and for only 20-30 euros each. The french have taste and style which I will now benefit from, not that I actually care what other people think of me.

 

The Perfect Trap

The anchorage here in LaMarin is huge and perfect. There are just so many boats sheltered in here. It is a perfect place for boats. There is also the perfect trap for boats in here too.

My french friend Virginie, being the wonderful angel she is, had been trying to help me sell WildChild on Facebook up here in the French islands. She had 3 potential buyers interested when I arrived. One of them, Marc, who is a local resident told me two delicious interesting local stories I thought I would share with you.

 

 

As we were bringing Marc back to WildChild to view her, I noticed this wrecked boat on the reefs to my northwest. I always wonder about the stories of the sailing adventures that silently end badly. On the return trip to bring Marc back to shore I asked both him and Virginie if they would mind if we went over so I could get a picture.

Marc tells us, with Virginie translating for me, that last week alone there were 3 CATS and 2 monohulls that also smashed up onto that same reef. That this is a regular occurance. He says that they do not remove that wreck because it is like a warning marker for people that there is a reef there. I think not a very effective marker.

I am surprised to hear this, these reefs are clearly marked on the charts.

He explains… that in the west, we mark our channels    RED RIGHT RETURNING   ….  but in Europe they mark them opposite. In Europe in it is   GREEN RIGHT RETURNING…!

If you notice on the chart the channel takes a detour around those reefs but when coming in, you see a bunch of anchored boats right in front of you, to the LEFT of the clear green channel marker. Europeans enter blindly GREEN on their Right as they enter the back of the anchorage. It does not help that at night the red markers are not lit up and only the green ones have lights on.

It seems so few French bother to use their chart plotters. They prefer the visual navigation and assume the channel marks are the same here as they are back home in Europe. The ignorant pay a heavy price for their assumptions.

The second story…

As we are returning him to the dinghy dock onshore he says to Virginie “… see those two sailboats there…?” she translates for me. Last week they were in the news… they were caught by the police trying to smuggle 1.1 tonnes of Cocaine into LaMarin…!

 

 

It seems… the organized crime and pirates and drug smugglers are a real danger out here. This stuff really does happen.

 

 

wow huh…!

 

Angels and Loving Kindness

I am usually very cautious about including other people into my blogs. My friends have given me permission to tell this story.

Yesterday, my boat parents and my friend french Virginie had an intervention for Captain Lexi, they saved me.

If you have been following along you know that I have a dental retainer behind my front teeth, the remnants of the braces I had years ago. You also know that a while ago the left side on my top teeth broke loose and I have had a sharp piece of titanium cutting my tongue up. My suffering has only been getting worse over time.

 

 

The thing about being alone out here far from home, access to healthcare, without any insurance and very little money, can be rather difficult. Not speaking the local language makes it even harder.

My suffering has been getting worse and my ignore the problem plan has not made my life any better. In the last few days, with so many cuts on my tongue and so much pain talking and eating, it has become apparent something needs to be done. My plan was to ask my boat parents if they would be willing to take a pair of pliers and perform a little dental surgery on me, rip that thing out of my mouth please.

They were rather unwilling but my crew was willing to step up to the plate, so that was my plan for today. A sailor is gonna do what they gotta do.

 

 

In loving kindness, my boat parents contacted Virginie, who can speak the local language, and she spent most of a day calling around to dentists on the island to try and find someone qualified who could help me in this emergency. Together they all arranged everything and told me yesterday morning to be ready for pickup at 9:30am…  “…we are having an intervention for you hunny…“.

They had a rented car and drove me across the island to the dentist they found. Virginie held my hand while I cried thru the fast procedure, for 27 euros a very kind angel of mercy relieved me from my suffering.

 

 

None of my friends owed me this effort. It was not their problem. This act of loving kindness shows just the best of humanity and the wonderful people I surround myself with.

I could not stop hugging them all, my angels of mercy.

