Kagán (pronounced ka-gone) means light in the Tlingit language, and this magic carpet that sails me around the Salish Sea has been a source of light in my life for twenty summers. She has made dreams come true, mine, for sure. But first, she was the culmination of a years-long dream for my late partner, Jerry.
After thinking on it long and hard, he decided to sell a house he never thought he’d let go (he’d been there while walking through a dark time of deep grief, and it had helped heal him), but he realized that if he sold that house he could buy the boat of his dreams, and move from darkness to light. Hence Kagán. When I would ask him if he missed the house, he always answered with a resounding “No!” because he was fulfilling his dream on Kagán.
She has been mine since Jerry left her to me, after he died of cancer. Sometimes she drains my savings account, but she always fills my heart with wonder and my life with adventure. I have learned so much and changed in huge and positive ways sailing Kagán. What a privilege it has been, and is (yes, I’m swinging at anchor as I write these words).
And speaking of Privilege, the first cruise-and-learn I did was on a boat named just that.
For so many, buying a boat is the realization of a dream and naming it (no, it doesn’t have to be gendered, but more on that later) is an important statement about that dream. Here are just a few boat names I’ve seen (or heard on the VHF radio) over the years: Sea Sparrow, Osprey, Peregrine, Heaven Can Wait, Wayfinder, Wander, Yonder, Tethys, Trinity, Sirius, Loki, Ta Da, Isobar, Providence, Adventuress, Imagine, Waitabit, Winter Solstice, Gypsy Spirit, Wind Dancer, Rendezvous, Moondance, Glorybe, Gemini, Seeker, and Sundance.
There are hundreds (that I have seen, and probably tens of thousands out there) of boats named for beloved women in mariners’ lives. A little internet research reveals that, yes, boats (particularly sailing vessels) are traditionally given female names and referred to with feminine pronouns due to a combination of historical, linguistic, and cultural factors. The practice stems from ancient maritime traditions in which ships were personified as nurturing, like mothers, or protective and/or powerful, like goddesses. And in some languages, the word for ship is grammatically feminine. This linguistic influence carried over into English, despite the fact that in English most objects are assigned gender-neutral pronouns.
Then there are the play-on-word names, like Important Business (Can’t you just hear them saying, “Sorry, I can’t take that meeting. . .I’m away on Important Business.”), Partnership, Friendship, Finalee, @ Ease, and Going Overboard (Really. . . someone named their boat Going Overboard. The Coast Guard was not amused.) And there are more ‘knotty’ and ‘knot’ name iterations than I could imagine, like Y-Knot, Knot Dreamin’,Knotty Girl, and more (just think of how many names you can could come up with using ‘sea’ or ‘nauti’ or ‘ship’).
Words in different languages, like Kagán, with meanings that are, well, meaningful to the mariner abound. I think I’ve seen ten boats named Andiamo this year alone. And today, I met the owner of Terrwyn, the Celtic word for ‘precocious young child.’ Then there are those names that seem to challenge Poseidon or Aeolus (that would make this superstitious sailor nervous, but others have embraced), like Wave Catcher, Wind Tamer, Tsunami, and Storm Chaser.
I’m sure each name means something important to the boater who chose it. and that’s intriguing, whether I can understand the meaning behind it, or not.
So, please, take a moment and tell me what’s in a name for you. What name would you bestow upon a boat of your own, and why?
“Am I done yet?” is a question any sailor might ask about her boat on any given day. Kagán has undergone hundreds of projects, large and small, during our decades together. From my first summer as first mate when we hardly left the dock while reconfiguring her windlass (for the non-nautical, that is the equipment used to deploy and retrieve the anchor) to replacing her standing rigging to installing new electronics to redesigning her staysail rigging to having new sails made—and that’s just naming a few of the bigger undertakings. And then there’s the ‘around again’ projects that need to be started over as soon as I’ve finished, like scrubbing and polishing. It’s not simply scrubbing; it all fits into what I believe about life on Kagán—if I take care of her, she’ll take care of me. And maybe that’s not just about boats. . . .
But back to projects, the biggest and longest project I’ve taken on is re-powering Kagán (well, really, our exceptional marine diesel mechanic took it on, but you get the idea). Re-powering means that Kagán’s auxiliary engine has been replaced, and believe me, this is big—both in the engineering and the implementation. This project has just been completed, I think. I say “I think” because I thought it was done two months ago, and it wasn’t quite, since one of the brand new pumps on the brand new engine had a bad seal and needed to be replaced.
All of this asking—am I done yet?—has made me consider (after only 20 summers aboard), whether boat projects are ever quite complete. And it has also made me realize that boats (or houses or gardens or careers or relationships, or people) have projects, or are projects, that will never be done. Because it’s more than just scrubbing. It’s more than making things shine (though making things look beautiful can, indeed, be satisfying). It’s about making things work, and how things work can change with time, innovation, and discovery. The realities of ‘living the dream’ are sometimes not so dreamy—it’s not all cocktails (or shrimp cocktails) in the cockpit or sailing into the sunset—but maybe that makes the reality even more rewarding.
So, I’m learning to embrace that my beloved boat will never be “done,” and neither will I—whether I’m polishing her stainless steel to both look brilliant and be protected from the elements (my current ‘around again’ project) or exploring what makes me tick at any given time. And rather than striving to be “done,” I’m working on loving (or at least not grumbling about) the day-to-day process of boat, and life, projects.
“The cure for anything is saltwater: sweat, tears or the sea.”
