Prologue
Life, like the sea, rarely follows straight lines.
It has swells and calms, storms, moments that lift you and moments that pull you under.
This book is not a narrative.
It is a logbook.
Fifty-two words, fifty-two stops. As many as the weeks of a year, as many as the years of my life. Each one, an allegory.
A sea within.
Inside these pages you will find different kinds of vessels: caravels, schooners, old sailing ships, fishing boats.
Like us. Some sturdy, some fragile, all built for the journey.
If you ever find yourself in rough waters, or in still ones, open a page. You may find something of your own there.
Fair winds. Safe return.
Beginning
There is no map without a sea, no course without the first push.
A beginning rarely happens at the start. It comes when something inside you finally moves, something that pulls you forward and whispers, let’s go.
You raise the sails not when you are ready, but when you can no longer bear standing still.
The shadows of the pier weigh heavier than the waves.
A beginning smells of old wood and salt. There is a knot in your stomach, and your gaze rests on the horizon.
And if you ask when the right moment is…
It is now.
It is always now.
Lighthouse
I am not drawn to the lighthouse for its light.
I am drawn to its insistence on burning.
Every night, every storm, every long stretch of solitude, the same light.
Steady. Silent. Tireless.
Like those people who never leave.
They do not chase you. They do not demand.
They simply remain.
A lighthouse does not save ships.
It reminds them they are not alone.
That is the difference. Not rescue, but presence.
And every time night falls inside me, I search for that small, steady glow at the edge.
To know that, no matter how far the current carries me, someone is still there, waiting for me to appear.
Storm
A storm gives no warning.
It arrives suddenly, like the things you never said.
It is the collision between I can’t take it anymore and I will go on.
It has always held me.
Lightning above, tremors below.
And between them, me.
No chains. No steady deck.
You endure a storm when you hear it, when you feel it, when you stop trying to hide it and finally face it.
I never avoided it.
I called it.
I danced with it.
And each time I came out a little freer, a little wiser.
Wind
I never saw it.
Yet I always felt it.
In the sails, in my bones, in the yeses I never spoke and the nos I was afraid of.
The wind is change.
And whoever cannot bear change ties their vessel to the same harbor forever, until it rots.
It is not always favorable.
Sometimes it guides you.
Sometimes it tests you.
Those who dared to surrender to it discovered new currents within themselves.