Tyler Sharp

Ssese Island Sensitivity

I am aboard a “barge”, (as the word ferry is sometimes, well, too fairy) flotsaming across the great Lake Victoria in Uganda, towards the Ssese Islands.

Having the time to ingest numerous books and films in my African wilderness isolation has brought to my attention how affected I can be by music, literature, and film, and how it can alter my moods and demeanor. It is not always a beneficial or equanimous thing, sometimes proving to bring sadness and suffering. But even those experiences have a place and purpose in teaching the soul. Some of my greatest lessons it seems were learned through heartbreak and tragedy, and my current seeming resolve to avoid it may likewise keep me from learning a few valued lessons. Surely there can be a curved rubric even in the lessons of life.

And being alone, or at least currently without a partner, I gain small moments of love and a feeling of completeness when I look across the booth of our reserved barge seats, and see a young couple from India gently sleeping on each other’s shoulders, the woman delicately fondling her husband’s neatly cropped hair as she herself drifts off. Not the drone of the engine, the crashing of the waves, or the short and abrupt bursts of audio from the mis-wired speakers on the wall above can wake them from their loving slumber. Solitude and sense among so many strangers, and I share this with them as I write, though silently, for eternity. It is in this way that my sensitivities are a blessing, allowing me to share moments with others in seemingly sterile and separated public places, bringing me closer to fellow humans that I will never be able to explain this to, or even know their names.

And so the barge moves on, and as the tides of emotion wax and wane with chance encounters and the celestial cycles, I must try to channel and apply these energies into something beautiful and meaningful, before they drift off and dissipate like wake foam behind our lake faring vessel. The lake knows of none of these things, nor does it care, but small things like that make the human condition both blessed and isolating. But nonetheless, focused and harnessed, it can be a power of creation and connection that is rivaled by few others, and allows me to speak with my heart. Unhindered by the brain and self serving ego, it sometimes can get right to the heart of things, which is the most universal language in the world, signified by a smile, a wave, or even a deep and passionate kiss.

Young Indian couple across from me, may your marriage be blessed. Likewise may mine, should it come to pass, pending the further voyage of this vessel, and the further voyage of my destiny.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 30th, 2009 at 5:43 PM. It is filed under Blog, Short Stories, Travel Tales, Uganda and tagged with Africa, June 2009, Ssese Islands, Uganda. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.