An inevitable part of life is having to deal with struggles. Rare is there a day when a struggle does not occur in one’s life. The only thing we can do about life’s toils is to overcome and use them to make us stronger. Santiago, the old man from The Old Man and the Sea, deals with a lot of conflict and struggle on this particular fishing trip including being lonely, the fight with an enormous fish, his age, sharks that constantly attack, lack of sleep and dehydration, and further unpredictable events that occur. But as we all should, Santiago remains optimistic to some extent, and he overcomes them, using mental and physical strength.
The first and foremost struggle that Santiago deals with is the enormous, over-sized marlin that he is fighting to catch. He has been holding onto the fish with his line for about three days now, and as he finally tries to reel him in, he catches a glimpse of the beast he is attempting to capture. The marlin is incredibly aggresive and on estimate about two feet longer than Santiago’s skiff. “The line rose slowly and steadily and then the surface of the ocean bulged ahead of the boat and the fish came out. He came out unendingly and water poured from his sides… his sword was as long as a baseball bat and tapered like a rapier and he rose full length from the water… 'He is two feet longer than the skiff'” (62). This is what Santiago was up against. He had a mere skiff in which he been living on for about three days and a very thin line which he was using to hold onto this marlin. It is impossible to imagine oneself in the position of Santiago and its obvious the amount of strength it must have taken to overcome this struggle because in the end we read that he does catch the fish. The author's words are exaggerative but entirely solemn in his description. There are an immense number of other things that the old man has to deal with as well.
A disadvantage that Santiago has, that seems to become a struggle, is his old age. Santiago is probably about eighty years old and although his physique is like that of a fifty or sixty year old, his age still limits his strength and ability. He knows his weakness and talks aloud about it as he is catching the fish. “But perhaps he has been hooked many times before and he knows that this is how he should make his fight. He cannot know that it is only one man against him, nor that it is an old man” (49). As people get older, their bodies are less able to do things that they could when they were younger; the body is constantly changing, espcially as a person gets older. Santiago’s age truly makes him vulnerable at the game of fishing, especially when it involves such big fish. His age affects his body and throughout the trip his hands become very tense and cramped. His back is incredibly hunched over from holding the line over his back as well. Santiago’s age makes him wise about fishing, but it is still something he has to fight against in order to get what he wants.
When Santiago finally catches the incredible marlin, the next crisis that he comes across is sharks. Because the marlin is larger than the boat, he must be tied to the side and the blood spreads through the water to the point where sharks are coming to eat the fish right off the side of Santiago’s skiff. “I am too old to club sharks to death” (112). To defend his marlin, Santiago is cautious but uses his weapons and his strength to defeat a many sharks that come from afar to feed on his marlin. Santiago, at this point, is already immensely sleep-deprived, hungry, dehydrated, and weak. But he’s spent so much of his time and effort to catch this marlin to bring back to this village that he won’t give up just yet. He fights the sharks using his gaff, a club, and other things on his boat as weapons. The sharks were just one of the many things he overcame but it seems like this would be the hardest, along with the actual catching of the fish. Sharks are known for being vicious, greedy, blood-thirsty creatures and Santiago does everything to prevent them from taking his prize.
Imagine fishing for a thousand-pound marlin for days straight, having to battle your own weakness, and then physically fighting healthy sharks afterwards. Santiago’s fishing trip was exhausting, to say the least. The events of this story make us feel sympathetic towards Santiago because of the anxious and suspenseful occurences that Santiago experiences. He had so many struggles to overcome that it almost seems impossible that he did. Not many people have such intense hardships in their lives, but everyone has had their share of struggles to overcome. Just like Santiago though, when difficulties occur in life, one should approach them with an open, determined mind to face them strongly and defeat them.
