Importance of water

Throughout the narrative, and in various forms, water represents possibility and opportunity. In the book's prologue, a reference to "sea time" refers quite directly to the openness of the sea as a metaphor for freely experiencing life as it comes. Early in the narrative, a slow-moving creek that occasionally erupts into stormy overflowing represents and foreshadows Perina's movement from a slow-moving rural life into the stormy life of a successful research scientist. Also early in the narrative, a moment on the open ocean provides a metaphoric echo, or context, for Perina's realization that he can openly care for his brother. Interestingly, as Perina's memoir progresses, inclusions of the water image become less frequent, eventually manifesting only in glimpses, and as representing something Perina must cross, or endure, in order to reach the places his ambition is taking him.