Buying a boat in Ft Lauderdale presented certain logisticalproblems.  How do you prepare andtransport a boat that you know very little about from a remote location?  I made many lists, drove down for manyweekends, and employed a lot of wishful thinking.  As it turned out, the wishful thinking wasn’tquite enough.

There were multiple lists with items including getting a headworking, cleaning the fuel, replacing an exhaust hose, measuring the mast, findinga captain, planning the route, buying gear, buying linens, buying food… lots ofbuying.

I envisioned a 5-day trip, stopping each night.  Some days would be longer than others sincegood places to spend the night don’t occur regularly along the way.  The longest day I planned was 10 hours basedon the expectation of being able to motor at 8 or 9 knots.  There was some doubt about whether we’d beable to break through the Keys chain, or if we’d have to go all the way aroundKey West due to our mast height being higher than the standard intracoastalbridges.

A licensed captain was required by the insurancecompany.  Insuring the boat was by farthe most difficult and frustrating part of the purchase process.  I feel competent to handle the boat, but itis understandable that an underwriter may not share my confidence.  A captain was not unwelcome, however, and I’msatisfied with how it turned out.  My dadwent along, so we had a crew of three.

The first surprise came seconds after leaving the dock.  No steering. 
The boat has hydraulic steering and apparently a large amount of thefluid had leaked out and been replaced with air.  This may have had something to do with theriver currents pushing on the rudders while she was at the dock.  I know it was okay when the boat was out ofthe water and I heard no complaints from the broker when he moved her from theyard back to her dock.  At any event, wewere now travelling down a winding river lined by boats and crossed by bridgeswith a stiff following current, and were unable to use our rudders.  Fortunately, we have two engines which can beused very effectively to maneuver the boat. 
With one forward and the other reversed, she can spin like a tank.

I relinquished the helm to the captain immediately, hopinghe could do a better job keeping us from hitting something.  He didn’t hit anything, but my pre-departurejitters mounted to full-blown anxiety a few times as the boat clearly was notunder control.  After navigating the mostdifficult part of the river under a constant state of tension, we stopped at a fueldock before entering Port Everglades. 
Adding hydraulic fluid and spinning the wheel back and forth bled thesystem and the steering didn’t give any more trouble for the rest of the trip.

The captain directed some criticism at me during thisepisode, and I’m still not sure whether he blamed me for the steering problem,or for letting him take the helm, or both. 
I recall that he stepped in as soon as I discovered the steering problembut before I went for the engine controls. 
It could not have been long because we only had 100 feet before we wouldbe swept into another boat.  Would I havegone for the engines in time?  I thinkso.  I think I probably could havemaneuvered out of the river with the engines, too.  But he wanted the helm, and I was happy togive it to him.

It is interesting to me how I can be deferential andunassuming in some situations, quietly accepting criticism that I think isunwarranted, even being yelled at during moments of tension with noresentments.  But in other situations, particularlyprofessional situations, I can be aggressive and territorial, harboring agrudge against the slightest affront to my ego. 
I’m not sure what the difference is. 
In all cases I expect a quiet competence of myself, but sometimes Idemand individual recognition despite the overall outcome, and in others I linkmy satisfaction with the result and ignore criticism.  I don’t see my giving the wheel to thecaptain and not challenging his declaration that he was disappointed in me asany weakness on my part.  A job needed toget done and he seemed the most qualified to do it.  Isn’t that a good thing?

The next disappointment came as we entered the Atlantic andthrottled up to cruising speed.  Mylow-end estimate of 8 knots under power was off by a bit.  With a 20-knot headwind and the accompanyingchop, 4 knots was more achievable.  Theboat is underpowered for my tastes. 

Boat speed under power is a complex relationship of hullshape, engine torque and rotational speed, and propeller size and pitch.  I don’t understand the relationship wellenough to say that the boat needs bigger engines to improve her boat speed.  They don’t seem to labor, and they achievepretty close to their wide open throttle revolutions, which may indicate thatthey can bear larger propellers.  At thesame time, with their placement in the hulls, I can easily see that the enginesmay have been selected for their physical size more than their horsepower.  A similar sized boat that I’m familiar withhas twin 60hp engines and is clearly overpowered.  But as most will agree, power is a safetyfeature, and I think my twin 30hp Volvos are at the wrong end of the range.

