Thinking - Oceanic etiquette

When you boat past some people in a village, or on the beach eating fish and chips, there's a difference in your interaction.

I'm thinking people like you more.

Sometimes birds sit on the edge of a road and eat road kill. They know that even though you're driving past at deadly speed, for some reason, the big fast shiny thing you sit in always stays between the lines and never crosses over. The only time you need to get off the road is when your road kill breakfast is on the same side as the big, fast, shiny thing.

When you boat past a village/drive past a bird feasting on road kill, the reason you are less intrusive, is because you stick to a few simple rules...

 1. You dont get out and stink up the place with your funny language

2. You stay on the river/between the lines, and you try not to kill anyone.

3. if you've given it some thought, you realize how less intrusive you are being by virtue of sticking to rules one and two, so that if someone wants to get their kit off to bathe, all they need to worry about is the river side of the equation. There are no tourists looking at you from the other sides.

The other sides are all family.

That makes life a lot easier. All you have to do is stand behind something, or even simply not wave, and you have privacy.

The result is, stick to the train tracks, the rivers, and driving between the lines until you've been invited to get closer, and you upset a lot less people. As a result, you either get a lot more invitations to get closer, or don't get closer when you were never invited and shouldn't have even thought of getting closer in the first place.

I met some really nice dolphins, and we all ate fish.

I have no idea what they were trying to say, but they seemed happy enough, and looked like life was treating them well.

They took no interest in my ocean dipped feet.





Invest in 120 Things in 20 years for all your oceanic etiquette, and general deportment tips.