I discovered at the end of last weekend that I get landsick.  That’s correct: landsick. Jay, on the other hand gets seasick. So far, he’s done fine, but I feel absolutely nauseous. It’s at its worst on Sunday nights when we get back from the boat, and doing the dishes exacerbates my condition. Normally, when I do dishes, I look out at the water and sky and sometimes see small people bouncing around on the foredeck or fishing, periodically peeping in at me. The horizon stays still, but everything else is moving. When I get home, I just can’t get my bearings. I plunge my hands into the water, look out of the window at our back yard and nothing will stop moving, including the horizon.  I actually had to go lie down last Sunday afternoon. Jay and I had a good laugh about it.

I guess I’m landsick in other ways too. As much as I appreciate my warm, high-pressure shower (now more than ever), and having space to move and breathe and spread out, I would rather be sailing. I am never more at ease than when the sail goes up, or we drop the hook to spend the night somewhere, or wake up in the middle of the night and see the stars overhead through an open hatch and feel the boat rocking me back to sleep. Last December, when we went to look at Take Two, I got a few minutes kid-free to go peeking into nooks and crannies by myself. I was the only one of our search party to actually lie in one of the bunks. After about five minutes of lying there considering the future possibilities, I said to myself, “A person could get tired of their house moving all the time.” Never did I consider that a person could get tired of their house feeling like it was moving, and prefer the actually moving house.

Does this mean I am ready to go overboard and abandon land? I don’t know. Can one be ready for that sort of thing? All I know is that I love being on the water, near the water, and in the water. I love sea birds, stars, small, deserted islands, being with my family, and sitting with Jay on the foredeck in the moonlight. When I’m at home, I think constantly of being back on the boat, and when I’m on the boat I finally feel at home.

The old adage holds true: Timing is everything. I believe that even the right dream, or right person, or right place can be wrong if they come to you at the wrong time. 

I read in my devotions this morning about Moses, who sensed early in his life God calling him to right the wrongs done against his people. So he acted rashly on righteous impulses and killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew slave. He then fled and spent forty years herding sheep in the desert. Was the calling wrong? Clearly not, as he eventually led a couple million people out of slavery. When the call came the second time, he had been humbled, and only when he felt unworthy was he truly ready.

It is true for us, too, I see now. Ten years ago, I got a glimpse of what a sailing life might entail and my heart was set aglow.  Two years ago, Katie Rose, the boat we almost bought, sailed away, and with it, my dreams of living aboard. I was sure we had let our destiny float off without us. We obviously weren’t ready. When Jay came home last December and said, “I found the boat,” he caught me off-guard. When we decided to do it, I was petrified. But the timing was right.

We’ve been dockside for four months. We were fixing, learning, acclimating. And only now has the time come to begin doing the thing of which we’ve been dreaming. It’s our time for firsts: first sail out of the Manatee River, first reefing in strong wind, first time dropping the anchor, first night “on the hook”, first leaps off the bow and swims through “the tunnel,” first expedition to an island, first edible fish caught. It’s just like I thought it was going to be. The kids are loving it, and Jay and I are still sitting on a moonlit deck after they go to bed incredulous that we actually did it. I admit to feeling impatient sometimes, but I now see the wisdom in waiting, in going slowly and taking it one step at a time.  

In a larger sense, the timing is right, too: many of the people who live their dreams of cruising do so after raising a family, after successful careers, after most of their time and energy have been poured into a land-life. The people who sailed away on Katie Rose were old and pudgy. Although that sounds critical, I myself will be old and pudgy before too long and that is exactly my point. In some ways it’s harder to do this now, to take a risk when we have small children, when our income goes mostly toward house payments and grocery bills. But in many ways it is easier: presumably we have a lot of time and energy left, the children will benefit from a simpler, more adventurous life, and we are young enough that we still feel almost invincible but not so young that we don’t recognize and try to avoid danger. And with times being uncertain, learning to live more self-sufficiently doesn’t sound so bad, either.

I think I understand just a bit of what Moses felt when he heard the call.  When I first stepped aboard Katie Rose, I heard a quiet voice saying, “this is your future home.” It was almost audible—my heart was pounding and I felt a little clammy. But my immediate response was, “No way!”  Since we didn’t end up living aboard that particular boat, did I miss or misunderstand the call?  I think not; I just wasn’t ready.  Am I now?  Are we humbled enough by the daunting task ahead of us to be truly ready? All we have are a dream, a boat, a willingness to work, and a belief that Someone bigger than us has a bigger plan.

