This visual tour of our nearly complete home renovation is my first step back into blogging. Since my last post I’ve worked too hard and played not enough – with words, boats, and people. I’m ready to Spring Forward and meddle with matters connected with boats and water.
Take a visual tour at:
http://www.smilebox.com/playBlog/4e4459794e444d334e7a4d3d0d0a&blogview=true
Who’s That Sailing On a Tin Can? Photo by NASA
There are still 26 days until the Solstice but yesterday we jumped the season, cast off the dock lines, and sailed Ex Libris into summer. We would never have left the dock without the help of our dock mates who have far more mechanical skills, tools, and how to fix anything experience, than we’ll ever know. It’s not that we’re dumb, as one pal explained to our daughter, it’s just that we know that by admitting what we don’t know (about fixing boats) – friends who know what to do are happy to help – and ready to set sail as soon as it’s fixed.
I like to think of myself as a confident, competent captain. I can navigate, steer, trim sails, scrub decks, sand and stain teak, and cook. Big whoop. Can I rewire the radio and troubleshoot a dead battery? Nope. Fix the hot water heater? Nada. Change the oil – yeah, maybe – if someone would show me how – but there’s no rush here. Does that keep me dock bound? No. I’ve got friends with skills, I’ve got boats, and I can sail.
I don’t look like Anne Bonny in my dreams. Not much. Photo via Wikipedia
I fantasize being a brave, challenging woman of the sea like the pirate, Anne Bonney – a fierce hell-cat of a sailor. Legend has it she drank like a man and pissed like a woman – perhaps a tribute to her tumultuous romance with Captain Jack. BTW –her last words to him when he went to the gallows, were “if you’d fought like a man you’d need not be hanged like a dog.” Johnny Depp wept.
When I wanted to become a sailor – I began with a little boats on small ponds and learned by doing. My learning curve included regular and unexpected capsizing. Two-foot-itis keep me trading up until now – with a big boat on a big river. We have friends who have sailed out of the river and into the bigger waters beyond. Other women more honorable than pirates dream of sailing to the stars. One of them, Sally Ride, was born the same year as me. Dr. Ride worked her butt off and despite the “no balls no sit in the rocket” attitude of the time, she became the first woman NASA allowed to sail off-planet. She retired her astronaut status the 80’s and rode out her time as a physicist inspiring girls to dream like Einstein and create the future through science.
Einstein said we are all related to and by time. Anne’s been gone for over 200 years – Sally just three. Whether dreaming of being free at sea or sailing on a comet’s tail – young girls and their grannies are bound through time with child bearing pirates and lady astronauts. Time on boats is well spent and often best savored in the company of good friends – especially the ones with skills.
Being a STEM Geek is something young girls can do. Dream big. RIP Sally Ride – that lady had skills. Photo by NASA.
Chicken-not-of-the sea swallowing the anchor. Ex Libris @ Sioux Harbor
S/v Sandpiper w/ Ralph & Connie Pickering Alton Pool
All too often, the picture-perfect sail on a pristine afternoon in the company of good friends lacks the pizazz of a good story worth telling twice. Daylight fades, sails are furled, and the anchor is set. The rum ration gets split. Tall tales are birthed as fair winds die and distilled spirits pillage common sense. Contentment yields to bravado. Sailors craft and swap exaggerated accounts of harrowing efforts to tame tempestuous winds rather than dwell on the boredom endured as they trimmed flaccid sails.
Close calls make for good stories. When a snake swims astride the stern and … well, what kind of story follows here? A description of the captain donning her life jacket and abandoning ship when the anaconda-like reptile attempted to board? Or, a recount of the exhausted serpent drifting away in the flood current? There’s a time for a yarn, but there are also settings where yarn is just a mess of knots. That’s when the elements of story must be simple and the story not the storyteller matters.
