IMAGINE A SAILING BOAT

The light this morning was exactly the kind of light you get on a holiday morning. Coffee and croissants on a balcony or a patio, maybe an orange juice and a go at the crossword - then someone says it's perfect weather for the beach.

Bright blue sky, short, crisp shadows, still air and gently waving trees. It's lovely out there, in a way that would only be made lovelier if the sea was just beyond the houses opposite; a deep green expanse of glistening magic stretching to the cloudless horizon.

I miss the sea. I can't even remember the last time I saw it. Certainly, I'm unlikely to see it until October now, which feels like such a long time to wait.

Meanwhile, work goes on. Broken links and cross-references that don't update; release dates that get shifted and moved; typos I hadn't seen when I sent a thing out for review that are now chipping away at my confidence; future products that morph from scary, to dreary, and then back again. It's a mess of things, work at the moment, made tougher by being at home for 36 (so-far) work days. The great irony of the system is that we do it all for the leisure of someone else who redistributes small chunks of that leisure back to us, with the sole purpose of making us more efficient at creating comfort for them. What a loop. What a capitalist loop.

If I could, I think I'd get a sailing boat and hire a skipper. Imagine - round the bay with the cap'n who tuts at the weather and the fact that I can't tie a sheep-shank. It wouldn't be just me though - I'd take people with me. There'd be puffins to see, and manx shearwaters. Oh, and grey seals lying on the rocks, the sunlight shimmering from their fur. The little boat would bounce softly on the green waves as the water slops against the hull. Seagulls overhead would swoop and cry, just in case there might be food for the taking. And there we'd be, in shorts and sunglasses, drawing and photographing, and chatting on deck, under a full sun, with a cooler stacked with cold drinks and snacks.

Then, as the afternoon turns to evening, we'd pull back to the marina. Skip would mutter something about having to sort out ropes, or fold sails, so we'd muck in and do that, before heading for a meal and drinks outside the Blue Anchor. We'd watch the sun go down and raise our white wine glasses to the sunset. With the happiest kind of hearts we'd stroll along the beach, and sit in the warm sandy dunes as twilight falls and the quiet waves lap the shore.

It's a nice thought. Far away, almost unthinkably far, but also nice to dream. I've often wondered whether imagining it and writing it are decent and uplifting ways to escape the humdrum, even if they're quite fantastical - or whether they make you feel worse when you crash land back to your own reality. 

Anyway, back to the typos I suppose. The light is still beautifully hopeful and summery out there. And there is an ocean at the end of all of this, I'm sure. But the best things come to those who wait.