 

Culture Shock

Although culture shock is not exactly the correct title for this section it is close. Although the french culture is rather different than the culture on the English islands it is not the contrast of the two that has caused me shock. It is that I generally live a very isolated remote existence in remote places and seldom have much contact with other human beings. All of a sudden I arrive in a very crowded first world European country and I am surrounded by thousands of people.

 

 

My brain keeps going into overload. I am having trouble processing all the sights sounds and colours overwhelming my brain. So much busy-ness and so much human activity, it hurts my head. The empath cannot help but feel every person around her.

My crew is from Europe, so for him, this place feels like home, for me, it is very foreign. I feel very out of place and out of my element. The Empath cannot help but absorb and take in every human that passes by her and it can be overwhelming. The Narcissist dismisses the sea of humanity around him as irrelevant background information, easy to block out.

As my crew and I explore land we are having very different experiences and it often goes badly. I am unsure what my level of responsibility is for my crew. I often want to clamp a hand over his mouth and shut him up quickly before we get beat up. I tell him when he goes off alone, do not tell anyone which boat you are on and do not associate my name with you please. Whatever attention you attract I do not want to be stained by it. His mouth is shocking and often offensive.

The story of the Narcissist and the Empath is as old as time, it almost borders on the cliche. I have begun to wonder though, does this story ever end well for the Empath? How will my story now with my crew end in the next few weeks or months?

 

 

I would say that so far we have found a balance living together. I would give so much credit to his mother whom I have never met. My crew is very polite with an understanding of good manners. He says please and excuse me. He also has no issues with strong women.

I am often loath to bring male crew onto my boat because so many men have sexist ideas in their heads and resist taking orders from a female captain, eventually they always try to dominate me. My crew has ZERO issues with women and ZERO issues taking orders from his female captain. He is completely submissive and never challenges me when I give an order. He must have been raised by a good strong mother, so to her, thank you.

I am unsure about the source of the conflicts with my crew and the larger world. He rubs like sandpaper on everyone around. I admit to incredible ignorance about Croatia and could only vaguely find it on a map. My knowledge of their country and culture is nearly zero, and my crew is the only croatian person I have ever met. I do not know if he is simply a normal product of his culture? Is he a normal Croatian and they are all like this?

I cannot tell if we are constantly having a cultural conflict or a human one. My crew is very intelligent, very smart, and incapable of guile. His thoughts are unfiltered to his mouth. He cannot seem to grasp the idea that sometimes people say one thing, while they are thinking something totally different. He says “…in Croatian culture we always say what we think… there is nothing wrong with this… it is normal…” but this is definitely not true in western culture where being polite and respectful of others peoples feelings is paramount.

I cannot get my crew to stop politically re-educating my friends and everyone around him. He is so confident in his truths he can allow no other truths to exist. I have had to yell at him for “fixing” my close friends. He seems to need to “RED PILL” everyone around him, whether they want it or not. His intentions are only to save everyone with his truths. He is so black and white though, no room for grey in his head. He has offended my friends.

I watch the way my crew interacts with and dominates everything and everybody around him. He is comfortable in this European culture and is oblivious that he is pushing around and offending everyone around him. As an Empath I am horrified by the looks and body language and reactions people have to my crew. Their unspoken language being different than their spoken polite words. The Narcissist is oblivious.

When we go to shore, we usually go separate ways.

If he is representative of his country, I think I do not want to ever visit there. Rude beyond reason.

 

The Conflict

The other night the complete total Narcissism of my crew lead to bad times onboard, that truly offended me and we had to have a talk in the morning. The problem is, he intends no harm, his brain just cannot place value on the existence of other human beings. He really does not know any better.

My crew had made friends nearby. Some Croatian guy and 2 Germans as crew on a charter yacht around the corner. Two days ago they wanted to pick him and invite him to dinner with them. I assumed, my bad, they were coming in the afternoon, and would return him before dark as is normal. There is an 8pm curfew here and dinghing around large anchorages in the dark is seldom a pleasant experience.

