Assumptions

I wish that this message would ease your mind, but it will not. I wish to understand you, so I come to you directly. You once said to me, “If you want information about someone, search for their name on the internet. If you want to know someone, ask them yourself”.

You make assumptions and draw conclusions about me because you have not asked me directly. I have also made assumptions about you. This is natural when two people have not had contact or communicated freely and met together as adults and friends to discuss and come to understandings and meeting of the minds. I would like to have contact with you because I wish to stop making assumptions about you, because I think this is harmful. I would genuinely like to understand who you are. This will help me with my decisions.

Consider the assumptions I could make about you (and, at various times, have made about you):

1) You are, and always have been the man I knew and love. You are the man I continue to love. You are compelled to say and do things you do not believe in order to protect yourself and protect me. When we interact, you cannot say what you think or feel, and you feel sad that your actions and words are so hurtful, and you have compassion for the pain you cause. If this is true, then I am obliged (indeed, I would very much wish) to aid and protect you.

2) You were the man I knew and love. You are also a coward. You lacked the character to stand up to social pressure and you preferred comfort over truth. Your previous decisions are uncomfortable because they were made in a time when you were morally brave, and you sense your own weakness now. You are ashamed of yourself. Your cruel behavior towards me is a reflection of this discomfort. If this is true, then such a man does not deserve protection. Indeed, he deserves to receive the things he fears most. I would not desire to be with this man, and I would ensure that he paid for his cowardice and cruelty. To the anger and fear you have expressed to me, I say: I have never harassed your work or private life. You would certainly know if I had.

3) You are not the man I knew and love. You destroyed that man. If you are the person responsible for the destruction of someone I loved so dearly, then I would very much wish to harm you. When we spoke in December, I had come to believe this about you, and this is what I felt when I told you that I "didn't want anything" from you. I was prepared (on the following day) to travel to the courthouse and put your name on the criminal complaint alongside Mac. You felt that our conversation did not benefit you at all. You were mistaken. After our conversation, I had doubts, so I did not act against you.

At first, I believed that one of these assumptions was the “truth”. I believed that, if I had an unambigious answer to a simple question on facebook, I would know which scenario was correct. But I have come to realize that these were only assumptions and that some fourth possibility may exist that I have not considered. This thought has haunted me for the past few weeks and is the reason I've sought additional contact. I have so little real knowledge of the man you are now. I would like to know and understand that man. I would like to stop making assumptions.

You ask me what I want. Not to put too fine a point on it: I want a reason not to seek retribution. I ask you, “does the man I knew still exist?” because this answer will bring me peace, one way or the other.

You accuse me of harming you, or desiring to harm you. I have not. Before you draw conclusions about my motivations, consider the variety of ways in which I could have acted. If you make assumptions about me, then consider what I might have done and allow my restraint to factor into your image of me. Perhaps you still see me as the broken person you created. I am not broken. I am not happy (as you say you are) but I am extremely strong and driven and capable. My continued feeling of love and loyalty for the man I knew is not a weakness: it has stayed my hand when I might have unleashed hell.

I understand your reluctance to have a genuine interaction with me. I don’t blame you for this. Continued interaction with me is not good for you in any of the scenarios I outline above. But this exchange is to determine whether another, alternate, scenario exists. I doubt that this message will make you feel comfortable and eager to engage. But I do feel that it’s right to let you know where I stand and what I want, because I would like a real exchange. No more assumptions.

Would you be willing to enter into a dialogue with me? I can’t guarantee the timeframe for the exchange, nor the outcome. But I come to the table with an open mind and heart. I am willing to learn about you and to know more about you. Would you like to set aside your own assumptions and learn more and know more about me?

The first days of the West Africa Maritime Exercise

I feel most comfortable, most myself, when I am in the middle of a multinational exercise or operation or conference. I look around at these people and I know them - by faces and uniforms. Senegal, the UK, Spain, Portugual, The Gambia, Cape Verde, The Netherlands, Mauritania, Morocco. I know so many and they know me by sight. They know what I do. Some of them like me. Those who do not necessarily like me at least respect my work.

I walked around at the Pre-Sail brief and it was like coming home. There are people whom I am genuinely pleased to see. It feels like a family reunion of sorts. Also, I like Dakar. It is a beautiful place. And I get to see my baobabs.