I close with the second stanza of a favorite poem, Sea Fever by John Masefield:

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I wrestle again with an old monster. I could euphemistically call it ambition, or even perfectionism, but more honestly I must name it Fear of Failure. Jay came to console me ringside during a long and troubled night when sometimes I was winning and sometimes the monster, and said something to the effect of “You’re failing at things no one else is even trying.”  Hmm.  Anyone else to whom I confess these fears often says the same thing my mother said when I came home from school crying because I got a 90% instead of 100% on a test: “Cut yourself some slack!”

I know exactly what brought the monster on. I probably invited it in and held the door for it. I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed trying to now take care of two homes when I was struggling before to take care of one. We are spending about half of our time and energy on the boat. We live there Friday through Sunday, and spend part of Monday unpacking and catching up. So I have three full days to plan and shop for the week’s meals, make phone calls or run errands, school the children, clean the house, do 6-8 loads of laundry, bake the bread, catch up on any missed sleep from tiring weekends…need I go on?  It’s exhausting just to make the list. 

So some things have to slide. Even though I know this, I allowed the scenery to accuse me. A pile of half-finished homeschool projects on the dining room table whispered, “Failure!”  The message light on the phone blinks, “Failure!” The To-Do List called out “Failure!” from the magnet on the refrigerator. Someone groaned when I told them what was for dinner and I heard, “Failure!” (Failure to cook pleasing meals and to raise children who don’t complain!)  Am I a failure at all the things I love and desire to be: a wife, a mother, a sister, a friend, a writer, a teacher?

A metaphor presented itself at midnight, as I tried to wind down for bed. I went to take a shower, realized the bathroom was disgusting and grabbed my spray-bottle and scrubbing pad. But it doesn’t matter how hard I work on that shower, it never looks clean when I’m done—it needs a tile guy, not a housewife. So even the mildew from the corners murmurs, “Failure!”  Once I realized that I was listening to inanimate objects accuse me, it should have been cause for laughter and set me free. Or at least sent me off to bed to sleep it off. But that burning question remained, “When is it good enough?”  Or maybe, really, “When will I be good enough?”

This fear of failure does not keep me from trying new things; it just keeps me from enjoying them. I am the oldest in my family, and some psychologists think that has something to do with it. For my also-first-born husband, it keeps him from trying things at which he doesn’t think he’ll be successful. In our first-born child, it manifests itself as intense frustration. Whatever our birth-order, most of us at one time or another set these unreasonable expectations, and respond to them as our personalities dictate.

The problem with these expectations is, of course, that it sets us up for disappointment. We are always looking at something and feeling like it’s just not good enough.  And maybe it’s not.  Where did this ambition come from? It’s like that homesickness of which I have written before. If we all feel like things should be perfect, that something is amiss, isn’t it possible that perfection exists and we were made to live in that state? I’m certainly not there now!

It turns out that I’m just like the mildewed shower: I don’t need a good scrubbing, I need a savior. The whole point of Christianity, as I understand it, isn’t just that Jesus came to take the punishment humanity deserved, but that He lived the perfect life we all want to live, the one required by a perfectly good God. He lived it for us. So I can say, “I am not good enough,” and because I identify myself with His Son, God can say, “That’s okay. I accept you anyway.” And the hope for someday is that He’s going to set it all right again. All the first-borns will breathe a sigh of relief.

In the meantime, we must wrestle.  I have to remind myself that, for now, it is good enough. I can’t scrub the shower all night. At some point, I have to go to bed and put a clean bathroom into perspective after a good night’s sleep. For our transition to living on the boat, this is the year when things slide, whether I like it or not.  A good friend reminded me that we are living our dream, which is already more than most people achieve. I knew it would cost something, and the frustration I am feeling just happens to be one of those costs.

“If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing.”     –Clive Staples Lewis*

I have felt it on a cold, starry night on a lonely mountaintop in Vermont. I have felt it in a ferny, mossy valley where the light comes through the trees in shades of green. I have felt it walking through a hayfield at sunset. But most often I have felt it on or near the water. It is a feeling of indescribable freedom, something so beautiful that it hurts, something that makes me feel very small, but very alive.  I am sure that you have felt it too. C.S. Lewis would call it joy, and define it as “a single, unendurable sense of desire and loss.” **

I felt it on Friday, as we raised the main for the first time and sailed out of the Manatee River toward the Bay and the world beyond. It was a short, but glorious afternoon in a beautiful breeze. The moment when the engine shut off and the boat mysteriously continued to glide forward through the water and all I could hear was the wind, the water, and the call of sea birds was nothing short of magical. It is why I want to do this for the rest of my life.