So I was surprised when he said his friends were coming to pick him up at 6pm. I asked when he plans on being home? Government curfew is at 8pm? He said he does not know. I told him very clearly, “…DO NOT COME HOME AFTER 10PM…. IF YOU ARE GOING TO BE OUT AFTER I GO TO BED JUST SLEEP AT YOUR FRIENDS PLACE AND COME BACK IN THE MORNING…“. He understood and agreed, “no problem” he says, “yes I understand“.

 

 

I am a wounded puppy. I know I am a wounded puppy. It is no secret that I am a wounded puppy. On the first day I get new crew I must tell them 3 specific things about living with Lexi.

1/ I have a heart condition, you will see me faint several times a day

2/ I have a weird seizure condition, you will see me get twitchy

3/ NEVER touch Lexi when she is sleeping…  I will panic, freak out, and attack.

It’s just a thing with me. I have done my therapy and I cope very well with the damage my terrible abusive parents did to me as a child. The PTSD from the child abuse I suffered thru as a kid has rewired my brain with an unconscious instinct to terror, especially when sleeping. I have been attacked while sleeping peacefully so many times by predators that the terror is hardwired into my brain as instinct. I don’t like surprises.

Also considering the crime mentioned in the last blog, and that I sleep alone on an open boat in strange places, the risk of a criminal boarding my yacht to cause harm is actually rather high… my heightened fear is understandable. For the women out there….  how would you feel…  if you lived alone in the country with no witnesses around, and you had no front door. If anyone could just walk right into your bedroom while you were vulnerably sleeping? Would you feel safe?  Sleep well…?

My crew understands all of this very well. It has been explained to him in great detail. A few times when he got up to pee in the night and I suddenly awoke to him moving around the boat I have woken up in terror. My PTSD conditioning is no secret.

I was very clear with my crew….

a rule of the yacht is…

CREW MUST BE HOME BEFORE THE CAPTAIN GOES TO BED…! 

PERIOD.

I was not unclear.

 

 

The thing about Narcissists though, is that they cannot help but have zero interest or respect for the existence of other people. We are all irrelevant background noise to them. Having consideration for the existence of other human beings is simply not in their wiring. They really do not know. They are completely self absorbed, their wants and needs the only thing that registers with them.

So at 10pm, I am tired and still alone on the yacht. No text from my crew and he has not returned home yet. So I text him, tell him I am going to bed now, sleep over at his friends boat, and I will see him in the morning.

I go to bed naked and alone on my yacht at 10pm 

Just before 11pm… my crew comes home in the dark and sneaks onto the yacht quietly. He wanted to brush his teeth with his special toothpaste don’t ya see. Nothing but himself and his wants and needs factors into his decision making process. He ignores all my words and everything I told him, does not even remember. It was all irrelevant to him, background noise, he hears only blah blah blah when other people speak.

My crew, completely oblivious to all of this, comes home in the dark after 10pm and at some point, mid salon, calls my name into the darkness.

I FREAK THE FUCK OUT…!

In my sleep… I jolt up out of bed and begin screaming NO NO NO NO NO…! I pull my knife and throw a pillow towards the doorway. By the time I am actually awake and conscious I have tears streaming down my cheeks and I can hear my own voice in the distance screaming in pure terror.

My sudden extreme reaction so shocks my crew he is trying to calm me down in croatian as he back pedals away towards the companionway opening to retreat.

I am sobbing in terror dripping with adrenaline.

My crew has ZERO interest or respect for other human beings.

We had to have a talk in the morning, he had no idea why I was upset with him. I almost kicked him off the boat. It does not matter that he does not logically agree with my extreme reaction, it matters only that he respects me.

This is hard for him

***

 

Yesterday that German girl got back to me. She will not be joining the WildChild crew when we leave today.

So this adventure remains as is…

The Narcissist and the Empath…

alone together on the ocean…

 

I think we are all curious about how this will end huh?

 

Cheers….

 

Wild Captain Lexi

 

hugs love and kindness to all the good people out there…