Insurers frown upon drama. For instance, when filling out an insurance claim after a lightening strike fried all of a boat’s electronics, only the facts should count. The damage is done and financial compensation is due if and only if the facts recounted match the protection described in the policy. Otherwise, if the story teller is viewed as more important than the story – the readers makes assumptions not found on any page (expect Mark Twain’s folksy humor vs. Stephen King’s blend of macabre). So then, when a boat insurer checks a claim (i.e., story) against the numerous clauses in the protection plan that unclearly state, “it’s a forgone conclusion that this claim will be denied because there’s not a word of truth here – sailors tell fibs about everything that happens when anchors are weighed*.”
Anchored in St. Thomas, VI – our’s for a day’s charter. JAL
Anchors play a big role on boats – they connect what’s afloat to solid land beneath moving water. An anchor holds a boat to where the captain wants to be – safe and secure. Boat captains are expected to act like anchors – to be stable and strong enough to hold a crew’s confidence. Boating is more fun when there is a person aboard who can be unconditionally relied on as unshakable, competent, and trustworthy. When captains serve as anchors we believe their spoken words are true. That is how order is kept at sea – in hell or high water. We trust captains who speak truthfully. Honesty instills respect and raises hope that neither tide nor current will put us in harm’s way. We can rely on an anchor that does its job without fanfare.
When an anchor fails its duty – consequences run afoul. If an anchor is truly fouled, caught on a log or sunken obstruction, the only course of action is to cut the line and let the boat sail free. It’s an expensive loss. Or as Shakespeare put it, “I shall no more to sea, to sea/ Here I shall die ashore”** -the anchor is swallowed – the captain is returned to the land and sails no more.
I’d be watching the Nightly News instead of writing this blog right now if Brian had acted as an anchor instead of as a sailor lost in the charm of an imaginative tall tale. His last words on the air should have been, “life’s a beach.”
Rested and ready – anchors aweigh! JAL
*anchors aweigh means to haul up the anchor and get moving
** The Tempest
Winter on the Narrow River Middlebridge, RI JAL
Janus was the Roman God of beginnings and transitions. During the inaugural month of each year the northern hemisphere leans back, wobbles on its axis in a sodden stupor, and shields itself from lengthily doses of direct sunlight. The New Year is stuck in irons. We’re aboard a year that’s stalled. Our rudder, that thing we use to steer and maneuver about life, is temporarily unresponsive. These are the burned out days of winter when it sometimes seems that we can’t get to where we want to be.
Patience. Middlebridge JAL
There was a sailing ship January found trapped with its bow facing the wind, its crew going nowhere. Ah, northern winters – the season of elongated murky nights that beget lackluster days and weeks spent tenderly nursing spirits stuck in the doldrums of lethargy. Exhausted by holiday festivities, January begins the year rather solemnly as if the long, bleak cloud covered days are mourning for days gone past. Some find that their lives seem to stall between the crests of enormous waves. Sailors of northern waters shrug off such feelings of discontentment as the essence of winter. Sailors don’t like being in the irons, when the winds roar and the sails get caught in grip of a grand mal seizure. The ruckus rattles the best of nerves.
Sailing St. Thomas Aboard Jolly Mon. JAL
Try not to stay stuck in the irons too long for the damage can get very serious very quickly. The wind is going to blow whichever way it wants whenever it wants – so in order to get unstuck you’ve got to push the sails until they catch the wind. Sometimes you’ll need help (mechanical wind). Be bold and ask for assistance to get back in the groove – that’s why boats have crews. Pay attention to the wind, heed the feel of the rudder, and force the boat away from the wind’s fist. The clean snap sails as the hull bites into the waves is the payoff – you are free to go.