It was a long day of motoring into the wind and waves toreach our first night’s destination at the southern end of Biscayne Bay.  Going into the bay was my decision and I madeit somewhat unilaterally.  We haddiscussed it, but the captain would have been happy to push on through day andnight, and my dad was concerned about being able to get out through the shallowpasses at the bottom of the bay.  I wastired and demoralized from the slow bashing in the Atlantic and just wanted toget into some sheltered water.  We founda quiet spot to anchor near Pumpkin Key. 
Everyone was tired and the planned meal did not materialize.

The next morning we motored out through Angelfish Pass verynicely.  The boat draws 4 feet and we didsee some fours on the depth sounder, particularly on the Atlantic side of thepass, but I think the depth is calibrated from the transponder, not from thewaterline, so the four foot readings were probably closer to six feet.  There are some good-sized boats docked in adevelopment inside the pass, so the channel is probably privately maintained.

The morning was uneventful as we motored south in HawkChannel between the Keys and the barrier reefs offshore.  The wind had clocked southwest overnight andcontinued move west throughout the day in order to stay on our nose as we camearound the bottom of Florida.  Our nextwaypoint was Snake Creek which is the only opening bridge in the Keys chain.

Snake Creek does not seem to be a common route for sailboatstransiting the Keys.  Nobody I talked tohad heard of it.  This may be because thechannel is somewhat shallow and the fixed spans at Channel Five and Marathonare conveniently nearby.  The spans areout of consideration for me because they’re only 65 feet and my mast is68.  I wasn’t sure about Snake Creekeither, because it has overhead cables and we couldn’t find a publishedheight.  We called the Coast Guard, thebridge tender, and the power company, but nobody knew.  In the end, we got right up to the cable andstopped.  From our perspective it wasimpossible to tell, but there was a guy on the bridge and he let us know byhand signals that we had plenty of room. 
In retrospect, if we were that unsure, we should have sent someone upthe mast.

The Gulf side of Snake Creek is shallow.  We saw fours again, but didn’t touch.

We transited Snake Creek at about 2pm and our next goodstopping point was Naples, about 12 hours away. 
The timing was awkward and we never seriously discussed stopping tospend the night in the Keys.   Inretrospect, I wish we had, because by not stopping we put ourselves out of syncwith our anchorages and kept ourselves out of sync with the wind.  Had we stopped, the wind would have clockedaround to the NE that evening and given us nice sailing the next day.

The Florida Bay was pretty stirred up with lots of sand andsea grass suspended in the water.  Afterawhile we noticed that the engines weren’t making the same RPMs that they hadbeen.  We worried about this for awhile,thinking we might have clogged fuel filters, until we hit on the idea ofbacking down to try clearing grass off the props.  It worked, but soon afterward the starboardengine overheated.  We shut it down,emptied the strainer, then restarted it and changed the port strainer.  Before long, the starboard side overheatedagain and this time the strainer was empty. 
It was night by now, the engine was smoking because it was hot, and itwas hard to tell if there was enough water in the exhaust.  Hanging under the boat with a flashlightbreathing the exhaust seemed to be my job. 
We shut the starboard engine down to rest for awhile.

The autopilot has a handy feature that allows it to followthe wind.  This enables us to trim thesails as we like them and then sail a wind angle that suits our trim instead ofa specific course.  This had been workingfine, but with the starboard engine shut down and the boat having a bit ofweather helm, our port rudder control was a little sluggish and we got tacked afew times when the autopilot couldn’t keep us off the wind.  Stupidly, we had been sailing with the frontwindows open.  During one of these accidentaltacks a jib sheet wrapped around the port window and ripped it off, leaving shatteredglass inside the boat and on deck.

Probably around midnight we went through another backingdown procedure to clear the port propeller, and something went wrong.  The engine raced.  The captain seemed to know what this meantand told me to go check the prop shaft. 
I thought he was crazy, but dutifully went to check.  Imagine my surprise when there was no shaftin the stern tube and water was coming into the boat.  I reported this and we began the holeplugging exercise.  Having water comingin your boat is never a good situation, but I had the plugs and the tools to takecare of it, so all in all, I think it went pretty well. 

With both engines out of commission now, and the wind stillout of the north-northwest, we were sailing pretty much west, giving up theadvantage we gained by cutting through at Snake Creek.  Stopping for the night was out of thequestion.  It was at this stage that Isuccumbed to seasickness.

