Joe, it's true! The Unicorns Come All By Themselves! (Joe sent me this great article the other day: http://tarrantworks.com/2004/01/01/unicorns-come-all-by-themselves/ ). This unicorn graced me with its presence right after I got a temporary resident library card at Rogers Free Library in Bristol Rhode Island where I checked out the books called Daring Greatly and On Looking, Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes. Then Adam took me to a great consignment store where I found some Unexpected Treasures. (He really knows the way to my heart.) Add in a breakfast date with a new friend (who I met in sailing class) at the delightful & delicious Sunset Cafe and that's a lot of blessings to count. ❤️
In the lovely town of Bristol, Rhode Island, the l...
In the lovely town of Bristol, Rhode Island, the library and the post office are right next door to each other, just like in the lovely town of Basalt, Colorado.
I was pulled over by the police on my way to the library because the officer couldn't see a license plate on the jeep. The temporary plate is very difficult to see. Nicest officer ever, besides you, Adam, and you, all of my former colleagues. His name tag on his uniform had BPD on it. Just like the officers in Basalt.
Beds & breakfast, part II We've ordered a new V b...
Beds & breakfast, part II
We've ordered a new V berth mattress and new cockpit cushions. ETA: 4 weeks. We've bought a twin size memory foam mattress for the aft quarter berth and stuffed extra pillows and sheets along the edges. That is where we have been sleeping.
Breakfast has evolved into a routine of green tea and oatmeal for me and cereal bars and coffee for Adam.
I wouldn't call boat life comfortable yet, but it is mostly acceptable.
We've spent the past month learning how to live aboard and getting a lot of small kinks worked out. (Watch for a future post about all the things you can't take for granted if you live in a boat or in an RV.) We hope to spend the next month sailing, sailing, and more sailing.
We still have a lot of stuff in the RV that we need to move onto the boat or give away or sell. We have until Oct 1st to do so. (That's when it has to be moved out of the boatyard.)
I'm still homesick, but not to the point of tears numerous times a day. Now it's more like a good cry every other day and lots of heart pangs throughout each day. Funny, they still always take me by surprise. You'd think I would get used to them.
The jade plant in the photo is the only plant that came with us from our plant filled house. It has survived so many kinds of weather and motion. It was out on a picnic table one night at a campground on Cape Cod and some animal tried to eat it. It has scars and has survived the loss of so many leaves. But it has TONS of new growth. Jade, the Plant Being, and Dawn, the Human Being have been on a parallel journey. I can only hope that my new growth becomes as beautiful as Jade's.
Two days sailing logged. One short day and one ve...
Two days sailing logged. One short day and one very long day. Back on the mooring, now. Grateful for the help of new friends and old. Now, must sleep.
We're going sailing tomorrow! We are incredibly e...
We're going sailing tomorrow! We are incredibly excited. (We are told that sailing is the best part of living on a sailboat.). It will be our first time sailing #SVDeepPeace. We have help, too. We met some wonderful, generous, kindhearted people on the dock at the boatyard last weekend and they just happened to be experienced sailors and they invited us to come sailing with them on their boat, Undaunted Courage. So last Saturday that is exactly what we did. We took a break from bilge cleaning and the never ending game of Tetris that is living in a small space and we went sailing with Bob & Darcey. And a wonderful time was had by all!
After sailing they invited us to lunch with them at their friends' beach house. Their friends & sailing companions, Dave & Andie, were gracious hosts and shared many sailing stories with us. Our sailboat could be seen from their dining table-- neighbors! After lunch Adam & I reluctantly said our goodbyes to go back to our boat and continue the cleaning and repairing and sorting and organizing. Later the same day, I was delighted to receive text messages from Darcey inviting us to dinner and for a lazy river float in a nearby cove the following day. Even though we felt we had to decline the invitations and continue with our boat chores, we were so grateful to be invited.
By the end of the weekend we were making plans to spend some time together this weekend.
So, tomorrow, if the wind cooperates, we will sail and have lunch aboard Deep Peace. And our dear friends, Neil & Nina, who have been so helpful to us since we arrived on the east coast, will come down from Boston for the big first sail, too!
I couldn't be happier. For the first time in months I can play hostess. and finally! We are going sailing on our boat!!! Wildly, this is our life. I still don't quite understand it.
Tell me your secrets.
Tell me your secrets.
Each day I do yoga on the bow of the boat. Each day I ask the ocean to tell me her secrets. One day she reveals what it feels like on my hands when the wind changes directions. Another day, when the surface of the water is glass smooth, I see silvery flashes just below the surface. They are tiny silver fish swimming in a school. I watch and a cormorant arrives to get her breakfast from the school. She dives in and chases them around, often coming up without anything, but not giving up, and soon emerging with a silvery fish in her beak. Another day I see the school of tiny silver fish and then notice glints of an almost neon green deeper in the water. Bigger fish. Looking for breakfast from the school. The ocean reveals her secrets in her own time. Daily yoga on the bow of the boat and almost daily paddles in the kayak mean I am there to witness the secrets as they are offered. And to witness my own rhythms, my own depths.