About ten years ago, Jay and I spent a week sailing with his folks on his Dad’s catamaran. It was a great trip, down to the Dry Tortugas and over to Key West and back to Naples. It was the first time I’d spent that kind of time on a boat. It was neat just to play at living aboard, but the last day of the trip was the most memorable. As is often the case, it started as a mistake, turned into a malfunction, and ended as serendipity. I clumsily bumped into an external fuel tank fitting which broke and caused the engine to quit, and then when it started up again, it wouldn’t go forward (pre-existing transmission troubles exacerbated by my oops), and we were forced to sail home all night long. I sat up in the quiet cockpit, staring in amazement at more stars than I had ever seen and the glowing green trail of phosphorescent creatures stirred up by our hulls passing noiselessly through the water. It was pure joy; I was hooked. I wanted it to last forever.

Lewis says, “all joy reminds. It is never a possession, always a desire for something longer ago or further away or still about to be.” ** And so we pine. Even in the most perfect moment, it is felt as a pang. It is where longing and having are one. As deeply satisfying as it was to sail our boat for the first time, a thing for which we have longed for many years, present in the joy was that sense that there is more and greater out there, that this is just a tiny taste. Perhaps we will always feel that way. Perhaps that is the way it is supposed to be—a kind of homesickness for a home we have not yet known.

* From Mere Christianity, McMillan, 1943
** From Surprised by Joy, Harcourt, 1955

I think everyone should spend a week or two on a boat. We should all be better stewards of limited resources and learn to live a little more simply, and I can’t think of a better way to force yourself to do this than living in the self-contained, self-sufficient environment of a boat. All the services you are used to in a house in a typical American neighborhood exist as a system on a boat, but instead of things like water or sewage magically appearing and disappearing, you are now (sometimes painfully) aware of where they come from and go to and how much of them there is or isn’t.  It sure has made me more appreciative of my land life! Here are a few things that come to mind…

Electricity: Unless you’re plugged in at a dock, you either have to make it (generator fueled by dead dinosaurs) or catch it (solar panels, wind generator). Those appliances at home with lights and indicators that stay on all the time are a no-no on a boat, where every amp and volt count. I don’t really understand our electrical system, but I do know that I want warm food, and if we have to budget energy to get warm food, I’m willing to learn to be less wasteful. A small example from our boat: the electric stove has a ceramic cook-top that holds heat for a long time, so after I cook something, I fill the teakettle with water and set it on the warm burner. This covers a potentially hazardous hot spot and uses heat that would otherwise be wasted because I will now have warm water for doing the dishes.

Water: Speaking of water…our humongous boat holds 200 gallons of fresh water in its tanks, but there are six people using it. When cruising long-term, we will have a rain-water catching system to supplement water taken on at port or made with the water-maker (which uses precious electricity). Warm showers are now a luxury, as they require the use of a generator. However, a solar shower (basically a black bag of water that the sun heats up) should help some, especially in the tropics. Here’s how to shower with minimal water usage: undress; turn on water long enough to wet yourself down; turn off water; soap up; rinse off; repeat for hair. Also, how clean do you need to be? Hair really only needs washing twice a week, and sponge baths do when a full shower is too cold or difficult. To conserve further, laundry and dishes can be washed in salt water and rinsed with fresh. We just don’t realize how much water we use in a house, but on a boat, using too much could cost you precious drinking water. Incidentally, we have a good gravity-fed, countertop purifier so we don’t have to rely on bottled water for good-tasting drinking water.

Sewage: At home, you flush the toilet and all unmentionables are magically whisked away, never to be seen again. The routine on a boat is a bit different. Depending on the kind of toilet you have, usually you have to pump the potty full of sea water, then pump the poo out of the potty.  When offshore, most cruisers pump the poo overboard to rejoin the “circle of life.” But near the shore, at anchor or at a marina, the poo goes into a holding tank. If you’re in a civilized place, they will have a pump-out station, where a long suction hose sucks the poo out of the tank and it rejoins the water cycle in the city sewage treatment plant. This, by the way, is less pleasant than changing a diaper—it’s like changing your whole family’s diaper once a week.  In this area, one cannot conserve unless one chooses not to eat and therefore not to create poo. But one does become appreciative of living in a place where sewage is piped out of one’s house and processed odorlessly somewhere else. Think of this the next time you flush and just be happy.