Winter gradually passes and yields to spring. Not everyone notices whether it’s winter or summer. Count them as happy people who are immune to seasonal affective disorders and wise enough to apply sunblock. Take advantage of this month to recover and prepare. So what if winter nights are long? Savor them for dreaming. Imagine during the night and work toward those possibilities by day. January is an open door to the rest of the calendar. The future lying on the other side might hold delightful surprises or great suffering. For some, an open door brings cold drafts and unbidden visitors, a bit like a Hobbit opening up to uninvited guests. Yet to close the portal shuts out the likelihood of partaking in adventures beyond the threshold. Fear what’s beyond the door and you’ll find that being stuck behind the gateway is fearsome. You’ll miss out and be missed. All doors are both exits and entrances – it depends on where you are when one opens. Carpe porta!
Most pathways begin or end at a doorway. Narragansett Beach JAL
Photo courtesy NOAA
Friends in Thunder Bay report that it’s 40ºF below. It’s not a good day to stick one’s tongue on a flagpole. It is worse to be at sea during days like today. Sub-zero temperatures can freeze the balls off a brass monkey! The cold doesn’t hurt the monkey but wrecks havoc on a frigate’s deck and crew who get in the way of random balls. According to maritime lore, tall ships used to carry a hundred or more cannons. The cannon balls took up a lot of space in cramped quarters. Ship shape meant stacking the heavy lead cannonballs like pyramids on brass platforms called monkeys. When temperatures grew very cold, the balls would shrink (“like a frightened turtle”) and the pyramid fell to disarray. The cannonballs tumbled off the brass monkey and rolled willy nilly around the deck. Sailor do not play dodge ball with cannon balls. 
As Mercury falls it is really hard leave the warmth of a cozy bed and move about the day. We are prisoners of science. Heat moves from warm things to cold things. Body heat dissipates as soon as our feet hit the chilly floor. Take away heat and things move slower. Remove heat and things that are fluid go solid. That’s probably why things said in the heat of a moment can leave us cold with a rock-hard resolve not to make the first move towards an apology. Our emotions seize up like old engines on frosty mornings.
USS Glacier (1956) Courtesy rossea.inf
Sailing in frigid weather is nastier than the mammary glands of Holden Caulfield’s witch. Brass monkeys makes me think about the Coast Guard crews patrolling Boston Harbor on this frigid day. Though sheathed in neoprene and thick protective jackets their service is another painful repercussion from a loose canon that rained hellfire on Marathon runners.
Tis the season to chill – but we simply aren’t built to hibernate. Go ahead, spend the evening sitting by a warm hearth with a hot toddy. You might even lose weight by just warming up since adding heat to a cold thing makes its molecules move faster. Program that into your Fitbit!
Sioux Harbor
Box o’ Flotsam. Camden, Maine Photo by JAL
Knot a good way to start the year. Photo by JAL
Americans celebrate New Years Day with a variety of customs. Some young children are perplexed that their parents who ushered in the New Year with frothy toasts and fireworks a scant half dozen hours earlier spend the day tired, cranky and apathetic about the potential for a wonder-filled year. Some observe New Years Day as a time set aside for televised football marathons and quiet reflection. The most common secular tradition in the western world is to begin the year with a resolution – a promise to do better and become a better person. It’s a banner moment for fitness centers, weight loss programs, AA, educational programs, shrinks, and travel sites.
Photo Robert De Jong, Flotsam on a Beach at Terschelling, Wadden Sea. Permission granted for use via Wikimedia Commons.
New Years Day is when many long to eliminate flotsam and jetsam from their lives. These are parts of the shipwrecks we captain, crew or come upon during any given year. Flotsam is floating wreckage – stuff aboard during a crisis that was washed into the sea and goes adrift. It can do great harm to other boats that accidently ram it. Flotsam is often toxic and does serious damage to the water and shore. It’s nasty stuff to encounter.
Jetsam is a form of prayer in action. Sailors shuck it. Beachcombers seek it. Jetsam consists of parts of a ship or its cargo that we purposely throw overboard (regardless of its monetary or sentimental value) in a last ditch attempt to lighten the load and Save Our Ship. Eventually it’s washed ashore and depending on what it is becomes either a hazard or a treasure.
