This is an excellent question. The seafarer isn't quite like other Anglo-Saxon literature like Beowulf where there is a definite king and a warrior willing to give his life to protect the king. However, the key ideas of loyalty and separation do apply when you think of the sea as the seafarer's lord. The sea is his life--his heart. When on the sea, the seafarer is his happiest, regardless of the cold, the wind, the icy bands, and the harsh weather that cause his body to age prematurely. When he is on land, all he can think of is getting back to the sea. He should be his happiest on land...the comforts of home, the fire, the food, drink, the company of women, but his heart aches for the sea, and he can't wait to get back to it. Part of the separation anxiety he must feel is the realization that his body will give out eventually, and his separation from the sea will be permanent at some point in the future. All that having been said, he is most at home on the water and would just as soon give his life at sea than to spend it comfortably on land mourning his love from afar.
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