Food: Our family has an elaborate plan for storing food for long voyages and times of shortage. It includes vacuum-packing whole grains for grinding in small batches for bread and breakfast cereal, storing canned goods and dried foods, freezing what we can, and catching fish. It means we eat simply and we teach our children not to complain but to just be thankful for what we have. Pickiness is simply not an option. Waste is to be avoided at all costs. We have manual backups for all electrical equipment, so if the generator fails and we can’t use the stove/oven, we have two portable grills—a propane and a charcoal (the “Cobb”). I guess if all else fails, there’s always sushi…

Trash: I always feel guilty after hauling my large black can to the street at home, but now I feel tired after hauling a large black bag all the way to the end of the dock to the can there. I’m not so worried about the recycling part (which is not as practical as it is marketed), but we really can do more about the reduce and re-use part. I use things in bulk which does reduce packaging, but we still fill a big bag each weekend. What to do at sea? Biodegradables are often tossed overboard, but plastic? Never!  So, no plastic bottles or baggies. I use and reuse glass mason jars for pretty much everything. And cotton towels replace paper. The baby wears cloth diapers. I carry canvas bags to shop. I feel like we’re doing our part, but we still create trash. And as a culture, it’s a little shocking to think of the volume…Without the big truck carting it to an unseen location, I’m definitely more aware of waste.

Stuff: I mentioned that I like to have a manual backup for all things electric. And this stuff has to last—we are in a stage of life now where we would rather spend more for something sturdy that will last than to pay less for something that will have to be replaced ten times in the same time period. The market in our country is based on the principles of perceived and planned obsolescence, something we fight strongly against. I’ll wear a pair of shoes to death, even if they went out of style five years ago. (My clothes are still stuck in the eighties, but they’re coming around again.) And we try to avoid things “Made in China” because they are destined too soon for the landfill. At a marine flea market last Saturday, I saw a refurbished Singer sewing machine made sixty years ago and converted to hand crank. It sewed through six layers of canvas like it was butter. I don’t have an immediate need for this thing, so I didn’t buy it (yet), but it epitomizes this principle I’m talking about. A boat is a very compact, efficient place. Because you can carry so little, everything has to have verifiable usefulness. I am both dreading and looking forward to the purging necessary to move our family of six out of a 2000-square-foot house onto a 48-foot boat. But I’m learning how much stuff I can do without and how much easier it is to care for a smaller house with less stuff.

Money: Never mind. We are all aware that this is limited. Whenever something breaks and we have to pay to buy parts to fix it, Jay says, what's the money for anyway? We were afraid if we saved it all for later, later would never come, or we would be too old to enjoy it. So we've decided use it now, give some away when the opportunity presents itself, and try to save a little for later. In any case, we refuse to worry about it.

Time: This, of course, cannot be purchased, and even if you save it, it doesn’t spend very well later.  We all try to cram too much activity into small chunks of it because the days, and our lives, for that matter, are just too short. But we are rethinking this way of life. Everything slows down when we get down to the boat. I stop looking at my watch. We wake up with the sun, eat when we get hungry, sleep when we get tired, and are generally more in tune with natural rhythms. This is the first year in my life when I am not signed up for anything, no commitments besides teaching my children and learning to live on a boat. It’s so freeing to say “No” to everything, even if for just a season. Part of the reason we are doing this is because life is short. But instead of trying to cram more in, we are actually trying to cram less in and enjoy that less more. I recognize this is not going to be an extended vacation—the work is very real—but present are the aspects of vacations that we love: no need to be anywhere at a specified time, and extra time to savor the people we love, the natural beauty around us, and worthwhile things for which we usually don’t make enough time (like books, music, laughter, games, art, etc.) Of all the limited resources of which I have become more aware, time is the greatest. I contemplate my priorities, worry less about staying on a set schedule, and enjoy life more. If the horizon is clear, the children sit with me on the coach roof at sunset looking for the green flash at the moment the sun sinks. It doesn’t matter if it’s eight o’clock or nine. If I were to put them to bed “on time” we would miss it. Every day is a gift, not to be wasted worrying or stewing. Weigh anchor and sail away for a week or two and you’ll see what I mean.

Eighteen years ago, a boat builder in the Netherlands began work on a custom-designed wooden vessel. Every detail had been thoroughly planned and considered and she would be both fast and comfortable, with plenty of storage space, yet attractive, with sleek lines, uncluttered decks and a spacious interior. Though built in a northern clime, she would probably spend her life in the Caribbean, taking couples on sailing vacations in the islands. 

At about the same time, several thousand miles to the southwest, a boy met a girl in a high school English class. He had grown up sailing on his Dad’s catamaran and dreamed of sailing into the blue someday. She, though born in the mountains, was a water person, feeling most at home on a beach looking out toward the endless expanse of blue and green.

So begins the tale—our tale—of two converging lines that led us to this point in time, sitting on the deck of our water-home, sharing a drink on a breezy August evening. I pondered those lines a bit and realized that our life looks less like geometry and more like two streams that meander toward the same river, replete with twists and turns, dams and falls.

