I have always been an escapist.

As a child, I sought escape by hiding among the trees, climbing up to the top or concealing myself in the branches at the bottom of the giant pines in the yard. I dreamed of flight, and took my first flying lesson when I was 14. I imagined flying myself to destinations new and unknown, mastering the art of flight, roaming the skies as I pleased. At 18, I got a job as a driver for a local financial services company and spent my days navigating the backroads of Maine, favoring the routes furthest from home when I could get them.

At 22, I left the United States and moved to the island of Curaçao on a misguided and ill-fated adventure, an attempt at escapism that went disastrously wrong. When I came limping back to America, full of lessons learned, I finished my pilot’s license and got into hiking. My life became more pedestrian, more normal, as the demands of work and family life kept me busy.

But my escapism is not dead. It just manifests differently now. One of my favorite methods of escape in my early-middle-age years has been The Cruise.

Cruises are a lot of fun. But before I can talk about that, the stuffy liberal New England killjoy in me feels obligated to remind everyone that cruise ships are giant seaborne ecological catastrophes staffed by people who work 70+ hours a week for nine months at a time, and therefore nobody should enjoy them. On the other hand, just existing in western society is an ecological catastrophe, and the people working on cruise ships are paid employees who signed a contract, not indentured servants forcibly Shanghaied from their homes. Now that the obligatory joy-killing is out of the way, let’s move on.

Going on a cruise is the ultimate vacation modality for an escapist. Consider: when you take a normal vacation, you’re still obligated to do many things. For example, you must plan logistics: where are we staying? How are we getting around? What will we do about food? What is our itinerary? These plans become extra complicated if you’re traveling internationally, where they can be compounded by language and cultural barriers. Bringing kids? Have fun with that. Traveling by air? Good luck. Managing the logistics, itinerary, and execution of a normal trip is an exhausting task.

On a cruise, you are responsible for none of those things. Once you have arrived at the port and boarded the ship, you literally have zero responsibilities. The crew operates and navigates the ship. You need not worry about cooking: there is ample food and plenty of drink. There are dozens of entertainment options available. If you want to just do nothing, you can loaf about in your cabin or sit on a deck chair and stare out into space. At ports of call, you can do the Tourist Thing and go on a cruise-line-sponsored excursion (for a bunch of extra money) or you can find your own adventures or simply wander around whatever port you’re at. Or, you can stay on the ship and make use of the ship’s amenities while the other guests are ashore. There are stores selling tax-free-at-sea luxury items. There is a casino. There are bars everywhere. There are nooks and crannies to hide out. There is a gym and an assortment of activities happening at all times. Everything is available; nothing is obligatory.

Furthermore, on a cruise you have minimal internet access by default. Sure, you can purchase WiFi, but the basic cruise package usually does not involve internet access. Not having a ready internet connection and an assortment of addictive newsfeeds encourages you to do something else with your time. On this cruise, my wife and I played games with our family and read books. I knocked out about 500 pages in Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch on this cruise (more on this book later). My wife finished a whole book. We didn’t look at our phones at all.

Another aspect of cruise escapism is that spending a week or so living on a ship is a break in routine. Unless you’re a sailor, you’ll find pretty much everything on the ship to be different. For one thing you are constantly in motion on all axes. The vessel moves forward, the waves cause pitch and roll, and even in good seas you feel just a hint of motion at all times. In terms of the ship’s environment, the decor on cruise ships is wild, often exceeding the boundaries of good taste. Everywhere you look, you can see the ocean. Your daily scenery will include the ship’s funnel, the lifeboats, the bridge. Every aspect of your existence is different. It is a complete detachment from your everyday life in a way that land-based vacations often are not. You are free to be whoever you want to be on a cruise, because you’re unlikely to ever see your cruisemates again. It is very liberating.

For an escapist at heart, Cruising is a wonderful vacation. You’re free from responsibilities, endlessly entertained, fattened by ample foodstuffs and pacified with alcohol, gambling, and idleness. The real world…the endless bills, the accelerating collapse of the American empire, the boiling rise of fascism, the general omnishambolic cluster-fuck of modern living…all of it is behind you, waiting for your return. But it doesn’t matter while you’re on the ship. You’re in another world. At the end of the cruise, you’ll be rested, refreshed, and energized, ready to face the world.

And man is it a world that needs facing.