All Creatures Great and Icky! : Boat Critters

We arrived back on our boat after our Christmas vacation in the land of paychecks. Agur’s Wish was pulling gently at her docklines and all looked to be well. We extracted our key from the top secret hiding place that everybody on the dock and quite a few people in the settlement are aware of, just in case someone needs to save her from sinking or burning to the waterline. Or, God forbid, there might be a real emergency like a shortage of rum, in which case the residents of the dock and town know we have enough emergency rations of rum to “float” a small island nation for the foreseeable future.

We descended the companionway into the gloom of the shrouded boat. As we uncovered the hatches, we gasped in horror. Strewn about the boat were remnants of cigarettes chewed down to the filters. The strings of fake plastic limes and lemons that I had hanging in the galley had multiple bite marks in them.

The cap’n and I looked at each other. Which one of our nicotine fiend, tequila deprived, lime-sucking dockmates was to blame? It could be anyone of them.

“I smell a rat!”

Yeppers, in our absence a transient hobo-type critter of the rodent kind had set up camp and was now plotting to hold me prisoner on my own boat. Think Nicole Kidman in the movie “Dead Calm” or Melanie Griffith in “Pacific Heights”. This intruder was hell bent on incessantly teasing, taunting and torturing me.

There was the night I was laying on the settee reading a book, listening to Stanley, the killer bichon, chomping away at his dinner in the galley. But wait a darn minute, Stanley was laying right beside me. That’s what I call teasing and taunting.

Trapping a rodent phobic, incurable insomniac with frequent nocturnal urinary urges in her bunk all night….that’s what I call torture.

Luckily, the cap’n wasn’t as easily cowed and he set to work setting a trap. Later on that night, let’s just say, our uninvited guest found himself in a sticky situation. The cap’n gave him the old “heave-ho”.

And now Mickey, the Mouse, sleeps with the fishes.

Although no worthy first-mate, except me, would lay claim to having such commodious quarters for the formerly described unwanted guest, rodents are actually your common, garden-variety type of vermin that might be found on your boat. Now let’s talk about some of the more exotic varieties that may take up lodging.

I was introduced to one such creature on a bright sunny afternoon while I was diligently cleaning the cockpit and the cap’n was diligently throwing back lethal adult beverages at the Jib Room at the Marsh Harbour Marina..

I was busily scrubbing away, whistling a happy tune when I happened to open a cockpit locker. Staring back at me from the depth of the locker were two bulging yellow eyes.(I swear he had yellow eyes). A viperine (look it up, as Sister Irene used to say) tongue darted at me. There squatting atop the debris was a big, fat, slimy, day-glo lime-green frog.

“Rrrribbett”, it said.

“Eek!” said I, as I slammed the lid and awaited the cap’ns return from his arduous duties on shore.

Once again the cap’n gave the old “heave-ho” and the culprit swam merrily to shore.

Unfortunately, now my fear of opening the cockpit lockers is akin to my fear of highway rest stops. You see, for some reason every time I go into a highway rest stop I fear that I am going to see an amputated body part floating in the toilet. I try to not even look in the toilet. I have no idea where this gruesome irrational fear came from. Believe me, I’ve never seen an amputated body part floating in a toilet. Maybe I’m a little bit crazy. Normal people don’t think about things like that at rest stops. Do you? Ha! Ha! I bet you will now. Gotcha! Anyway, that explains the sorry state of my cockpit lockers.

Both of the previous experiences pale in comparison to what happened to our friends on the s/v Just Dreaming. This happened a couple of years ago and I wrote about it on some of the cruising boards, so if you’ve already read it I apologize. This is what happened.

We received an interesting vessel in distress call to us via VHF yesterday afternoon. I don't know why they thought we could help them with the nature of their distress except it happened to be one of those rare days when the water in Marsh Harbor was clear enough to see the interesting array of nature on our bottomsides.

It seems that the admiral of the distressed boat had been diligently (Ah-ha, a fellow member of the diligent cleaner club) scrubbing the head when she noticed what she thought was algae poking out from under the rim. She immediately armed herself with toilet brush for the attack and the enemy beat a hasty retreat. She decided to flush the area for more traces of enemy insurgents and sure enough more little legs poked through.