Somewhere along the way, you may hear someone say, “God is sovereign.”  That means different things to different people. It usually means, “God is in control,” but for some, that makes God a tyrant, pre-determining doom for the masses of unbelieving pagans, or, at the very least, a God that allows a lot of suffering. For me, it hints at a parental guidance undaunted by childish disobedience. Somehow, no matter how much I may try to screw it up, the loving Father will make it all come out right in the end. Not that I won’t suffer along the way, but that the suffering (sometimes at my own hand, sometimes at others’) will produce something good.  I have done nothing to merit this particular favor, merely asked to be called His child by identifying with His Son, and sought His advice and desired to live life His way. (Admittedly easier said than done.)

Looking back at the course of my life, it is easy to see the convergence of unwarranted serendipitous circumstances (I call it grace, but some call it luck, and others fate). This begs the question, “How did this happen?” Were these truly coincidences? I tend to think not; like random mutations, accidents are generally not beneficial. Was it design? And if so, who designed the course of my life? I believe in free will—I made lots and lots of small decisions that altered my course immeasurably. But there is something at work that I cannot explain.

We did not buy Katie Rose. She was a fifty-five-foot solid glass monohull that presented herself to us very appealingly, despite the work necessary to make her livable.  We delayed making the final decision because we were afraid to take the plunge and follow our dream, and someone else bought her: free will. But there was an unseen Plan there not to be thwarted. For the next six months, we had to live on our boat savings while Jay was unemployed. A year later, when Jay found Take Two, we had built our savings, and our courage, up again some. But when we finally decided to buy the boat, we reached an impasse with the owner about repairs that needed to be done before we were willing to finalize the deal. The owner was unwilling to spend another cent on the boat he had been trying to unload for a couple of years and considered a great deal. That’s free will. But sovereignty—God making a way despite human activity—that would be the rock pile near the channel the owner hit on the sea trial, which gouged the keels and  forced him to haul out for repairs and acquiesce to our most pressing demands. We felt pretty confident when it all worked out that it was supposed to.

Two teenagers in love somehow survived four years of long-distance dating and philosophical obstacles and married. They somehow simultaneously arrived at the conclusion that life on the water would be great and began to share a dream that would materialize this year, eighteen years after they met. Just like our boat, which seems like it was designed for our family, the direction of our lives appears to be clearly marked out. Detours, yes; setbacks, of course, but a path that causes us to trust in an unseen designer. How did that Dutchman know what we would need in a boat? Why didn’t anyone else want her while we dawdled and dilly-dallied? Trust is funny. You can’t know anything, not really. But looking back at the evidence on this gracious path makes us able to walk forward into the unknown more confidently.  Free will is in the walking, but the confidence comes from following the directions of a sovereign Planner.

I can tell we’ve become more flexible. We used to plan out our entire lives and now I can’t even tell you what we’re doing tomorrow. Or in five minutes, for that matter. Jay says, “Be ready to head to the boat,” and the kids pack a bag and put their shoes on and stand on the rug by the front door. I ring the ship’s bell and all hands are suddenly on deck, ready for a meal or further instructions. Jay says, “Stand ready with the boat hook to grab the spring line,” and everything goes like clockwork.

When we packed up yesterday for our weekly trip to Bradenton, I didn’t know if we were staying for the day or the whole weekend. So I packed extra clothes and food, just in case. Up until the last moment, I thought we were going to eat dinner and head home. Then we ended up staying the night, and got to try out our new coffee percolator the next morning. Last weekend, I canceled plans to drive my sister to Naples so I could take a “now or never” weekend sailing class on docking, anchoring and man-overboard maneuvers. This kind of loosey-goosey, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kind of life would have driven me mad before, but now it just makes me laugh. It’s the first time in my life I am not signed up for anything, leading anything or teaching anything (besides homeschool!). No commitments beyond being committed to learning to sail and live aboard this worthy vessel.

It reminds me of our move to Florida. We had laid carefully-timed plans: Sarah would be born at the end of April, Jay would fly to Tampa for a job interview, and we would close on our house and move at the end of May.  But the job fell through, the buyer fell through, and Sarah was late. We had almost made a local move the previous January, but both felt misgivings and backed out. That left the door open for a move to Florida, but then that didn’t seem to be working out either. What were we supposed to do? We asked God for guidance and ended up more confused than before. So we threw up our hands, said, “Whatever,” and waited. God worked out the details better than we ever could have through a series of carefully-orchestrated coincidences. When we moved, it was God who moved us; not our plan, but His. All He required of us was to be available to go or stay as He worked it out.