I’ve always battled with mal de mer and it wins most of thetime.  Intellectually, I think it is largelya psychological phenomenon, but that hasn’t helped me much.  It always seems to be multiple conditionsthat collude to defeat me.  Was itexhaustion from several days of preparation and lack of sleep that weakened me?  Was it that cigar I had after dinner, or thediesel fumes?  Working below on theengines certainly didn’t help, and it being night there was no horizon toorient myself against.  And theaftereffects of stress can be enough to make a person nauseous on dryland.  Whatever it was, it was blessedlyshort, and I was back to normal in about 12 hours.

We had a great sail overnight in the wrong direction and bymorning we were about 40 miles off Marco Island.  Not a great place to be with no engines.  The captain went over the side to investigateour port shaft.  It was still therethankfully.  The zinc anode stopped itfrom sliding through the strut.  It justneeded to be pushed back in.  He tied itoff in case it managed to break free. 
Why he didn’t try to push it back in, I don’t know.  I think I had suspended independent thoughtby this point.

The wind died around mid-morning and we started thestarboard engine to see how it was feeling. 
It started getting hot and we shut it back down.   We talked about what the problem could be,but didn’t do much.  The captain wentover the side to inspect the intake, but it was clear.   We discussed the possibility that the intakehose was clogged, but didn’t take it off to look.

We spent all day sailing slowly back toward the coast.  We discussed putting in somewhere forrepairs, but decided that as long as the wind held, we would try for Bradenton.  It did, and so we did.

Shortly after nightfall, the wind clocked around to theeast, allowing us to tack and resume heading north.  It built until I decided that it was prudentto reef and we went right to the second reef.   
It continued to build until we had gusts to 35 knots.   It was a beautiful clear night, but colderthan any of us had packed for.  We wereclose enough inshore that the seas were relatively light for the wind strength.

The captain called for relief at about 4am and I went ondeck to relieve him.  It seemed that theautopilot was having trouble controlling the boat and he had been hand-steeringfor the last couple hours and was now exhausted.  As I took the wheel he told me that he hadbeen trying to keep within 40 degrees of the desired course and to be carefulof a gybe because we would lose the rig. 
This was not at all acceptable to me and I decided we would take themain down.  We rolled the jib and shewent right up into the wind very nicely. 
The drop went just as smoothly as the reef.  We unrolled the full jib and made a nice 9knots with the autopilot steering.

We were off Englewood when dawn broke clear and chilly.  The breeze slackened and we put ourdouble-reefed main back up, shaking out the reef by late morning.  The breeze continued to clock until we had itoff our starboard quarter.  I put up thespinnaker for a little while, but my crew was not as enthusiastic about it, soit was short-lived.

We started to see other boats off Sarasota.  The solitude of the previous couple days hadmade us lazy and we were not keeping a proper watch.  I went on deck at one point just in time tosee an anchored boat with a diver down flag bob down the side less than 6 feetaway.  I think that shook us all alittle.

We made it through Southwest Passage into Tampa Bay around 2pm.  The captain called a friend to bring his fishing boat out to us, and he towed us in to the dock.  Docking was relatively uneventful and the delivery crew dispersed by 5pm on the fourth day.  None of the five planned dinners had been eaten.  

Things are breaking faster than we can fix them at this point. You might think we would be daunted as we are just setting out on this adventure, but that is not the case. Of course, part of any adventure is flirtation with danger and willingness to confront the unknown.  (As in, “What will break next? Who knows?”) That takes a bit of pluck, not to mention a hearty dose of optimism.

I’m what you might call an apocalyptic optimist, with an outlook that goes something like this: the world is going to hell in a hand-basket, but in the meantime, I’m sure everything will be just fine!  I can also be a bit moody, swinging between the extremes: from “this is so exciting!” to “this is the stupidest thing we have ever done!” (I often experience the two simultaneously which makes me feel really crazy.) My husband is very steady—things are what they are, and will continue to be that way so there’s no reason to get excited.  That means, in my opinion, he can’t truly enjoy something, but then he is somewhat impervious to disappointment.  Not that he doesn’t get frustrated sometimes, only that he doesn’t freak out. I, however, do freak out—freak out happy, freak out scared, freak out mad, take your pick. 

So when things break, Jay calmly looks at it as an opportunity to learn something new, like plumbing or electrical engineering. That’s his brand of optimism. I, on the other hand, will feel like freaking out, but attempt to talk myself out of it by playing Pollyanna and finding something to be grateful for. Like, “At least it broke now, while we’re tied to a dock only an hour from our house and not in the South Pacific!” I said as much to one of our G-dock neighbors who was privy to our electrical troubles this past weekend. He said, “Boy, you sure see the glass half-full, huh?” And a few moments later, “You’re gonna need a LOT of that glass-half-full…” I think he’s right. Keeping our attitudes in check and keeping our sense of humor and sense of adventure is going to be our key to survival—both here at the dock and when we actually leave someday. We’ll have to have the kind of optimism that says, “All this trouble is worth it!”