Dispersing with the usual regimen of interrogation she went straight to the torture stage and started gingerly tearing off limbs. When the captain and admiral had torn off a respectable amount limbs without gaining any useful intelligence they decided to call us. They now had their own little P.Y.N. (pinch your nose) camp set up in the intake of their head and they had removed all means for their prisoner's escape. You think the Abu Gahraib (sp?) scandal caused a stink.

My captain had indulged in his usual breakfast of Kalik's followed by a nutritious brunch of Rum-N-Ade’s and for some reason couldn't come up with a solution. I muttered, "You suck." My captain replied, "I besh your parshon!" I replied, "Tell him to disconnect his intake hose and apply suction." Sure enough, after just a few seconds of militia strength ShopVac to intake hose and the enemy lay legless and quivering on the floor.

A 3-4 inch slimey Jabba the Hud squid in his last throes. Of course, my captain took all the credit for the successful mission.

So, if some dark, .dark night you find yourself on the throne trickling and you feel something tickling....... Sorry Denny and Diane this one's going 'round the world wide web.

Whatever You Want To Put In It Pop-overs

I took these over to sundowners on JilliQ the other night and was told that I have to put the recipe in my blog and in return Jill will add her made-in-the-pie-plate pie crust recipe. Jill, you are within dinghy distance now and I can come over and wring it out of you. Actually, the pop-overs start with a basic cream cheese pastry that is very easy to work with and you can do anything you want with it. First the pastry recipe (Not for the lite-hearted diet types)

Cream Cheese Pastry

1 8oz. pkg of softened cream cheese
1 cup of softened butter
2 cups of flour
1/2 tsp salt

1. In large bowl cream together cream cheese and butter

2. Slowly add in sifted together flour and salt.

3. Shape into two balls, wrap in plastic wrap and chill for at least 3 hours.

4. Roll out to desired thickness (1/4 inch or so for me) cut with desired size of round cutter (I use a Guana Grabbers cup which is about 3 inches diameter).

5. Fill pastry round with about a tablespoon of filling (sample fillings down below) if your using the Grabber cup, fold over and seal edges. Crimp sealed edges with a fork.

6. Place pop-overs on greased cookie sheet and bake at 400F until nice and golden brown. In my oven you never can tell how long this is going to take and I'm still usually crouched down next to the oven beast with flashlight in hand 15 minutes after happy hour has started. I also usually have to turn them over to brown them on both sides. So do them the day before and reheat.

Fillings I have used:

Italian:

Slosh some olive oil in a frying pan and heat, drink a glass of red wine, add a brick of cream cheese, drink a glass of red wine, add chopped onion, green pepper, pepperoni,mushrooms, or whatever you have, and drink a glass of red wine. Heat until the mixture and you are toasted and bubbly.

Mexican:
Same as above except use hamburger and Sangria.

*This pastry also makes a delicious quiche pastry. I have used it for mini-quiches by lining regular sized muffin pans with the pastry dough and filling with an egg mixture of eggs (duh), heavy cream (or whatever dairy product you have onboard), scallions, shrimp, asparagus, and swiss cheese. Just bake until pastry is brown and egg mixture is set. Yummy! And can be frozen and reheated later.

Bon Apetite! Slosh! Slosh!

Reefer Madness: Boat Refrigeration Gremlins

That title should garner some interesting hits to my blog. (*Note to self: Look up the definition of “garner”)

The captain and the boat are driving me crazy today. Or maybe it’s just the captain on the boat and it’s not the boat’s fault at all. Yeah, that’s probably it. Anyway this is kind of like one of those letters you write when you’re afraid to tell your spouse he’s doing something that drives you crazy so you put it in a letter to an anonymous newspaper column hoping he’ll read it and recognize himself. Then he’ll recognize how ridiculous his behavior is and beg your forgiveness and swear to change his evil ways. My problem is the captain doesn’t read those columns and the other problem is I’ve told him repeatedly, sometimes loudly and profanely, every little thing that he does wrong and he keeps on doing them.

You must understand that the cap'n didn’t develop these annoying little habits only when we moved on the boat. He’s always had them. They just seem amplified in the limited space and magnified expanse of time we spend together on the boat.

