I've been more positive in general over the past few months. It's a work thing and I think it's carried over into my personal life, which is entirely positive. This is very welcome, as there have been challenges, as there always are, but having a more full tank of fucks to give, emotionally, has certainly helped.
I attribute it to Situational Distress, or more accurately, getting out of situational distress.
I wrote about this some time back. Situational distress is the 'silent accumulation of operational stressors that lead to situational distress: cognitive fatigue, emotional strain, and performance degradation in the moment. These human factors are subtle, dynamic, and often invisible to traditional mental health tools, yet they’re the most common precursors to errors and accidents at sea'
Basically being in the shit, with hopelessness and no sign of an end to it.
That's how bad it was from last September until March. Coming back from Brazil after burying my mother-in-law and realizing on the day of her funeral that we'd been fucked out of well over $100,000 bucks by the builder of our dream home in Brazil, the culmination of almost a decade of planning, overtime, etc, that spending 9-10 months a year at work, and my wife working 80-90 hours a week for 7 of those years... for nothing. You know I haven't taken more than 3 days off for actual vacation since 2010. 15 years, when I went on a road trip for fun with my family.
So I mean thst sucked, but I was dealing with it. The problem...the REAL problem, was that work suddenly became awful right as my emotional resiliance redlined. Constant maintenance problems leading to terrible living conditions aboard, nonstop work with no rest and the only reward for difficult jobs being carried out correctly was that peers who were fuckups started getting rewarded for being bad sailors by being given easier jobs...just no TIME for self-care, and seemingly no shoreside support as all this was going on, just a lot of sympathy, but no change, as they attempted to manage chaos. Things seem to ve better for them too. Some new blood, some new efforts and Indunno, support for them too, maybe. Over my pay grade. I knew they weren't neglecting us, just things were tough for a time.
And then, the HQ went to shipyard... and I got some good assignments with free time, leaving me with a chance to calm down, to sleep, to work on things beyond work while at work (which is a necessary part of shipboard life lived on a career-long timeline). Being given time in the shipyard with the HQ, where I arrived just... better... I was more productive than ever. The current HQ, outside and in, hasn't looked this good and run this well since... well, since at least the first time I stepped foot on it about 15 years ago when I filled in for a week on here.
That's the shitshow that is Situational Distress. You know things are bad and hope it'll get better, but the hope has to take a backseat to practical things like just getting the fucking day over with.
I think blogbuddy BCE is having his crisis at that point right now. Signs are positive that he's coming out of that hole.
So, yeah. All that popped in my head this morning when I stopped and took a second to admire the skyline here in an otherwise butt-fucking ugly port.
It's been a long while since I looked at God's handiwork and was glad in it... which used to be one of my favorite parts of being a sailor.
I'm glad I noticed today.
So, today... today I've got a modest load of heavy fuel oil and a splash of marine diesel to pic up for a Japanese car carrier. We're moderately busy here on the HQ. I'll work 4-5 days, then get a day or part of a day off to use as I see fit, for maintenance and sometimes just reading a book or actually sitting down to eat.
Better. Much better.
Things are going better in Brazil too. More on that at some point.
Anyhow, time to sail. Tide's almost slack and our tugboat just cranked her engines to warm up.
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