Today I did the entire Bikram standing series out on the bow, with the boat moored on a ball next to a busy channel with lots of boats going by. I felt self conscious. A boat driver whistled a cat call kind of whistle. Briefly, I wanted to stop, to hide my practice away inside the boat. But I stayed on deck and continued. Nothing to be ashamed of or embarrassed by. Just me and the ocean and the wind having a quiet conversation.
Do you have secrets waiting to be told to an attentive listener? What are you learning about these days? Who are your confidants?
the music question
if you were going to take 3 (or 5, or 10) albums with you on a long journey, what would they be? why?
something for dancing?
a lullaby?
a love song?
something for laughing?
something for brain food?
somethings for singing along?
Exactly what Adam said...
Exactly what Adam said when I told him that Brittany & Michael were really, truly, seriously ready to buy our house. That was back in April (the 11th, to be exact). Today, I find this as we are sorting out what to put back on the boat. (after having taken every single item out of the boat, deep cleaning every nook and cranny, and now officially moving on board, minus beds) This was in a book that was left behind by the previous owner.
hot day. rain.
It was a very hot and humid day. We were cleaning various compartments and bilge areas (there are so many). Then there was a rainstorm in the mid afternoon. We stayed on deck and got soaked by nature's shower. It was so cooling, even a little cold. The rain stopped after about 20 minutes. Then the sun and a strong, steady breeze dried our skin. We took a short nap on the bow-- not sleeping, just resting-- so maybe I should say we had a short savasana on the deck. I felt very peaceful and at home. This is what I imagined it might be like to live on a sailboat.
Smell mitigation continues with some major breakthroughs.
5:53 pm and I am happy with this life today.
How has your day been? What's a good thing that happened in your world today? Any breakthroughs?
homesick, still (as in, continuing to be and also, not moving)
fb has just informed me that last year at this time I had just completed a hike to Hanging Lake with some dear, dear people and then I posted a lovely photo of the mountains out of the living room window of my favorite house that I have ever lived in in my entire life. two years ago on this day I was having my breath taken away by the very early morning views from Cottonwood Pass after dropping my Mom off at the airport, listening to KDNK, and heading home to sit in the hot tub and watch the humming birds. and 6 years ago today I had a lovely hike at the base of Mt Sopris with some other dear, dear people. I didn't know when I made those posts that they would simultaneously sooth and torture the future me. today I had a great vegan lunch in a magical place, I did some yoga on the bow of a sailboat, which was lovely, I saw a great lightning storm in a dramatically beautiful sky, and I felt homesick anyway. right now I am desperately scouring the internet for custom bed makers who can get some new beds made for #SVDeepPeace in less than 6 weeks and for some bilge cleaners for hire, as I don't feel up to the task and the smell in the boat has not been completely cleared up by changing the head hoses. some nice things: boxed red wine and good bread and cheese for dinner. a reasonably good internet connection. and Adam is still an even better husband than I ever could have imagined. soon, soon we hope to be actually sailing. that might be a nice thing to make all the other things seem less not nice.
one nice thing
One nice thing about our boat: It has a gas stove that is designed to not blow us up. It has a heat sensor near the burner that switches it off if it doesn’t sense heat.
I learned this when I got frustrated trying to turn on a burner. I would get it lit, which was a process in itself, and then it would immediately go out. After three rounds of this, when Adam heard me let out a big, long, exasperated, nearly defeated, sigh, he said, “You have to hold the handle in longer. If you let it out too soon it doesn’t know that it is burning and turns itself off to prevent the boat from getting filled up with propane.”
My slightly less annoyed than before reply, “So it’s designed to not blow us up?” His bemused response, “Yeah, something like that.”
One nice thing about my husband: He knows lots of things that could save our lives and quite a few things that can make our lives more comfortable.
I’m sure gas stoves all over the world have similar failsafe designs, but I don’t know those stoves, so I can’t write about them. They say to write what you know. Right now I know only that I have to learn lots of new things and adjust to very different ways of doing them while also being fairly uncomfortable at times.
One more nice thing about Adam: He touches my back when I feel sad or homesick or anxious, which activates the part of me that is designed to not blow us up. I seem to have a sensor that lets tears come out of my eyes when the pressure inside is getting too much. It’s a genius design, really.
When overwhelmed by frustration at things like slow progress in getting rid of ALL the smells and things like boat insurance companies who will not insure our boat unless it is out of the water, in New England, for the winter, plus serious heat and humidity (it felt like Arkansas or Oklahoma around here yesterday and last night), it helps a little to focus on some nice things.
What is one nice thing about your surroundings right now? What is one nice thing about your nearest loved one?
dreaming of Alice
I dreamed I gave birth to a baby girl named Alice Marie. Then woke up to see a post on fb in a group called Alice that led to an article in Marie Claire magazine. Hhhmmm. Shrug.
Over the years I have found it useful to consider that each character in my dream is actually a part of me. What part of me feels like it is giving birth to a new human being? What part of me feels like a baby? Alice Marie. A.M.
I AM. Hhhhmmm.