Courtesy RMS Titanic
Jetsam and flotsam are surface things. Not everything flung overboard floats. Some of the lost goods and boat parts sink to the bottom. Among the wreckage is Lagan. These are things once lost that can be recovered and saved. A certain degree of foresight and knowing where you are during the crisis are key to savaging parts of the wreck. Whether it’s marked by a GPS positioning from a May Day distress call or by a buoy what’s important is that Lagan can come up from the deep to the surface and be reclaimed. Lagan keeps its worth and meaning.
New Years Day is a good time to express gratitude for surviving the past year’s storms. It is a day when hope springs for prosperity, health, and serenity across the days ahead. Springs support life. We know them by what we see not from where they came. Springs are bodies of fresh water come from deep underground, far below the surface. Springs and lagans are not tainted by the flotsam and jetsam of old wrecks. Springs are clean. Fresh water is essential for life. Lagans can be re-used in good ways. Lagans remind us that all is not always lost – sometimes it just seems that way from the surface. Seize this day and greet 2015 with a fresh water toast– a token to the belief that hope for safe passage and salvaging lagans springs eternal.
Round Spring, Missouri Ozarks Riverways near Eminence. Photo by JAL
M/V Kent Reliant grounded on a reef. Photo courtesy of response.restoration.noaa.gov. File from Public Domain.
A third of all commercial ship accidents are caused by running aground. That means the vessels connected to the bottom of shallow water. They get stuck. That’s when bad goes to worse – changing tides and currents batter the boat. If there was damage done to the hull by whatever was on the bottom – while the boat can’t really sink, after all it is on the bottom – it is in danger of becoming ship wrecked. Running aground is an accident – whether it was caused by tide, poor visibility, or waves, at a given moment the water isn’t deep enough to float the boat. The ship and crew are in trouble. It’s rarely an option to get out and push the boat into deeper water or swim to shore. Without help or divine providence the potential for loss is great.
Photo courtesy Amazon.com
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia
Most recreational boats that run aground cause little or no damage to the crew. The number one killer of boaters is excessive alcohol use. Booze trumps bad weather, hazardous waters, and not paying attention to where the boat is or who’s on board. Drinking at the helm of a boat is not an accident – but what happens next is the result of purposeful behavior – and is too often a preventable tragedy.
Festivities during winter holidays have a perilous downside with the power to sink relationships and drown feelings of comfort and joy. The stream of a tear contains the same salt that makes up vast seas. The last stretch of the calendar is the most hazardous of shipping and sipping lanes. If you’ve hit bottom you can’t sink further – you must get yourself up to the surface. Whether you are sailing solo or huddled in the grand salon of a cruise ship – its safer to act as if the helm is in your hands. Don’t just stand and stare at the water expecting it to take you someplace. It will not reward your anxiety nor gift you with contentment. Don’t expect the sea to rest because you are restless. Exercise moderation and you will become strong enough to navigate though these final days of the year. Pay attention to the currents, sky and shoreline so that you don’t get caught in the shallows.
The difference between a holiday ordeal and a holiday adventure is attitude. Just as a compass needle seeks the north – position your feelings to find and move toward good tidings. Be and behave. To seek is not the same as to find – but it’s a start – as bright blue fish Dory said, “When life gets you down do you wanna know what you’ve gotta do?”
JUST KEEP SWIMMING
A bright blue fish. Foam construction paper fish made with Elle when she was two by JAL.