Of course, for those of us who believe that all things work together for the good of those who love God and are in sync with His plan (loose paraphrase of Romans 8:28), there is no choice but optimism. It doesn’t matter if we go broke fixing this boat, or if we are hot, tired, hungry, or in trouble—all of that, all the hardship will ultimately be for our good. We’re not doing this because we thought it would be easy.  And God doesn’t really care about our comfort as much as He does our character. So it may be hard and uncomfortable and we may experience growing (or shrinking) pains as we try this new mode of living, but, in the end, according to the written guarantee above, it will all be worth it.   There might even be some pleasant surprises to enjoy along the way! I’m feeling optimistic.

Jay brought our new baby home on Wednesday night. She was a little worse for the wear, but she sure does look good sitting at the dock. We cleaned her off and out and spent the night on Thursday. I watched the sun go down over the heads of the four children sitting in the cockpit having their first dinner on the boat.  We fell asleep to mysterious new sounds. We woke to the calls of water birds and to cool, moist air on our faces from the open hatches. I did my first day of boat-schooling and we divvied up boat chores. I mopped my galley and salon and hosed down the cockpit. In short, I was happy as a clam. I felt more at home on the boat than I do at home.

When Eli, Aaron, Sarah, and Sam got on the boat for the first time (they hadn’t laid eyes on it since December when we first looked at it) they were bouncing off the walls with excitement. This is the rundown on the boat tour Jay subsequently gave the kids: “This is the engine kill switch. Don’t touch it.  This is a fire extinguisher. Don’t touch it. This is a sea cock. Don’t touch it. See these switches? And these buttons? Don’t touch them.” And so forth, and so on. The children looked a little confused; they had the mistaken notion that this thing was their new toy. But the rules that are so important for an orderly household now become even more important in the floating house, in some cases for safety and survival. They seemed to catch on pretty quickly.

I have spent so much time imagining what it will be like—the daily life, at least—that actually doing it seemed easy and natural. What will be strange will be waking up to make pancakes on a Saturday morning and finding that the view has changed since yesterday. I can’t really imagine what the voyaging and exploring will be like, so I just don’t spend any time thinking about it.  But when Jay talks about romping around on the island and sending Eli up a tree for a coconut, I get a little thrill of excitement. What will it be like? If our first day aboard is any indicator, it’s going to be better than we imagined.

As you’ve probably heard if you’re reading this, we finallybought a boat.  I should say anotherboat, since we still own the first one, but this is THE boat – a 48-footcatamaran.  If you know us, you’ve heardus talk about this for some time.  Infact, we’re about 3.5 years into our 5 year plan, and the idea predates theplan.  You may think we’re 18 monthsearly, but we’re actually right on schedule because the plan is not just to owna boat, but to live aboard and cruise extensively.  And in our more candid moments, you may haveheard us mention circumnavigation.  Theboat is capable, whether we are remains to be seen.

So where should I start? 
The beginning?  Where isthat?  This is not one of those simpleideas that can suddenly issue forth from the subconscious fully formed.  This is a culmination of our lifeexperiences.  It is the practicalapplication or our ideals and philosophies of life.  It is the embodiment of our faith.  It is what we were made for.  It is a journey that had no beginning and likelyhas no end.  This is who we are.  At least we think it is. 
As you’ll see, we’re still trying to figure thewhole thing out.

Buying a boat is never a good financial decision.  They’re expensive to buy, expensive to own,and hard to sell.  But we’re trying tobuy something else, and hopefully it will prove much more valuable.  And what is money good for anyway if not tochase your dreams?

If you’ve never tried it, moving from the path of easyaffluence to that of hard work and simple living doesn’t come naturally.  Folks are usually striving in the otherdirection.  Both are probably equallydifficult.  Being “successful” andachieving “the American dream” are always upwards on the scale.  Sitting here, I can’t think of a singleperson who has been recognized as successful for going the otherdirection.  To most readers, the idea isprobably preposterous.  Okay, it might bepreposterous to all of them, but I trust some might at least have a sense forwhat I’m driving at.

