Unwittingly

Diligence is the name of the game if you are to work on a ship. Shipping, like all transportation, relies on punctuality and hard work so I arrive at the dockyard early. I just got here, but I'm already wet with the constant drizzle that hangs in the air. There is no way to keep dry against the tiny droplets, which I seemed to simply walk into rather than be rained on by. My umbrella, useless, dangles limply from my wrist. The the sky has begun to lighten, but you would hardly know it through the mist. I nod to the harbormaster and he nods back who seems surprised to see me here, though evidently not surprised enough to come out of the dry booth that oversees the waterfront and serves as his office. He flips through his charts and schedules and then looks up at me, surprise changed to amusement and grins grotesquely. My attempt at a smile back looks more like an awkward grimace than grin.
The dock is empty. I look at my watch. I'm early, but the ship must be cutting it close. Pacing up and down the wooden planks, I count my steps and watch my breath come out in small clouds that are quickly swallowed into the fog that envelops the dockyards. Then I hear something coming over the water and I peer into the haze. The sound of... laughter? I am listening so intently that the blast of a foghorn makes me jump. The water swells around the pier announcing a ship's arrival. And then, as I begin to make out the dark shape of the ship in the fog, I hear it again. Laughter. Or is it weeping? Hard to tell, but the sound of human voices is undeniable. I turn back to the harbormaster's shack. He has been watching me, as if waiting for this moment, and seeing my confusion he bursts into laughter behind his window. He points behind me, as if to reveal the joke, and when I turn I see that the ship has come into into view. The hull is crawling with odd figures: some hang from the mast, others from the rigging, some are leaping around the deck of the ship, skipping, and jumping. I see people rolling around, tussling with each other. I see one figure that is holding his sides with laughter, while another is weeping and holding the sides of his head, as if something were trying to dig its way out of his skull. Someone throws down the mooring lines and I catch them instinctually. But I can't bring myself to secure them to the dock. I am too transfixed and horrified by the name plaque on the front side of the ship. Somehow, I have been hired to sail the "Ship of Fools."