Quotation from the Movie, Finding Nemo
Moby Dick Being Followed by Nantucket Sleigh Ride Much Like Rosetta Chasing Comet 67P
Comet 67P orbits the sun at 85,000 mph. It is more rapid than eagles. Ever since I graduated high school in the summer of ’69 (mid 20th century) when 67P caught some astronomers’ eyes – a bunch of scientists have wanted to sail aboard this chunk of icy rock. They built a ship for sailing 310 million miles across space that “as dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly, when they meet with an obstacle mount to the sky.”[1] They christened the space vessel Rosetta and for a decade its been following Comet 67P like Cat Steven’s Moon Shadow. Rosetta stayed its course to a new port of call. Because of this bold voyage, as Major Tom said while floating in his tin can, “The stars look very different today.”[2]
JFK, himself an avid sailor, declared space the “final frontier” long before William Shatner’s opening line of Star Trek. Over half a century ago he credited the true grit of pioneers who sacrificed their safety, comfort and sometimes their lives to build our new West. Kennedy praised those who slipped past the boundaries of the now standing St. Louis Arch as people who were not “captives of their own doubts, nor prisoners of their own price tags.”[3]
Star Ship Enterprise Photo courtesy Wikipedia
Why bother with an expensive rodeo ride on a chunk of star dust? Easy answer; because there are so many unanswered questions about our world. Are we alone? Is any body out there? Buehler?
And there’s another thing earthlings don’t know. What one sees of our planet from space is mostly water, and what physicians know makes up a human being is, mostly water. JFK was at the 1962 America Cup Race when he explained, “All of us have in our veins the exact same percentage of salt in our blood that exists in the ocean, and, therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our sweat, in our tears.” Where does all that salt and water come from? Scientists think that just maybe water came to Planet Earth from space – riding a comet just like 67P.
Naming space ships is as sacred an honor as naming any boat on earth. Yesterday, Rosetta sent its dinghy, Philae to set its harpoons into 67P’s rocky surface and begin the ultimate Nantucket sleigh ride, “On, Comet!” Rosetta was named for an inscribed piece of volcanic rock – that’s a stone that once flowed like water from a fiery hell – that allowed scientists to crack a language code and read Egypt’s past. Philae was named for the island on the Nile River where the obliesk was found. Today it’s anchored on an island in the sky. What code will it crack? Who could we come to know? What has flowed into our lives via comets just like 67P?
It’s good to know that there are still pioneers on earth willing explore the New Frontier because it’s here whether we chase moon shadows, play space cowboys, or cower in the dark. It is comforting to know that science still probes the mysteries of the heavens despite the hefty price tags only Richard Branson can afford. A better understanding of a single virgin comet may help humankind better understand why it is that “when we go back to the sea — whether it is to sail or to watch it — we are going back from whence we came.”[4]
From sea to shining sea
[1] David Bowie, 1969, Space Oddity
[2] Clement Moore, 1882, A Visit From St. Nicholas
[3] John F. Kennedy, 1960
[4] John F. Kennedy, 1962
Anchor Yankers Island Island Closing. JAL
Imagine doing something just for the sake of doing it. You’re in the zone. You are going with the flow. Time fades and your entire being gets into whatever it is you are doing. The moment is prized and you hardly notice that your body and mind are stretched to their limits. The flow is you.
DW’s idea of a river dance. Port Charles to AYI.
Saturday I hitched a ride up river on our friend DW’s power boat. I arrived at the harbor and found him on the dock, relaxed as he savored a hot tumbler of coffee. When I apologized for being a couple of minutes late he grinned, “We’re on River Time.”
His 24’ Cobia stirred up a mess of Chinese carp before pointing upstream, getting down on plane and ripping through the current. The shoreline was ablaze with orange, crimson, and golden foliage. The channel shined beneath the low-slung sun as a purloined trove of Cartier’s finest diamonds.
Pavillion @ Anchor Yankers End of a Season. JAL
Time like a river flows. Boats allow us to flow with time in ways that can’t be measured by Rolexes. Watching a bald eagle soar above the river for just a few moments is a vision that can endure in memory over a lifetime. Being with the flow resets our heads to moments in life when age is irrelevant. Age is trumped by the joyful sensation of being alive. The past is left in our wake the future lies at the bow. We float with Now. Regardless of the number of candles on the last cake – being on the water resets our internal sense of time. We are forever young.