When moving the boat this evening from her hurricane slip back to the dock end, I stood at the ready, boat hook in hand, and waited for Jay’s guidance. We ended up grabbing the bow line instead of the spring line amidships as planned, but I was ready and waiting, so it went smoothly. I think that is what God is asking of us. To be free is to be ready and available, patiently waiting for whatever comes next. Sometimes at a moment’s notice, the vista changes and we must be open to that, since we can’t see the Big Picture.

Part of this readiness is freeing ourselves from obligations (debt, schedules and commitments, stuff, etc.) and the other part is pure flexibility—being ready to change our plans mid-stream without whining and trying to get our own way. For us that means being surrendered to doing things God’s way and making space for Him to work. We must build in margins—financial, time, energy, and otherwise.  Jay and I realize we can’t just “go” at the word because we owe debt, own a house and have not settled all our land business. It behooves us to do that as quickly as possible because if God says, “Now!” and we aren’t ready, the plan will not go off without a hitch. It would be like trying to pull out of a boat slip with dock lines still attached.

But that wisdom is not just for us. All of us can be made more available—more attuned to the purpose of our existence. We all have something that holds us back—often our own desire for control and security. In order to open ourselves to a more rewarding and fulfilling life, we have to let go of that control and grasping for safety, for sameness, and embrace uncertainty.

When Jay and I were dating, back in high school, we used to have this thing we called “recovering gracefully.” It happened when we were on a date and the Ben and Jerry’s shop would be closed when we got there, or we planned to go to the beach and it started raining on the way there. Would the date be ruined, or could we recover gracefully and come up with—and implement—a “plan B” quickly and without ruffled feathers?  That, indeed, is the question.

I like change, for the most part. I admit that I am not a furniture-re-arranger-type, and that once I think things are “perfect” I don’t mess with them any more. But on the whole, I like to try new things, meet new people, and go new places. Unfortunately, I don’t change gears quickly if I am not the one who planned the change!  When things go wrong, I am more likely to be found standing in the rain, as I was today, shouting, “What do you mean you left the duffle bag at home?!”

There have been multiple opportunities presented to our family lately to practice recovering gracefully. The pancake incident is one, as told in an earlier essay. Last weekend, I baked two loaves of bread on Friday morning, to last for the weekend. I didn’t remember about bringing them until we were on the boat and I was unloading groceries. I made an ugly scene, not unlike our four-year-old daughter when she can’t find her favorite stuffed animal. I did recover and managed to bake a fresh loaf on the boat, but I can hardly claim gracefulness.  Then on Saturday morning, I went for a sail in the dingy, a ten-foot Walker Bay with a floatation collar, oars and a sail kit. It was lots of fun once the wind picked up and I got to really practice filling my sail with wind and tacking and jibing, but the wind changed on the way back to the boat and it did not “blow me right back home” as Jay had promised.  I was forced to row, which was made more difficult by the broken oarlocks, the boom, which kept hitting me in the head, and the rudder, which I did not know how to remove. Never mind about my deflated mood and the feeling of panic as I tried to avoid being swept out to sea! (That may be a small exaggeration. I would merely have been swept out into the Manatee River, which does eventually end up in the sea.)  It was humiliating to say the least, as folks were standing on the dock watching me struggle. I am not sure if I recovered gracefully, but I did not completely lose my sense of humor, and I did get home.

This afternoon, realizing that we did not have our duffle bag containing all the clothes we packed for the weekend, it seemed for a few moments like the end of the world.  Jay’s response to my exasperated shouts were, “Then fix it.” 
“I can’t,” I shouted back.
“Then stop hollering about it and come on.” 
That did it. I snapped out of it and from then on, I began to recover gracefully.  Ideally, I would begin the recovery the moment I realize something was amiss instead of freaking out first and apologizing later.  When we leave for a vacation, or a weekend away, the response to “I keep feeling like I’ve forgotten something,” is “Do you have your wallet?” There’s almost nothing I have forgotten that was not at least temporarily replaceable.  And so it was today, that as I walked in the rain down the dock toward the boat, I remembered that there was an outlet store right next to the grocery store, and I could easily replace two changes of clothes for several people at a small cost, and buy groceries at the same time, killing two birds with one stone. I also took stock of the things we didn’t forget and began to be thankful. My recovery could have been quicker, but you might still call it graceful, because grace also means offering another, though undeserved, chance.

I am glad we are given these “opportunities” frequently, because it keeps us on our toes. And we are learning the antidote to disappointment and frustration: thankfulness and joy. What is an adventure if it is not encountering the unexpected? That is both for good and ill. True, the pleasant surprises are easier to handle, but if one can learn to recover gracefully, there is good in even the most unpleasant ones as well.