So, what’s wrong with us? 
Beats me.  Seriously, I knowbetter than attempt to articulate that in one sitting.  Bear with me, and it’ll trickle out on itsown.  Suffice it to say that this dreamis an amalgamation of many different ideas and desires.  Some of which we may not even completelyunderstand.

So let’s begin with the boat.

I found the boat while searching through listings on theInternet, as I am wont to do, or was.  Iwas looking for catamarans in Florida between 44 and 50 feet.  The length being what I thought we couldhandle and could also handle us, Florida being where I live.  Obviously, there are more boats beyondFlorida, but I had the sense, nay, the expectation, that the boat would findme, not vice versa, and I was in Florida. 
There are many, and I pored through them methodically.  Some I’d seen listed for years and would skipthese out of habit.  Some I would skipover due to some combination of age, designer, or price.  Some piqued my interest enough for me to readthe listing, and then were discarded upon failure of some aspect of myanalysis.  Many were interesting, but alleventually failed.

When I first saw her listing, I was struck by the number ofthings about the design that were done correctly.  Engines in the middle of the hulls.  More fuel than water, both also in the middleof the hulls.  Watertight crash boxesforward.  Triple-spreader rig with innerforestay and running backstays. 
Sacrificial keels.  Very narrowhulls with acceptable bridgedeck clearance (one can never really have enough).  I can count on one hand the number ofproduction designs that have some of these aspects, and none that haveall.  This of course was a custom boat.

A custom boat is one where a client contracts a designer tobuild a boat to meet his specifications. 
The client is usually very experienced, has lots of money, and knowswell what he wants.  Through a series ofdiscussions, the designer learns what the client is looking for and the two workout a design that meets the client’s desires and his compromises (since a boatis nothing if not a study in compromise). 
The design is then taken to a builder, and eventually a single boat ismade.

A production boat on the other hand is built speculatively,attempting to capture a large segment of the marketplace.  There are marketing people involved, doingresearch to determine what features sell best. 
While a custom boat is designed to satisfy one highly experiencedperson, a production boat is designed to satisfy a thousand people.  Then they are mass produced, with thenecessary emphasis on controlling costs to maximize profit.  You may well imagine that the results can beless than ideal.

In addition to the design, she had the right gear.  Generator, watermaker, hot water heater,large battery bank with stacked inverters, full instrumentation with hydraulicautopilot, forward looking sonar, EPIRB, liferaft, etc.  This was serious stuff for a serious boat.

But saying the right things in the listing is notenough.  She was built in 1991 and timeis hard on boats.  Pictures are thequickest way to get a rough estimate for a boat’s overall condition.  Inexplicably, and very suspiciously, herlisting had very few pictures and they were of dubious quality.  While interesting, the listing did notidentify the boat as a serious prospect.

I’m pretty choosy.  Itake these decisions very seriously.  Upto this point I had actually called a broker and gone to look at exactly oneboat, and that was over a year prior.   The story of Katie Rose will have to be toldanother time, but the short version is that while we agonized over thedecision, someone else snuck in and bought her in the span of a weekend.

This new boat continued to rattle around in my thoughts foranother week or so.  I found myselflooking at the listing again, and this time I followed a link to the broker’swebsite.  The broker had his own listingfor the boat there, which was the same as the one I had seen, except that this onehad pictures.  Glorious pictures.  This boat was in good shape.

I went home that night and told T that I had found theboat.  Knowing full well the gravity ofthe statement, she asked if I was sure. 
I claimed 90% confidence, which was somewhat remarkable for never havingset foot on her.  It was time to call thebroker.

Thus began a long and frustrating process that hasultimately ended with us owning the boat. 
It was four months from offer to closing and we experienced manyemotions throughout: fear, anxiety, longing, etc.  But in retrospect I think I can say thatdoubt never played a significant role. 
Some may think that a contradiction, but one can have fear about what heis about to do and yet have full confidence that it is the right thing.  Is it risky?
 
Yes.  Is it foolish?  Perhaps. 
Will it change us forever?  I hopeso.

"Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bow lines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover" — Mark Twain

I think this is my new personal motto. When people first hear about the dream we are pursuing, namely, to move our family of six aboard a large catamaran and maybe sail away someday, the first thing they ask is, “aren’t you afraid?” Afraid? Of course we’re afraid.  Afraid of storms, seasickness, shipwreck, sharks, piracy, conflict, running aground, our own ineptitude, untimely breakages, isolation, going broke, death, the unknown. I am afraid of the things that will scare me that I don’t even know about yet. I don’t even know how to sail. I have no business dreaming this dream. I have been moored in the safe harbor so long that my mooring line is encrusted with comfort and has become one with the mooring itself. I’m not going anywhere without something breaking off and causing some damage.