Our cruise back to port was brief as the boat bit into the groove and sped down the channel. My mind absorbed the crisp fall air, glare of the sun, and brilliant foliage reflected off the calmer waters. My knees flexed to absorb the shock of crossing over wakes. Crows dug their feet into the creases of my eyes and lips as I squinted and grinned into the wind. Water, land, wind, and sun were transformed into a memory that will last longer then the time yet to pass between laying up for winter and next year’s boating season.
Ralph, Jeri, Big G Last Sail of 2014 on Ex Libris
Our Lady of the River @ Portage Des Sioux from Palisades Yacht Club – erected as a “Thank You for Not Flooding the Whole Town in 1950”
Rivers, lakes, and oceans have some places where the water is deep and others that aren’t. Boaters put a premium on knowing the difference. When the bottom unexpectedly meets a hull the results can be catastrophic, so boaters seek water that’s relatively deep. Novice swimmers (regardless of their height) tend to do the opposite and feel more secure when they can touch bottom.
My (in the) River Home during 2013 spring flood – parking and grassy area to Palisades’ harbor
We can get into real trouble in water whether it’s over our heads or beneath the keel and propeller. Depths vary between the spots where water kisses dry land and the deep abyss where living things take it upon themselves to light their way.
People are not just made mostly of water – they tend to act like deep or shallow ends. We all know at least one philosopher savant who makes simple things complex and often drowns us with details ad nauseam. We grow exhausted fighting the current of drawn out discussions that appear to have little meaning to anyone past the first drink and no end in sight. Then there are our easy breezy pals who never dive deep into any conversation. These easy chatters bring a light chop to dialogue that carries us through the next round. Somewhere in between are the acquaintances that are much like uncharted waters. We’re not sure whether their cups are half full or empty – and don’t really care. Not knowing the details makes navigating some relationships really interesting.
I know people who think, “I’m really not all that deep – what you see is what you get.” That’s a misleading statement. You can’t always tell what lies beneath by what the surface looks like. This season the river has gone from flood (more than12’ feet below our boat in the harbor slip) to the lowest levels (3’9” beneath us on Saturday) many of us have ever seen. Take for example the Mississippi River last weekend. We set sail on our friend’s sailboat, Mariah. As we prepared to leave the dock, numerous sailors warned that there was less than a yard of water at the mouth of the harbor. Our skipper affirmed that he had a retractable centerboard and we’d only draw about two feet of water beneath the hull. Sure enough – out we went into the river channel.
“Frankly, Scarlett – it is a dam.” @ The Lady of the River’s feet – fall 2014
It was a beautiful day for sailing – steady 10 knot winds from the north. We headed back with big grins and wary eyes ahead looking out for the rock dam that extends from the Lady of the River across the slough (a skinny channel set apart from the main river by a series of islands). We knew almost exactly what lied beneath – but not how far the lie went. The golden autumn sun was setting low in perfect alignment with the slough and the wind was at our bow. We had to squint to read the current as it swirled the energized, dancing waves in a chaotic rhythm. We saw the line of whirlpools and white caps that signaled shallow depths – but the river unexpectedly went shallow under quieter water. With a sickening series of thuds the centerboard rammed the dam and had a rocky ride over its crest.
Bent centerboards don’t retract back into their kangaroo pockets beneath the hull. A harbor mouth that was “deep enough” a couple hours earlier – was a greedy sucker that swallowed the centerboard and held the boat solid in it’s jaws. We were stuck. Drama ensued with a tow by the harbor master, sheepish nods to the naysayers who warned us to stay tucked in our slips, and a certain sense of satisfaction that we really did have a great sail while everyone else busied themselves ashore. Rather than wreck the day with deep analysis of what went wrong – we all sort of shallowed up. Our small community offered to help fix the boat and get the skipper back on the water ASAP.
Of course – the river’s going to have to rise up and lift Mariah off the bottom. Then our conversation will be deep enough to be interesting and shallow to the extent we keep our mood afloat.
Sky above goes up forever, river below keeps on burnin’. Alton bluffs seen from Portage des Sioux. 10/19/14
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