6/26/10
We’ve been working on getting ourselves shoved off now for over 3 years. And now we are just 3 months or so away from our proposed leave date, 10/10/10. As the day comes nearer the excitement and anxiety and the stress is increasing. I feel like we have bled, sweated, pissed and shat ourselves into the projects on this boat. We’ve busted our knuckles removing and replacing thru-hulls. We’ve sanded our fingerprints off in the bilges. Despite masks and gloves we have had more fiberglass dust in our eyes, mouths, armpits, kneepits, and all over our bodies then we care to think about. We feel like we are dangerously close to reaching our lifetime dose of epoxy. The frustration of trying to finish all of our projects in time is overwhelming and we sometimes take it out on each other. We are terrible at trying to make money, save money and spend money all at the same time (actually we are good at spending money). We are finding it difficult to grant quality time to all our friends and family before we leave and maintain our strict schedule of “work at our jobs for 7 days/work on the boat for 7 days”. I get pissed and curse the names of people we hear about who are living the dream we have dreamed. I feel jealous when others are doing what we want to do and seemingly have had an easier time getting there, have more money to spend, have a nicer boat, or have accomplished these goals at a younger age than us. I want to spit on the ground when we hear about all these young kids who’s daddies handed them a boat, outfitted it with top of the line gear, and fly around the world to meet them in port and pay for their repairs.
Then right when I’m about to freak the fuck out Meghan calms me down and reminds me how lucky we are. We’re lucky we have each other and we both desire the same goal, instead of one of us dragging the other along. We’re lucky we found a derelict vessel that we could afford to turn into a badass ocean cat. We’re lucky we have jobs that (although we don’t love them) allow us to work 12 hour shifts so we can have 7 days off in a row. We’re lucky we don’t love our jobs and don’t have an inkling of hesitation about walking away from them. We’re lucky to have the friends and family support we have. Most of all we are lucky to have been born in America, where we can make this happen for ourselves. How can we bitch about other little punks and their rich daddies when our families have been nothing short of instrumental in getting us to where we are today, maybe not with cold cash but with advice and sweat equity. Who are we to complain about unfinished boat projects or the size of our bank account. So many others have done so much more with so much less. Everybody in this world is doing the exact same thing: taking advantage of the opportunities life has presented them with the best way they know how. You can’t fault others for having different opportunities than you, and vice versa. The best we can do is the best we can do.
Meg is quick to point out that so many different factors will determine what type of trip someone has, you know, what the experience will be. Things like when you leave, what boat you have, how it is outfitted, how much money you have, if you take your dog or not, if you have to go find water instead of make it, if you like to eat at Macdonald’s or if you prefer to let the land and sea feed you, how prone you are to sea sickness, etc. She tells me not to try and make this trip fit some kind of mold, not to force it to be something. I may not even know what I want it to be yet. And there is no point in worrying about any one of these factors that could change it, let alone all of them. We just have to do the best we can and then go.
Once Meghan slaps my perspective back into focus I usually feel a lot better. She’s had to do this half a dozen times or so in the last 3 years. Then I’m comfortable relying on our abilities to make due with what we have. I’m confident we can take advantage of the opportunities life presents us with. That’s what sailors have been doing for thousands of years. For us, now seems as good a time as any to start.