Do you remember your dreams? Do you think of them as messages from your subconscious or just as nonsense? Do have any particular way of interpreting them that has been edifying to you?
Beds and breakfast.
We had been eating at a lot of roadside stands and decided, for health and pocketbook reasons, that we needed to learn to eat on board and provision the boat well. (Thank you so very much to everyone who replied to my fb post question about what you would bring on a two week journey!) this morning we are having an easy snack for breakfast: "Mary's Gone Crackers Super Seed Classic" crackers with avocado topping. (And coffee made in a French Press).
Today our mission is to get some new bed mattresses for the forward and aft berths (both bedrooms). The old ones were a little old, and a little smelly, so we tossed them out. It isn't as simple as just going to the mattress store and buying new mattresses. The bed spaces are oddly shaped, so we have to measure and have them made.
Smell mitigation is coming along.
Photo: boat breakfast today.
why we haven't been sailing yet.
We haven't been sailing yet. Why? Because the boat is not yet registered in our name. We have to wait for it to be deleted from the Australian registry so we can register it in the US. Meanwhile, we are finishing up the changing of the head hoses. This is one of the least pleasant boat maintenance jobs that there is. And just when it was almost done, we ran out of hose. So off we went to West Marine again. We now go to West Marine as often as we used to go to Lowe's in Glenwood Springs. The cashiers have begun to recognize us.
Then back to the boat, Adam had all the parts put back together when he discovered that the macerator has a blown fuse. He is now looking into all the "Very Useful Boxes" in which the previous owner had stashed all sorts of very useful things, looking for a fuse.
When this job is finally done, we can clean the bilges, which, it must be said, are not very dirty as far as bilges go.
I can't imagine anyone I would rather be on this boat with - Adam is a mechanical genius. And he just found fuses!! I am incredibly lucky to be married to Adam and I know it. And we are incredibly lucky to have this particular boat. And we know it. Even though there are unpleasant bits. That would be true on any boat and in any house.
In the time it took me to type the above paragraph Adam put in a new fuse. And it blew immediately. He is currently investigating the cause. I have faith that he'll have it all sorted before bedtime.
homesickness
I desperately miss my mountains: the smell of sage and juniper, the twisty piñon pines, the long views, the rivers, the wide open spaces. I desperately miss the profound quiet and the chats with neighbors. I am hopelessly homesick. The water is beautiful but I have not yet learned its language. In my dreams I have fallen asleep on a kayak in the river and awakened in crowded, unfamiliar lands. I have no internal maps of this place. In the daytime I am well and happy to explore this new life. At sunset I begin to ache for high altitudes and solid ground beneath my feet. How to proceed? Just breathe. And let the tears flow. At sunrise my internal cartographer, linguist, and oceanographer will begin again.
a traveler's heart song
there are songs made of confusion, chaos, leaving and love.
there are bags made out of recycled pop bottles that can hold your pens, journals, postage stamps.
there are political revolutions made out of heartaches transformed.
there are bicycles that fold up so small you can put them in a suitcase.
there are podcasts with poets who are no longer living, but yet still are sharing wisdom -- heartfelt, wholehearted. and books about daring greatly, falling down, rising strong.
there is green grass (so green it glows), blue sky, white clouds, yellow dandelions.
there is cold air -- brisk, fresh. and warm air that turns sea to mist.
there are ways to navigate that require no instruments, ways to travel that require no movement.
once I stood on a mountaintop and breathed in the sky.
today I have a headdress made of clouds, boots made of waves, jewelry made of stars.
~ by dawn on a mountain, April 2016 and dawn on a sailboat, August 2016
Rainy day. Repairs. On the water in Rhode Island...
Rainy day. Repairs. On the water in Rhode Island.
Yesterday was laundry day. Laundry day is a little different when you live on a boat on a mooring ball in the middle of a bay.
Today we are doing important maintenance and repairs on the head (toilet) hoses and holding tanks of #SVDeepPeace .
Tomorrow or Thursday will be bilge cleaning. Yum! (No. Not really.)
This little book (see photo below) is helping me keep my sense of humor. It was left on the boat (with loads of other very useful things) by the previous owner. Each time we open another drawer or look into another storage space we are overwhelmed by the previous owner's attention to detail and organization skills. We are super lucky to be the owners of this particular boat.
There are some not fun parts of boat ownership and some steep learning curves, but this is true of almost everything. Most of the fun things come with their own particular challenges to overcome. Once we get the chores done, the fun can begin. (Right? Someone please say I'm right about this.)
My beautiful, smelly life.
What? Smelly? Yep. The boat cabin has a bad smell, actually a couple of bad smells. We have spent the past two days trying to determine the sources and fix the problem. One of the smells is just your basic run of the mill mildew. A thorough cleaning from top to bottom will get rid of it, most likely. The other is more like porta-potty and has the effect of making me insta-irritable. Ah. New adventures and new challenges. Found a book online that promises to help solve ALL boat odor problems. It only comes in physical form, so my goal today is to find a nearby address where I can have it delivered ASAP.
Hanging out at the West Marine store. It's a bit ...
Hanging out at the West Marine store. It's a bit overwhelming.
