When I was at college I was invited to crew a yacht <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I jumped at the opportunity but it was an experience <\/p>\n\n\n\n
That totally changed my life and me as a person <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We had been island hopping for about a week <\/p>\n\n\n\n
When we ran into a terrific storm <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The yacht was overwhelmed and I was the only survivor <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Quite how I survived was and still is a complete mystery <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I found myself washed up on a debris strewn beach <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Without any memories of my ordeal <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I could not even remember my name <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After a short time I decided to call myself Zanussi <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I had discovered the remains of a washing machine <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was an easy name to remember in the chaos of my mind<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The island that I had been washed up on had once been inhabited <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I found buildings drained of their colour <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bleached in the sun <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although not plentiful there were sources of food <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fruit became my staple diet and I sometimes caught a fish <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In time I became used to the island and fancied myself as a Crusoe <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Who would find his Friday and teach him civilised ways <\/p>\n\n\n\n
How wrong I was as after a month I saw a negro unloading a dinghy <\/p>\n\n\n\n
My first instinct was fall into his arms and request rescue <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But something was not right as he was soon joined by another negro <\/p>\n\n\n\n
They seems to be storing packages in a building not far from the beach <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This occurred about every ten days <\/p>\n\n\n\n
They spent about three or four hours on the island and then left <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I always made myself scarce during these visits <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But I became used to them and soon became careless <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As one day when I was having a shit in the sea <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A tall negro who I had never seen before <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Approached me with a rifle <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He told me to return to the beach and lay on my back <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I knew what was going to happen <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was as he was unbuttoning his pants <\/p>\n\n\n\n
That a shot rang out and his head exploded in front of me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
By then I was hysterical <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was screaming with fear <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was then I spotted his assassin in the shallows<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His rifle was pointing at me but nothing happened <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had expected a cruel execution <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the negro in the shallows gestured for me to stand <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I still expected my execution <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He walked towards me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I closed my eyes and expected that at best <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I would be violated in the minutes before my death <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But this did not happen <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The negro just stood and looked at me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I glanced at the bloody face of his accomplice <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In short nothing happened <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The negro who spoke with an educated English accent <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Told me that the man who died was a bad man <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not worthy of the gift of life <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said that not all black men were savages <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He offered me a deal which surprised me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
If I gave him time to empty the building <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then he would ensure that I was not harmed <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He would also tell the authorities that I was on the island <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He asked me to forget what had happened <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The negro then fired a shot into the air <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To alert the others on the island that it was time to leave <\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the next few hours I watched as the sea reclaimed the corpse <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was in a state of shock as people had died around me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The island was beginning to frighten me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And I felt a strange vacancy <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Consuming each of my days <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Within two weeks I had been rescued <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The negro had kept his word <\/p>\n\n\n\n
For a while I was world news <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But it faded and life returned <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was told that my name was Stefanie Sliberwicke <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And that the yacht that I had been crewing<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Had not been lost <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had been washed overboard <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And had by a miracle survived <\/p>\n\n\n\n
God had looked after me <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was offered a book deal but declined <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I had nothing to say <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I began travelling on the road <\/p>\n\n\n\n
With my girlfriend <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I needed to understand reality <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When I was at college I was invited to crew a yacht I jumped at the opportunity but it was an experience That totally changed my life and me as a person We had been island hopping for about a week When we ran into a terrific storm The yacht was overwhelmed and I was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15897"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15897\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15900,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15897\/revisions\/15900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}