It goes without saying, but I’m a writer so I’ll say it anyway: owning a boat is a continual lesson in patience.  Jay and I have been dreaming of “sailing away” for about fifteen years, so we’ve had to be patient. Granted, until we almost bought Katie Rose a year and a half ago, it was all just talk. (That’s another story for another time.) Then we took the plunge with Take Two and we are now in year four of a five year plan, but haven’t actually gone anywhere yet. So we shouldn’t be surprised that things take longer than we expected. In fact, that things take longer is actually a blessing, since things are also harder than expected. We have the cushion of time to absorb the shock of drastic change.

Being an all-or-nothing type has its disadvantages. When we talked about making the dream happen, I wanted to sell the house and move aboard in one fell swoop, but now I see the benefit of going slowly. I’m like a bull in a china cabinet; things usually get broken when I’m in a hurry. Jay is careful and cautious, tending toward inaction rather than rash action. In this case, we balance each other nicely: I get excited and light the fire, and he is wise and makes it a controlled burn. The downside is that I can’t stand limbo. It just requires so much…patience.  I am now taking care of two households when I was barely managing one before.  So I work twice as hard so that things can be one-half as orderly!  When I am at home, I can’t wait to get down to the boat, and when we’re at the boat I am thinking about what needs to be done at home. And then there’s the question of daily necessities: do you get duplicates of everything, or carry everything back and forth? We are learning what we can live without.

It’s now been six months since we started this journey. I use that word loosely since we haven’t sailed Take Two anywhere yet. And it might take another six months for us to be ready to go anywhere beyond our backyard. Not only does the boat need work, but we do too. Nonetheless, there’s been a lot of progress since she was delivered from Fort Lauderdale two months ago. For starters, spending every weekend aboard has made us feel comfortable and “at home” in a completely foreign environment.  Also, we have cleaned out every nook and cranny and sorted all the junk we found hiding there, so that we now sit about four inches higher than the old water line! Jay has repaired both engines, the water pumps, the electrical system, the hydraulic steering system, the A/C, the dingy and taken on countless other projects. I have altered meal plans at the spur of the moment and managed to feed everyone before the grouchies set in, baked a loaf of bread, pizza, and cookies in my ancient, though trusty Bosch oven, entertained cooped-up children on a rainy weekend without turning on any electrical devices (we set up a mini-bowling alley with plastic cups and the baby’s ball), and taken sailing classes to increase my confidence at the helm.

The kids have also made strides toward adapting to this life aboard, probably with greater ease and grace than we have—the boys help with all kinds of projects, for the most part without a word of complaint, Sarah helps keep Sam busy, and their behavior has been exceptional, so much so that people stop me on the docks in the marina to tell me how great the kids are. We see a lot of growth in their confidence, their ability to meet new people of any age and engage in conversation, and their willingness to “go with the flow” when things are unpredictable. Many of our concerns have been eased as we see the children enjoying our time at the dock. We keep busy with boat chores, reading, visiting the museum and planetarium (which is within walking distance), and swimming at the pool. The public library is across the street from our dock and downtown Bradenton offers a small-town main street feel, so there are plenty of things nearby to occupy us if the boat gets too crowded or people start getting antsy.  

In fact, aside from trying to figure out how to keep a one-and-a-half-year-old busy but out of trouble and moments of “can we go home now?” (each of us has had one), we’re feeling pretty comfortable here. Some of that is just getting used to things and some of it is adjusting our expectations. Either way, feeling comfortable is a sign to me that it’s time to get going. Or maybe that’s just me feeling impatient again…

Barnacles and crabs make strange noises at night. It sounds like someone is popping bubble wrap all night long next to my bed, which is smaller and harder than I’m used to, not to mention that I’m sleeping on the “wrong” side—opposite from the bed at home, where I have slept at Jay’s left side for nearly 11 years. Occasionally, Sam tumbles out of his bunk and I have to respond to cries of confusion if he wakes during the fall (sometimes he sleeps through it and we find him asleep on the cushion on the floor!). I have almost knocked myself unconscious numerous times in small passages in such middle-of-the-night maneuvers. Morning comes too soon. While cooking breakfast one morning, the power failed and I was left with soggy bacon and a bowl of pancake batter. Yum. When it rains, the “roof” leaks. Right over the beds, of course—where else? The afternoons are sweltering, and even with the (praise be to God!) air conditioning on, the salon is warm, the galley warmer. The fridge and freezer, combined, are smaller than my refrigerator space at home. The front burners on the aged stovetop don’t seem to operate at any other setting than “HIGH.”  The head (strange name for a toilet, eh?) smells like rotting sea life and you have to manually pump sea water in and sewage out to a holding tank, which gets pumped out once a week. And even in our calm, sheltered marina on the Manatee River, the whole place is always moving.

