By Nate J.

Santiago faced many consequences during his time out at sea. He spent around two to three nights in the water, which can be very dangerous to your health if it rains. In the novella, The old man and the sea, by Ernest Hemmingway, Santiago’s decision was to stay with the Marlin, and his consequences of this action is the old man’s mental health deteriorating, getting a disease or getting sick from the raw fish he is eating, and his physical health deteriorating from his old age. All of these problems are important to his health, and extremely dangerous if he does not sustain his health out as sea.

Santiago had his mental health deteriorating during his time out at sea. Since there was no one on his boat with him while he sailed out, he started to wish that the boy was out there with them. So then, to still have some one to talk to, he started talking to the big fish, or his “brother”. “’How do you feel fish?’ he asked aloud. ‘I feel good and my left hand is better and I have food for a night and day. Pull the boat, fish.’”(74). This is his only communication or sociality that he can have with this marlin. This communication would have been seen as “crazy” to some people, but is as normal as to talking to a dog. This relationship with the fish makes him have an active motive to catch the fish, and lets the old man talk to someone during his time out at sea.

Next to his mental health, it is bad for him to eat raw fish too. If the fish has a disease, or has some problem with it’s body, it is possible for the old man to get sick. “’and what a miserable fish raw. I will never go in a boat again without salt or limes.’”(80). With salt or limes, added to raw fish is called ceviché , and it is like a cooker with out heat. It burns the meat of the fish, and in turn, killing the bacteria on the fish. The fish was also bad tasting with out salt, such as a dolphin. Dolphin is an excellent fish cooked, but to sweet to eat raw.

With his mental health deteriorating, and eating fish raw, his physical health was also deteriorating. When he was holding the wire with the marlin on the other side, he held it all night and then, in the morning when he woke up, he was brought in the morning with a cramp on his left hand. ”’What kind of hand is that,’ he said. ‘Cramp if you want. Make yourself a claw.’”(68). this quote shows that he does now the effects of having a cramp. His cramp was a problem throughout the book, because now, he had to hold the wire with his right hand, risking another cramp on his right. Under all odds, he makes it through the trip without his right hand cramping, and his left hand’s cramp leaving his body.

Santiago faces many consequences to his choice of staying out at sea with the marlin. Santiago’s decision to stay with the marlin is that the old man’s physical health was deteriorating, the possibility of getting sick from the raw fish, and his physical health deteriorating from his age. Facing all of these consequences, Santiago somehow makes it back to his home, but the satisfaction that he had caught an 18 foot marlin. Even thought his marlin was eating all of the marlin, he at least brought some reminisce of the fish to prove to everyone.