Now which one is my very least favorite? The one that has me gnashing my teeth and muttering words that would have my mother washing my mouth out. Hmm. Let me think. Ah yes, that’s the one. The diabolical refrigerator or to be more specific the captain's neurosis about anyone opening the door to get things in or out of the refrigerator.

As I said, he’s always had this particular neurosis. The kids and I used to time him and it usually only took about 2.8 seconds after hearing the refrigerator door open before the captain would espouse the same wise words.

“It’s not a TV. Get in and get out,” he’d bellow.

This isn’t such a big deal when you have a side by side with about thirty shelves and see-through bins.

Since buying the boat his repertoire of sage refrigerator advisories have grown. Let’s see there’s…

“What are you looking for?”

As if just by the act of answering this inquiry the sought after item will magically levitate through the layers of jumbled containers and decaying produce to the top of the refrigerator.

Oh and then there’s…

“Do you need a flashlight?”

Let me think. Not unless it has an x-ray beam that can see through the questionable contents of those jumbled containers and decaying produce.

There’s also this one…

“You know the cold just pours out when you use the front opening instead of the top one.”

Since I can’t get to the bottom compartment without using the front opening I guess I could stop storing food in the bottom compartment but with the captain's penchant for provisioning for a non-stop round the world cruise every week, that’s out of the question.

Here’s my favorite.

“You need to organize it better.”

I would be overjoyed to do this if I could have at least twenty seconds in the fridge to put things to rights and then another five seconds each time I put something in it to put it in its place. The current practice of gathering all the refrigerated items together, opening the door, throwing them in, and then slamming the door doesn’t lend itself towards organization.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot this one…

“Is that the freezer running again?”

Which translates into, “You’ve been in there long enough. Get out!”

On most sailboats power conservation ranks right up there with water conservation. You don’t have to be planning an ocean crossing to be concerned about conservation. A week of gunkholing can put a serious drain on your batteries, especially if your trying to get away from it all and swearing off civilization and marinas, or if you just dread docking like this first mate.

On a sailboat without a generator the production of power is limited to solar panels, wind generators, or your engine’s alternator and a reliable battery bank. Solar panels and wind generators are great adjuncts to your engine’s alternator regenerating capacity but they cannot be relied on as the primary source of electricity for most modern boats. Eventually you’re going to have to run your engine to recharge your batteries. This unfortunately increases your engine hours along with wear and tear on your engine. The longer you can manage your power usage with just your battery capacity, the better off you are. So what does all this have to do with the previous diatribe on marine refrigeration? Refrigeration is a big consumer of electrical power and that is the reason for the involuntary sphincter reaction of most captains I know every time the fridge door is opened. But there’s help on the way. Here are some tips that might help keep the air in the refrigerator a little colder and the air between you and the captain a little warmer.

Tip One: If you’re an American or just can’t abide the thought of drinking a warm beer, keep a separate ice chest with your favorite beverages in it. This saves space in your fridge and saves multiple trips in and out of it. Ours fits right under our salon table so it’s out of the way. Of course, you still have to buy ice which can be expensive.

Tip Two: Do try to keep the fridge somewhat organized. I try to keep routine items in the same place every time. You’ll also have to layer your foods according to their squishability. Meat and cheese and hard vegetables and fruits will survive on the bottom of the heap but more vulnerable fruits and veggies that bruise easily will have to go on top. I also keep my bread products in the refrigerator because out of the refrigerator bread products don’t last more than a couple of days for me. The squishablility theory applies here also. Pizza crusts and tortillas go on the bottom with loaf bread and hamburger buns on top. Remember though, no matter how well you accomplish this you’re still going have to do some excavating when you’re looking for items but at least you’ll know which way to tunnel. It also helps to keep a list of what items you have in the refrigerator and freezer because, as mentioned, things can get buried. Of course, this only works if you mark off items as you use them.

Tip Three: Cut a piece of foamed plastic insulation to fit over the top of the refrigerator/freezer area. When my captain suggested this I fought it tooth and nail. I didn’t want to have to remove some ugly piece of silver insulation every time I got into the refrigerator. As usual, I lost and he did it anyway. And boy, it was ugly! Thankfully a friend, that has all the decorating genes I was born without, suggested covering it with contact paper or wallpaper and it actually turned into an attractive workspace. It is lightweight really not all that inconvenient to take on and off.

