There is no pain, you are receding....

...a distant ship's smoke on the horizon.

Tonight we sailed under the Great Belt bridge, cutting through Denmark on our way back to Sweden. I had never heard of it before, and probably wouldn't have paid any attention except that the captain made such a point of mentioning it in his daily update.

And after having been confined to my cabin for two days, any excuse to leave it seemed like a good idea, so at ten pm I grabbed my camera and took the elevator up to the top deck.

There were already fifty or sixty people up there -- the best positions at the front railing were already taken -- and more arriving every minute, in formal dress from dinner, carrying cocktails. It was all very giddy and giggly, like a party where the guest of honor was running late. The sun had set and the evening was foggy, and there was no bridge to be seen but that didn't stop everyone from taking pictures of the nothing that was not there and the nothing that was, as my pal Wallace Stevens used to say.

At first the bridge seemed like a trick of my eyes: it was there and then it wasn't and then it was, a thin slice of fog growing darker and more substantial. As we approached we could see the cars and trucks flashing their lights in greeting. The top of the ship seemed to clear it by mere inches.