I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m complaining. These are simply some of the things I’ve had to get used to as we have begun to spend weekends on the boat at the dock. Jay is currently repairing the port prop shaft (which connects the engine to the propeller), so we haven’t actually gone anywhere yet, but I am so grateful for this time to “practice” living aboard.  We can learn the rules and routines in a relatively safe environment.  We are close enough to home that we can bail if we need to, but also near local amenities like the marina swimming pool and the Bradenton Public Library so that there’s somewhere to go if we just want to get off the boat for short spells. We are attached to shore power and water, which means the comforts of unlimited (cold) showers and (mostly cold) air conditioning. It’s like learning to live aboard with training wheels—the change variables are blessedly limited. Even so, it takes some adjustment in outlook and attitude to get used to this new way of life.

This is the adventure we have craved, so we are joyfully learning to adapt to changing circumstances. There is no greater analogy to life than sailing—a vessel in a fluid environment with the wind constantly shifting, currents and tides, things you can’t see lurking beneath—the whole operation demands flexibility, vigilance and a good attitude, and not a little humility!  I gave the children some peanut butter bread and went to the neighbor’s motor yacht to cook the pancakes on the fateful morning of the electrical meltdown. When it rains, we set out the pots and bowls and towels and try to keep the baby from rearranging our carefully devised drip-catching system. When it’s hot, we sweat like the human body was designed to do and drink water and stay in the shade and rest. I’m learning how to cook again with different pots and pans, different stove and oven, different ingredients because of limited refrigeration, and lack of gadgets. In essence, we’re learning that we really don’t need that much to be happy.  I can even live without my (gasp!) precious Vita-Mix.  We spent three nights aboard this past weekend, and by the third night, I fell asleep quickly and slept soundly (and so did Sam). As we get things organized and cleaned, it’s starting to feel like home. The children are learning to entertain themselves while we busy ourselves with projects, and to adapt without complaint.  It’s not always smooth sailing (pardon the pun), but we’re getting there, little by little.

Then there are the beautiful things to get used to which I neglected to mention: falling asleep with a hatch open and a cool breeze blowing in and the moon and stars overhead. Waking up to bird calls. Breakfasting outdoors on the waterfront. Washing dishes with a 360˚ view—palm trees, the swaying masts of sailboats in the marina, the sunshine on the water, the clouds, the sky, the train bridge. Sea life at our doorstep: jellyfish, crabs, fish of all shapes and sizes—the kids spend hours in the cockpit looking over the coaming into the water. In the late afternoon, after the rain, a refreshing breeze blows. In the evening, we climb onto our “roof” and watch the red sun sink into the sea and light the clouds on fire. When the children are in bed, Jay and I get a cup of tea, or glass of wine, or cold beverage, as the mood strikes us, and sit up on deck, talking and laughing and listening to the live music from a nearby restaurant drifting over the water to us on our private, floating paradise. 

We wonder what our parents will think when they come to visit us at our new home. Will they wonder what kind of man provides such a small, leaky, dirty, broken-down home for his family (in some places, the boat is literally held together by string and duct tape)? Or will they see it as I do: a perfectly simple, self-contained, cozy, exotic living space with an incredible view?  I venture to say that some wives (including me just a few short years ago) would complain about the inconveniences which I am learning are part of the quirky charms of living aboard.  Now when I hear people complain about not having enough space and needing to move to a bigger house, I laugh! What do we really need space for? We have four cabins with full beds and two quarter berths, so there’s room to spare. Since we spend all our time in the cabins unconscious, they don’t need to be big. Our salon is spacious enough, the table easily seating eight, with a separate sitting area and space for kids to play on the floor. The galley is adjacent, so when I am cooking or cleaning or baking (which is a lot of the time), I am a part of the action. The cockpit is enclosed, which makes it relatively safe, and seats six to eight. The deck is just enormous—open and uncluttered, wide and comfortable. And the yard—it never needs mowing!

It’s true that one’s outlook changes everything (call me Pollyanna). Learning to take every day as it comes is an art. Beginning to see all of life as an adventure is essential to a vibrant and passionate existence. Slowing down is good for us, and living simply, though it may actually entail harder work, is more rewarding than living an easy, convenient life. Certainly, this way of life is not for everyone, but everyone can benefit from the lessons it is teaching us.