**I promise all first mates that if you make this suggestion to your captain he will be eternally grateful and then he’ll immediately claim it as his idea.

Tip Four: Buy smaller containers of products. I’m not a big believer in keeping food products that say “refrigerate after opening” out of the refrigerator. I figure there’s a reason for that warning and it’s probably because someone died or got really sick. I know there is lots of literature out there that says if I use a clean spoon in my mayo every time or if I turn my eggs every week I don’t need to refrigerate them. Well, if you saw some of the water conserving methods we use to wash dishes on our boat you might question the cleanliness of that spoon and if there ever was a universal inexpensive food it has to be eggs. Why would I risk salmonella because I forgot or was too lazy to turn my eggs one week. You can probably tell I’m not a big fan of food poisoning although I have considered it as a diet alternative. Seriously, I would rather throw a questionable item out then risk it. I also buy smaller containers of my favorite condiments even if they are more expensive and keep them in the refrigerator after opening rather than larger containers that won’t fit in the refrigerator. I‘ve found that even when I refrigerate larger containers of perishables I end up throwing half or more of the product out because I don’t use it fast enough and lose faith.

Tip Five: My captain should probably patent his latest “keep the cold air in and keep the first mate out of the refrigerator device”. It is a kind of thermal blanket for the freezer. Hmm…a blanket for the freezer. It didn’t make a whole lot of since to me. He couldn’t find one, go figure, so he had to design it himself. He bought a small silver tarp and some bubble wrap. He then made a template of our freezer using newspaper and using this template cut two patterns out of the silver tarp and two out of the bubble wrap. He placed the bubble wrap (with bubbles together) between the tarps and glued it all together with contact cement. It now resides on top of our frozen goods. It manages to keep me out of the freezer because it is a little unwieldy to get the “blanket” in and out so usually I just grab the first thing I feel under it. “Oh look, lobster again. I wonder how all those little buggers got to the top of the pile?” The captain swears it has noticeably reduced our refrigeration running time and, for once, I’ll admit he’s right. Ouch ! That hurt.

Tip Six: Almost any book about cruising (ECGIER) will have tips on how to reduce your refrigerator’s power consumption. Find the ones that fit you and your boat and use them. Every little bit helps.

Final Tip: I saved the best for last. This is the one that works best for me. If you find you really do need to get into your refrigerator for some mundane reason such as sustenance, plan ahead carefully. Figure out everything you need out of the fridge and its approximate location then boldly make your move. Just make sure the captain is off the boat.

Epilogue: I wrote this article when I actually had refrigeration and my most heart-felt back-thumps to you that live without it. I went all last year without it and the only good things I can say about doing without it is that I helped the Bahamian economy by eating out a lot, and buying a lot of stuff that I would have to throw out and replace on a day by day basis. Oh, the other good thing was that the cap'n didn't yell at me every time I opened the refrigerator (hatch,door??? what do you call it?).

Whadda Ya Do All Day?

I just got back from Pilates class on the beach (actually it was on a concrete slab behind the Hope Town Methodist Church, but beach sounds more romantic) and the cap'n is out racing on a friend's boat. Life is wonderful and idyllic. Actually some friends had to pry our lazy asses off the boat.

Life is one big circle. We spend our first few human years with nothing to do but learn the basic skills of walking and talking and controlling our bodily functions. All of this happens rather naturally without much effort on our part. The rest of this time is spent, well, just playing. This too comes rather naturally and without much effort on our parts. Most of us probably spent countless hours banging on a metal pot with a spoon. We didn’t spend a whole lot of time worrying about what we were accomplishing or contributing to society. Life was simple.

And then they ruined it! They sent us to school. Our life became a routine. 8:00 a.m. first bell. 8:15 a.m. time to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. And on it went. Even recess was organized play and as we got older the recesses got shorter and shorter until they finally disappeared altogether.