—Isak Dinesen
I take nourishment, my vitamin sea, on Kagán each summer. Leaving the high desert in spring, means the winds go from an assault of airborne grit to a means of locomotion on my fair little ship. The rhythm of my days slows from 75 mph on an interstate to a few knots upon rippled waters. Though mostly calming, those few knots (not many mph. since a knot is 1.15 mph) can feel quite exciting. Some skippers say “under three turn the key”—as in under three knots of boat speed, turn the engine on. But on those days when the only goal is to go where the wind blows, I’m happy to ease along on a gentle breeze and a planned-for ride on the tide. My late partner, and Kagán’s previous skipper, would call it “sail drifting.”
While taking vitamin sea, for me, it’s all about tides and currents, wind and weather. Nature’s schedule and no one else’s govern mine.
This year especially, as I fight fear, hopelessness, and grief for the direction my beloved country is taking, I am deeply grateful for my dose of vitamin sea. As the Dinesen quote says, saltwater is the cure—my daily dose of sweat (both from exercise and boat work), tears (from that aforementioned fear and grief), and the powerful healing of the sea (in all its states, from those that demand respect to those that elicit profound peace).
“If the ocean can calm itself, so can you. We are both saltwater mixed with air.”
May sure was a month for me. Considering only my corner of the world (and not the calamity that is currently our country), it was a great month, but it was one for the books. Literally.
The independent bookstore in Albuquerque, Bookworks, where I’ve been a bookseller for years, and am now fortunate to be a partner, was the bookseller for the Santa Fe International Literary Festival from May 16-18. This was the festival’s fourth year and Bookworks’ first as its bookstore. And what a festival it was!
This gathering of amazing authors and avid readers was a celebration of stories—fiction and non, bold and quiet, the lives we live and where we live them. I feel honored to have played a part in it. And exhausted. I imagine our entire Bookworks team is too, but I’m not there to ask, because three days after the festival ended with Heather Cox Richardson’s inspiring interview, I hit the road without really having the chance to exhale.
Listening to two novels (it’s all about the books, after all) made the miles fly by. And I pulled into the parking lot of the Boat Haven Marina in Port Townsend, Washington after a few days, which included short visits with long-time friends and a few moments to exhale.
It was exciting to see Kagán afloat, after her winter on the hard being re-powered. That very afternoon, we did a sea trial with our stellar marine diesel mechanic, who not only installed the new engine but worked hard to re-engineer the structural issues that had contributed to the old one failing. Now, the next book on the pile to be read is the new engine’s manual.
So, May was one for the books. I hope June will be too, both reading and writing them. And although I’m a pretty high energy person and like it that way, I also hope for time to exhale, fully and deeply.
What do you hope for this month and for the summer?
“You were made and set here to give voice to this, your own astonishment.” —Annie Dillard
I hear Dorea’s pad crinkle when she rolls over and Moni’s mini sigh-snores sing softly in my left ear, parts of the music of the night—our third on this trip to Joshua Tree National Park, and our first lined up “cowgirl camping” style, under the stars, tents forsaken.
My spendy new sleeping pad provides a level of comfort I have never known when sleeping on the ground—ahhhh. My hip bones don’t ache in the morning and my toes are toasty all night long, even in the wee hours of morning, those chilly hours when I pull my shirt up around my nose because its tip gets cold peeking out of my sleeping bag. Turning onto my side, hoping the rustling doesn’t wake my companions, I think about taking another peek at the stars. They have been glorious this night, with no netting between me and them. But as my eyes flutter open, it is the half-moon rising I spy instead. It is lustrous behind a lacy curtain of clouds, and so beautiful that I gasp. Then hope, again, not to have wakened Dorea and Moni.
As I lie here, snug and warm, watching the glowing clouds shift with the breeze and the moon’s slow and steady climb, I think of the many amazing views I have seen and the many sweet songs I have heard from the cocoon of my sleeping bag.
Distant lightning in the chasm of the Grand Canyon.
The Milky Way glowing from horizon to horizon on dark desert nights.
A marmot’s morning chittering from the hollow trunk of a nearby snag.
An Alaskan sunset in the shadows of Denali (yes, in a sleeping bag, but perched upon a lounge chair, wine glass in hand, while our wilderness guide cooked dinner).
A crisp November night on the flat roof of my home in New Mexico watching the Leonid Meteors streak across the sky.
Almost putting my hand on a camouflaged horned toad as I slid out of my sleeping bag on a cool desert morning.
And like that night, so many other moonrises—from the barest of slivers to full moons bright enough to wake me with their light—live as treasured memories of car camping and backpacking trips with beloved friends and family.
What is the thread that sews all this together? Nurture in nature.
Places without air or light pollution. Time away from media—social and otherwise. I am deeply grateful for deep breaths of clean air, dark night skies, time to focus on the beauty around me, and the most important thing to put my attention on is placing my feet firmly with each step I take, literally. Maybe metaphorically too, because I come back from these times of nurturance feeling more solid in myself.
Now, more than ever, I need to nurture and strengthen myself. Perhaps you find your strength in nature too—whether hiking a rugged trail or listening to a songbird trill while you sip your morning coffee. Nature has the power to heal us, and we have the power to protect it. May we find it in ourselves to protect our beloved National Parks, National Monuments, and many other public lands—my backyard and yours—from those who don’t understand their value or the value of their stewards (like Park Rangers and wilderness fire fighters and research scientists, to name just a few, who are being let go by the thousands under the guise of saving money (when one less presidential golf outing would pay for any number of their annual salaries)).
So, I’ll take my strength from those nights in a sleeping bag, and use it to fight for the places where I love to do so, and more. What are you moved to fight for?
Geologists study the earth and the processes that shape it. Writers study the human heart and the processes that shape it. The GeologistWriter builds a bridge between the two. Come across it with me!
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