In the Panama Canal Tuesday November 26, 2019

90º here in the Panama Canal about 10:45 am EST Tuesday.  Passed through the two locks on the Atlantic end about 10:05 am. 

Gates in canal next to us

Eating breakfast - other canal out window

Gates closing

View from outside our room

Earlier this morning we were on bow deck

Earlier this morning we were on bow deck

As we came to first lock

Phyllis using her cameera

 We were going out on the bow deck early and it was raining hard.  So, we, and many others, headed back to the elevators to go to the Crows Nest inside on deck nine forward.

Looking out of the "Crows Nest"

Some notes on fellow travelers.  Phyllis strikes up a conversation whenever possible.  I listen.  One lady we ate breakfast with one morning said she had a week's notice for this trip.  She is on a list with her travel agent to fill in on last-minute bargains.  She said she got on at about one-half price, but did have to fly from Canada north of Seattle to Fort Lauderdale.  Another couple we ate breakfast with yesterday morning are full time RV'ers, but spend their winters in the Rio Grande Valley closer to McAllen.  Another couple recounted how they bought a sail boat some 15 years ago and set out on the Pacific Ocean.  Spent some 13 days to some island and then some 45 days around the islands before spending 23 days back to California.  They had never been on a sailboat before, but said they had no problems.  They don't sail anymore as they sold the boat.  Met people from Washington State, California, Louisiana, Florida, Britain.  Lots of Britain's it seems.  Our table mate Cheryl has some funny eating habits.  She usually does not eat what is on the bottom of any food, meticulously scraping off fish scales, little over-cooked rice; sorting out anything she didn't recognize.  Last night she took all the bread out of the French Onion Soup---and then commented there wasn't much left.  She always asks for plenty of lemon slices and sweetener, then squeezes the lemons, cuts several envelopes of the sweetener into her glass.  She won't drink just plain water.  One couple mentioned they came on this "shorter" cruise (16 day) as they were seeing how he got along after recent heart problems.  They were in their 90's and had gone on many 50 day cruises and several 60 day cruises.  Supposedly, you get discounts on future cruises if you book while aboard now; and, with "Black Friday" shopping the day after Thanksgiving you can get terrific deals!   I have looked at literature where 30 days are spent repositioning a ship from California to Australia with many stops in between -- then another 33 days stopping all around Australia and New Zealand.   Have no idea what it costs, but would be quite a trip.

Here is something I read:

On the Day I Die by John Pavlovitz

On the day I die a lot will happen.

A lot will change.

The world will be busy.

On the day I die, all the important appointments I made will be left unattended.

The many plans I had yet to complete will remain forever undone.

The calendar that ruled so many of my days will now be irrelevant to me.

All the material things I so chased and guarded and treasured will be left in the hands of others to care for or to discard.

The words of my critics which so burdened me will cease to sting or capture anymore. They will be unable to touch me.

The arguments I believed I’d won here will not serve me or bring me any satisfaction or solace.   

All my noisy incoming notifications and texts and calls will go unanswered. Their great urgency will be quieted.

My many nagging regrets will all be resigned to the past, where they should have always been anyway.

Every superficial worry about my body that I ever labored over; about my waistline or hairline or frown lines, will fade away.

My carefully crafted image, the one I worked so hard to shape for others here, will be left to them to complete anyway.

The sterling reputation I once struggled so greatly to maintain will be of little concern for me anymore.

All the small and large anxieties that stole sleep from me each night will be rendered powerless.

The deep and towering mysteries about life and death that so consumed my mind will finally be clarified in a way that they could never be before while I lived.

These things will certainly all be true on the day that I die.

Yet for as much as will happen on that day, one more thing that will happen.

On the day I die, the few people who really know and truly love me will grieve deeply.

They will feel a void.

They will feel cheated.

They will not feel ready.

They will feel as though a part of them has died as well.

And on that day, more than anything in the world they will want more time with me.

I know this from those I love and grieve over.

And so knowing this, while I am still alive I’ll try to remember that my time with them is finite and fleeting and so very precious—and I’ll do my best not to waste a second of it.

I’ll try not to squander a priceless moment worrying about all the other things that will happen on the day I die, because many of those things are either not my concern or beyond my control.

Friends, those other things have an insidious way of keeping you from living even as you live; vying for your attention, competing for your affections.

They rob you of the joy of this unrepeatable, uncontrollable, ever-evaporating 

Now with those who love you and want only to share it with you.

Don’t miss the chance to dance with them while you can.

It’s easy to waste so much daylight in the days before you die.

Don’t let your life be stolen every day, by all that you’ve been led to believe matters, because on the day you die—the fact is that much of it simply won’t.

Yes, you and I will die one day.

But before that day comes: let us live.