Most of us endured this for at least twelve years. A lot of us suffered even longer. Why? So we could get a job! That’s right, after years of forced routine and learning, we traded it in for more routine and even shorter vacations. For what reason did we endure another 20, 30, 40+ years of enslavement? In order to make enough money to go back and do what we were doing all those years ago. Play.

So now you’ve been on your boat for a few months and ….

“Waaah! theres nothing to do!”

Snorkeling and fishing all day were a blast when they were a once or twice a year event but they lose some allure when you do it every day. I know you won’t believe me but you can get real tired of a steady diet of fish, even lobster.

You don’t want to admit it but your bored out of your mind. Try admitting that to a working person and you won’t get a whole lot of sympathy but lament to a fellow “first mate”and believe me they’ll know where you’re coming from. We all started out with great expectations of the nirvana of the cruising life. Water of unbelievable beauty and all the activities that go along with it, perfect weather, beach barbecues, nights under endless stars…and it’s all out there, the only problem is it doesn’t seem to be enough. All those years of routine and learning and accomplishing have altered us. We want to be doing something. We want to be challenged.

Okay, so you’ll learn new skills. You’ll paint or write. But you may find if you haven’t used these skills since high school or college you’re bound to be rusty. You can learn on your own but you’re going to have to be very self-disciplined and not give up after your first disappointing efforts. Channel your inner child, you know the one that picked up a crayon without any concern whether the result was going to be a masterpiece, and just have fun. The good new is that in some of the larger harbours there are organized painting and writing circles that readily welcome newbies. And where there's internet, there's a way, or at least an online course, either for fun or for college credit. One friend of mine taught herself oil painting (and she was good at it), how to play the flute and sax (and she was good at it), she also wrote a book, and, in her spare time, she monogrammed clothing for friends on a special sewing machine she brought on her boat. All of this in four months. Oh, I forgot to tell you she also jogged every day. She had retired from the military and was obviously very self-disciplined. I hated her.

So have I finally convinced you to give up on the idea of sailing off into the sunset and living happily ever after? I hope not. You don’t have to become unhappy and bored but you have to be prepared to prevent it. You have to realize you’re not going to be happy for long with nothing to do everyday but walk on the beach or snorkel in crystal clear waters. I know this is hard to buy when you’re in the middle of a fifty- hour work week with additional children and grandchildren obligations to top it off, but take my word on it. Unfortunately, all those years of routine and productivity can’t be wiped from our subconscious right away. You’ll find that you miss routine. You’ll find that you miss having something you’ve got to get done and deadlines. That’s right we creatures of habit need routine. The good news is now we get to be in charge. We get to say when and what we’re going to do and how. Oh yeah, and we get to put recesses back in the schedule. The only problem is we’re going to have to learn to play again but we’ll discuss that later.

Let’s get started.

Step One: Don’t enforce the routine the minute you cast off the docklines. Do take a vacation. Spend the days like you dreamed. Walk the beaches. Find some shells. Do nothing! You’ve missed a lot of recesses. You deserve it. You’ll know when you’re getting a little restless. Then you’ll be ready to add a little routine. It took me about four months to start feeling restless but a lot longer before I did anything about it.

Step Two: Decide what your routine is going to be. That’s the beauty of it. It’s entirely up to you. Most of us spent our working careers with someone else engineering our days. Now we get to do it ourselves. The routine you create will depend on how much you want to accomplish and how much time it will require. I am not a very regimented person. I like flexibility. Instead of planning my routine on an hour to hour basis, I like to make lists of the things I want to accomplish each day and the approximate times I intend to dedicate to them. My list looks something like this:

Sample List: Write 2 hrs.
Exercise 30 min. (Maybe…probably not)
E-mail 30 min. (Actually it’s more like 3 hours but I steal it from my exercise and boat chores time)
Boat chores (laundry, cleaning, varnishing …) However long the chore takes. Boats are a lot smaller than houses and you can get a vast amount of work done in an hour.

(Sorry! Can't make the friggin' tab work on blogger. AARRGH!)