I gave a preseentation on the assessments plan for the exercise. I pray that people actually give me usable data. God, I need them to! I have some compulsion to make sure that I understand EVERYTHING: how all the pieces fit together and why. When I’m missing information, I
feel so frustrated.

I met with the British Defense Attache to Senegal, The Gambia, Mauritania and Morocco. He invited me out to dinner last night with the leadership from the British Destroyer which is conducting a West Africa training cruise. We went to a place down by the water, a holdover from the French colonialist days:"Le Lagoon". It is run by a Frenchman and his son. I like going there when I come to Senegal. They have really nice fish and this Senegalese dish called, "Yassa Poisson". And I get to sit in the sun and look at the water.

There is something really nice about having someone to distract you from internal bad thoughts. At least, this is what I’ve discovered. I feel such a relief in chatting with several people who have interesting lives and stories to tell. Such was the dinner last night. The Commanding Officer (CO) of the ship is an unassuming man. He speaks fluent Dutch – so I was able to practice. He told a story about an unfortunate Pictionary game in the home of a Senior Dutch officer and 20 other folks wherein his mis-interpretation of the Dutch word for “road sign” led him to draw the picture of a man and woman completing the coital act with the man ejaculating over the woman. Tell you what: Dutch sailors have taught me some pretty naughty words, but not that one! The executive officer (XO) was a really great Scotsman who’s told me to visit the peninsula and island just north of the Isle of Skye when I visit Scotland next.

As I came through the Paris airport on Wednesday, I picked up a bottle of Scotch for sharing. This can be a good way to make friends and I certainly made use of it. We drank until late. I finally staggered up to bed at 1:30, stopping by my friend Jim’s room. Jim was working on the servers for the exercise all hours of the night and I figured he needed the rest of the Scotch.

When I socialize with international folks as part of my job, I always have the intention of making best use of everyone’s efforts with better coordination and analysis and figuring out creative ways to engage. In the last year, however, I find that my primary reason for interaction tends to be personal, rather than programmatic. I reach out to people with my whole self, trying to take them in and to understand them; Trying to be in the moment. It has been a eighteen months since the dark time in Cape Verde and Cameroon . Since I lost Sjors, I often feel the lack of the future in my life. But surviving the blackness that has accompanied this loss makes me cognizant that I do have the present. I have THIS moment. Maybe this has led to some bad decisions, but I sort-of feel that, short of acquiring some nasty disease, it doesn’t matter too awfully much. Maybe all that really matters is that I connect with one other person right now.

When I was in Gabon in December, I met a guy named Brendon. He does work on the Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) systems in the African Naval bases. He’s about 26 years old and a real sweetie (not interested in THAT way. He’s also engaged). In Port Gentil last December, Eve and I had a really nice time with him – and he reminded me that I had scolded him for not bringing his running shoes because I needed a running buddy. Apparently, he had brought his running shoes specifically to Senegal because he saw my name on the registration list for the exercise. We both got up at 0630 this morning and went for a nice run along the ocean front. It was dark outside when we began, but the sun rose over the water and it was so beautiful when we arrived back at the hotel.

I spent the morning in the Senegalese Operation’s Center. In the afternoon, the CO invited me to tour his ship. I really loved it. It's an operational vessel, designed for battle, and most of the sailors have been in battle. I find operational men to be very interesting. There is an underlying sense of reality and gravity because they have made decisions which caused one person to die and another person to live. But they are often not “serious” people. They joke and are interesting and fun, but they have lost the shallow-ness of our consumer society. By protecting our way of life, they excuse themselves from it.

It is neat to be on a British Warship. This is the natural descendant of Nelson and Hornblower. The technology may have changed, but many of the traditions are so very recognizable from reading those books from childhood. There is a “toast” every day. Sunday: To Absent friends, Monday: To our men, Tuesday: To our Ships, Wednesday: To a willing foe and sea space, Thursday: To bloody battles and a sickly season, Friday: Fair winds and following seas, Saturday: To wives and sweethearts – may they never meet.

We had gin and tonic in the Captain’s cabin, and then the CO gave me his driver and car to take me to the airport: the flight from Dakar to Praia. It was a two-engine propeller plane which was playing jazzy Christmas tunes as we boarded. The African flights always spray a cloud of bug spray through the cabin before takeoff (which is, I’m sure, bad for the health). All these things conspired to make the world seem completely unreal.