Alright. So what? Let it break off; it’ll only hurt for awhile. (Aha!) Those are the words that purchase freedom and welcome adventure, a life replete with excitement and risk of danger. In any case, we’ve decided that there are things worse than fear. Like regret. We’ve been afraid before. Like on our wedding day. The day we closed on our first house. The day we went to the hospital to have our first child. The day we moved to Florida. But if we had not done those things, actually gotten married, taken on the responsibilities of a home and a family, made big and scary decisions, if we had stayed in the safe harbor and never filled our sails with wind—what would be the point of our lives? The weight of regret would surely have crushed us by now.

We are, on the eve of “the point of no return” on this boat deal, alternately giving each other the pep talk. You can do this, we tell each other. It’s crazy, but we can do it anyway. We will, too. Just watch us. And if we do manage to do it, to actually acquire this worthy vessel, sail it around the peninsula and successfully dock it, take it for short cruises, learn to live with her and with each other, and to ultimately go exploring, it won’t be because we deserved it, nor because we were prepared, and it most certainly won’t be because we were unafraid, rather it will be despite those things.  We have decided to really live, or die trying.

“Full fathom five thy father lies.
Of his bones are coral made.
Those are pearls that were his eyes.
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea change
Into something rich and strange…”

—Ariel in The Tempest by William Shakespeare

We are in the process of making some big and scary life decisions. It’s harder than I thought. I like to believe I am a dandelion: blow me in any direction and I’ll thrive wherever I land. To be perfectly honest, I’ve become rather comfortable—no, spoiled—in my current circumstances. I was raised in a house where little was stable: feast or famine finances, moves every couple of years that meant changing houses, neighborhoods, cities, states, or even countries. I got used to adapting to new schools, new environs, new friends. But what I have treasured in my stable and happy adulthood is how stable and happy it is!  I married my high school sweetheart and we settled into a wonderful, predictable life together. Despite adding a few “surprises” to our family and an interstate move a few years ago, it has been relatively smooth sailing, and our lives have become increasingly more comfortable and happy. So why would we abandon our safe and cozy life? Yet that is just what we propose: we’ll sell or give away ninety percent of our belongings and move our four young children aboard a large catamaran and maybe sail around the world. No big deal, right?

Somewhere between calling the yacht broker and signing on the dotted line, I got cold feet. I suddenly decided I didn’t want to trade words like “safe” and “boring” for “risk” and “adventure.” My whole being cried out in fear of losing the comfy-cozy shell it’s built around itself to insulate it from pain and hardship.  I like things the way I like them. Though I hate to admit it, I like to be in control. I want what I don’t want. I want to live a wild, free, unfettered life—as long as I can control it. But the sea cannot be tamed. This is the thing that simultaneously attracts and repels us, and will slowly do its work on our safe and easy existence and transform it into a self-sufficient, exciting journey.

But just like in Ariel’s haunting song, this sea change doesn’t happen without death first.  And so, in order to move forward despite my fear, I had to die. And I may have to do so again a hundred times. I thought the adventure starts when we bring the boat home—or, rather, the home to the boat—and we set sail. Who knew that it took so much courage just to initiate the process? Not I. As I wrestled with panic, the desire to bolt in the other direction, I realized I would need courage just to say “yes, I’ll try it.”

The night I first died, I called a friend who lovingly coaxed me away from the edge. I hung up the phone, prayed through the anxiety, and finally fell asleep. I awoke the next morning—imagine my surprise—resurrected! The sun shone, the dew sparkled, the birds sang, and my heart with them. What do I really need in this world, anyway? The trappings I was so afraid to lose had lost their luster overnight and I was ready to leave the nest and fly away.

I have begun to realize that the very thing I thought I hated about my childhood is the very thing that will serve me best in a future life afloat: in a word, the ability to adapt. I wasn’t in control then, and I’m not now. How like my Father, the Sovereign King! In charge of all circumstances, He uses the things we hate, the things in our past we run away from, our pain, our shame, even our sin—and changes it into something useful in his kingdom! That is the crucifixion and resurrection, reenacted daily in the lives of his followers everywhere. It’s a terrible and glorious process: our flesh, put to death, is transformed into something “rich and strange.”