Never mind! Blogger was smarter than me as usual. Mea Culpa, Blogger


I don’t usually schedule more than four hours. I feel like I worked enough 8+ hour days to deserve a lesser work schedule. This is enough for me to feel like I haven’t become a beachbum or cockpit potato. Some of you will want more and some of you will be more regimented. Once again, it’s up to you. Just don’t forget to make time to play. I like the daily list so I can tailor it around where we are and what boat activity we might be doing that day. Plus I love crossing things off of the list so I feel I’ve accomplished something that day. In my former life I was an over-achiever. As you can see, I expect a lot less of myself these days. It’s amazing to what depths of laziness you can sink on a boat.

Step Three: What are you going to include in your routine? This is probably the most difficult and important step. The best time to figure this out is before you slip those docklines. Most of our former lives were centered on our jobs and families. We didn’t have time to figure out what we’d really love to do. I’d always known I wanted to write and had written articles for various magazines before we moved on the boat. I had done research on writing and publishing while I was still a dirt dweller so I had a few tools in my toolbox and I knew it fulfilled my need for productivity and creativity. Many women I met brought art supplies or musical instruments. I did too. We carried a guitar around for two years before we gave it away and I still can’t play a tune on my harmonica. I am just a little more proficient at my pastels. I consider these my “play” things and I don’t devote a whole lot of time to them. Mostly because I don’t believe I have the gene to surpass my painfully embarrassing level of talent in these skills. I can still have fun playing with them though. If you wish to spend a “routine” amount of time in developing this type of skills, then by all means do so.
However, if these skills do not have enough substance to fulfill your need for productivity you might want to investigate “real” jobs you can perform from the boat. Internet access is pretty much accessible in all areas of the world and many people are working from their boats. You may even be able to bring your old job with you. My friend, Joan, on “Joan Marie” tried to retire from her job as medical laboratory technician instructor at a medical college in California but they wouldn’t let her. They still employ her as a consultant and she contributes to several textbooks in the field. Any of these jobs may require additional learning and skills that would be much easier to acquire while still on land. And, of course, lots of people in the computer sector are going about their business as usual. If I can talk to a guy in Timbuktu about my computer problems, why can’t I talk to a guy in George Town, Exumas. So while making future preparations for the boat in planning a long-term cruise don’t forget to make a few preparations for yourself.

An additional activity many cruisers take part in while in paradise is volunteer work. This may seem difficult to plan if you’re moving around frequently but you’ll be surprised how simple it is. Almost any church or school on an inhabited island will be very grateful to find something for you to do. This might range from picking up a paintbrush to reading to a group of children while the teacher spends a little extra time with an individual student. Most volunteer jobs require no special skills although if you do have applicable special skill they are also always very appreciated. Another “Joan” friend of mine on the boat “Ola B” was waiting out a hurricane at a school when she happened to mention to the principal that she had been a psychologist in her former life. Well guess what? She’s now counseling a couple of kids a couple of times a week and she loves it. Here in the Abacos there are many requests for volunteers with any building skills for many of the non-profit organizations there that receive no aid from the government. Believe me, if you put yourself out there some one will put you to work.

If there aren’t any opportunities make your own . If you happen to be on an uninhabited island, take in a couple of trash bags and pick up the debris that litters the beaches and haul it to the next settlement that has a trash pick-up. If there’s more than one boat in the harbor invite everybody to do the same thing and make a party out of it. It may not seem like much but every little bit counts. Another fellow boater, Niels on Westwind, organized a shore clean-up in Marsh Harbour and it has now become a yearly tradition with both boaters and locals involved.

Step Four: Convincing the captain to cooperate. Although some of these activities can be done together, you will have to put your foot down and insist on some time for yourself. Probably before you even get restless you’ll notice that the captain is starting to get on your nerves. Most couples have never spent as much time together before going cruising, much less in the close confines of a boat. In my experience it seems that this sudden aversion to your spouse occurs earlier and much more frequently to the boat’s first mate than it does to the captain. Probably because the captain is just so doggone happy to be on his boat. And that is where you get your edge. Remember he really wants you to be happy on the boat. He doesn’t want you to make him sell his boat. You don’t have to hold this over his head 24-7 but it sure does make a good bargaining tool when you want something to go your way. This really isn’t a big deal. Discuss it with him when you’re at the “ Setting the Rules of Our Cruising Life ” stage and it won’t be a big surprise to him when you demand your space. Discuss with him how much time you need and when you want it if it is going to be on a regular basis. Remember to be flexible. If you’ve just sailed into a new anchorage and he really wants you to go explore it with him, by all means go and put off your plans for a few hours. But if you’ve been lazing around in the same harbor for a week or two and you’ve become locals let him go off on his own to snorkel or fish. It will do both of you good.

