Finally I get to my feet. I find a cup. The inside of the closet is a mess—all the unbreakable dishes have been tossed around and deep inside it is damp; water must have leaked inside here too. The closet is situated where the deck meets the hull—it can’t be fully watertight there either.

I step on the foot pump for fresh water, and muddy water drips into the cup. The water has a faint odor of diesel, like almost everything on board, but I am used to it and drink quickly.

I open the door to the stowage space for dry goods and find a mess in there as well. The lid has fallen off the can of flour. Everything is white and damp; bags of powdered soup, canned goods, and packages of pasta are covered with sticky flour. I dig out a package of spaghetti and tear off the plastic, can’t bear to wait for the water to boil, can’t bear to look for a pot, but chew some of the hard strands right out of the package, along with a piece of crisp bread that has become soft from the moisture.

I eat half the pack, find a chocolate bar too. Palm oil, I know it contains palm oil, but bought it anyway, can’t manage without it out here. And nobody can see me, I think quickly, but catch myself doing it. Signe, c’mon now, there are limits.

I open the hatch, not knowing what to expect—chaos, the rigging destroyed, the dinghy blown overboard? But everything is as it should be, the rigging, cordage, everything is hanging in its place, as secure as before. The boat has weathered this, held its own, without my doing a thing, and I know that long-keel sailboats like this one can withstand a lot, can be knocked down and get back up again. They aren’t like modern boats with deep-fin keels, which can lose the keel, be tossed about and capsized. Blue was designed for this, for recovering in a storm.