Landsider

What else but the quest for knowledge would tempt a sane person away from a comfortable home? What else would persuade a landsider to take to the ocean, except the chance of getting to meet more strangers in a shorter time?

He wanted to stop at Petra's bunk and tell her about his home, about what his birthdays were usually like, just tell her it was his birthday so she'd say something about it being a happy one. But nobody told birthdays. It was childish. It was what landsiders did.

We'll be going out with the tide, with an extra five knot of current running where the river is usually slowest. I just thought you might be in a hurry to move at this end, what with the way your friends are keeping out of sight down with the codfish smell. The way I hear tell, you landsider don't favor fish odor too much.

Not a man I'd trust alone with her, you understand. Not a man I trust entirely on anything—too involved with the landsiders, the traders, the political people.

It is easy for the landsider to forget that seafarers came in many disguises. We tend to think of officers and ratings — deck sailors. We might, if pricked, think about the engine room crew — who with the onset of oil, then diesel, just kept on shrinking per ship.