Step Five: Oops! Sorry the bell just rang. It’s recess time. Let’s go play!

For Evelyn

I wrote this article several years ago. Since then my father has died. I was honored to have spent the last months of his life with him. I held his hand the night he died and prayed to my mother to release him from his suffering... and she did. He was 76 and had truly lived his life. He was not a great adventurer or a traveling soul, he liked his front porch and a drink in his hand and his friends. On the other hand, I got an email yesterday from a friend about a friend. A daughter of close friends of ours was killed in a car accident yesterday while returning to her home after visiting her parents over the Christmas holidays. Miranda Hale, 25 years old, daughter of Mike and Kathy, sister to Justin, and mother of Kyler. It just reminded me of how quickly things change and how if you have dreams, you better live them now. Here's the article.

I lost a friend today. Too suddenly. Too young. And before I had a chance to really know her. I didn’t know her dreams. What did she really want ? What did she want to be? I know she had plans for someday. “Someday” when the kids are grown. “Someday” when she and her husband had saved enough money. I last saw her two days before she died. She had eight children at home, six of them adopted. They had just moved into a beautiful home. She wasn’t ill. She didn’t have the time to prepare herself or her family for this unexplainable loss. None of us were prepared. Since her death, I’ve wondered if she could have known what would she have done different. She was 31 years old and gone overnight. Her “somedays” are spent. Her dreams untouched.

Death causes us all to take stock of our own lives. An unexpected death lends a sense of urgency to this contemplation. A fear of being cheated of all life has to offer us. “Did I live my life the way I wanted to?” is a question all of us will have to answer someday. Almost daily someone approaches me and says “I wish I could do what you’re doing.” I’ve given up assuring them that they can do anything they want to do because they will not be convinced.

All of us that have decided to go off and live on a boat have had hurdles to bound. It requires sacrifices and, most importantly, compromises to live the life we want. Believe me, when the captain first started talking about living on a sailboat, I tucked that notion away very securely in the “future” file. After all, it just wasn’t possible. I had sons in high school who were not going to be convinced to give up their social life to go live on a boat. I also was the child that had lived closest to my father since my mother died. And let’s not forget our jobs and our bills.

Stubbornly, the captain kept pulling the dream out of the file. He didn’t want to get too old to live his dream. As health care professionals, we had witnessed too many times the scenario of the retiree who waited too long and was not healthy enough to enjoy what he had worked for all of his life. So we started jumping those hurdles. My sons already lived with their father for six months of the year which would allow us to live the dream at least part-time. My father is a pretty independent old cuss who really doesn’t need his youngest daughter fawning over him. Besides, without me being so conveniently located maybe the rest of the kids would come around more often. We sold the big house and most of the stuff. We quit our jobs and bought a boat.

There are still times I question if we’ve done the right thing. My father fell and broke his shoulder a year ago and I wasn’t able to get there right away. I’d like to see more of my youngest son’s football games and I miss my family and friends but the captain compromises with me by letting me fly back home when I feel the need. This keeps everybody happy. Although we’ve been lucky with employment so far, we always have to cross our fingers when it’s time to come back to Kansas for our six months on the hard that we’ll be able to find work. Currently the captain drives 80 miles one way every day to work. That is sacrifice!

But today, when I learned of my friend’s death, I felt so fortunate that we’ve decided to live our life as we do. There will always be other places I want to see and more people I want to meet, but I am so very thankful for the dreams I have realized in the places I have seen and the friends I have made.

We all have a choice in how we live our lives, no matter how hard we try to convince ourselves that we don’t. Live the life you want now—before “someday” is out of reach. What are you waiting for?

Lastly, take a moment today and everyday to treasure the warmth of the sun, the energy of the wind, and the majesty of the ocean—for Evelyn and Miranda. And drink some cheap whiskey for my dad, Joe.


Happy New Year! Go Out and Live It.