It was 2:52 a.m. and I was lying awake, orchestrating the next three days and seven hours (roughly the time between then and when we would pull into the ferry line). I was planning, hour by hour, the time I had to finish getting my sailboat, Kagán, put to bed for her winter slumber. Since it’s dewy in the mornings, I would clean the fridge and do laundry until the cockpit enclosure dried the next day, at which point we would take it down. The day after, pack suitcases until the boat dried out, then put the cover on. The minute-by-minute organizing felt like quite the contrast to going with the flow, as we did so much of this sailing season.
This life in two places is a balancing act. It gets pretty tippy at the transitions from one place to the other. Like now. And it all seems to go better with a good plan.
It was also a balancing act, that night—let go and sleep, snuggled and warm in Kagán’s v-berth or switch the light on, pull a sweatshirt over my head, and grab a pen and notebook in order to not lose the words that had started forming these very sentences (knowing they would elude me in the morning, if I didn’t)?
Plan or play? Consistency or spontaneity? I am so fortunate, and grateful, that these are the balancing acts I get to live these days.
Speaking of consistency, since August, I have been posting my ramblings on the 10th and 25th of the month. Two months is not a long run, I know, but being consistent starts somewhere. The plan is to continue, and I feel determined.
As I also discovered in the wee hours that morning, when the words come spontaneously, I should capture them, even if it would be easier to turn over and tug the covers up to my chin. By 3:20 a.m. that late summer night, I decided I had scribbled enough. It was time to turn the light out and let Kagán’s gentle motion rock me back to sleep.
When I woke the next day, plan in hand, I let myself savor a steaming cup of green tea before clicking my (metaphorical) stopwatch on with its countdown to the ferry. After all, there are pluses and minuses to both planning and playing, consistency and spontaneity. I’d like to maximize the plus side of my ongoing balancing act.
It seems that each summer, one creature or another comes to us in a way that defines the sailing season. That the wind and weather, the landscapes and seascapes, and their inhabitants distinguish one day from another aboard delights me. I remember—2007 was the summer of mama Mergansers with their myriad ducklings, Pacific white-sided dolphins claimed 2011 in a most amazing way, and in 2019 it was the season for seeing Humpback whales. Other years our totems were Bald eagles, Harbor seals, Marbled murrelets, Orca, Great Blue herons, Harbor porpoises, and Rhinoceros auklets. From the small to the mighty, they fill my mind with wonder and my heart with joy. This summer has been the season of Purple martins in all their iridescent splendor.
The first morning aboard Kagán, I woke to their melodies. Seems they nest atop the pilings in our new home port of Friday Harbor. Each day of recommissioning the boat began with their serenades. I admit to grumbling at some of those early wake-up calls—at this latitude, the days dawn well before five as the summer solstice nears. And there’s no snooze button when your alarm clock is singing the day in from the rigging. But, oh the stunning sunrises I would’ve slept through without them.
And each time back and forth—as I went to the shower room or laundry or a coffee shop for a latte or just to take a walk—they scolded me for passing beneath their territory. Maybe it was my imagination, but as the days went by, their chattering lessened as they got used to my comings and goings. I became a neighbor, rather than an intruder.
Though in past years, I had seen the occasional Purple martin, throughout this season they crossed our paths. I’d catch the trilling—so familiar to me from Friday Harbor—sometimes at distant docks, sometimes at anchor, often to start the day at dawn or to end it as the sun sank. While on the hook in Gig Harbor, a flock of them fluttered in and out of Kagán’s rigging—clinging to the shrouds, perched upon the radar dome, and even settling onto the boom just feet above our heads while we watched and listened from the cockpit.
So, for me, this is the summer of Purple martins, and their songs will bring memories to my mind of this particular sailing season. I feel so grateful that nature, and my neighbors in it, define my days.
I love when a fellow sailor pauses on the dock to tell me what a beautiful boat we have. Kagán, however, is not only beautiful, she is also a great sailing, and liveaboard, vessel. But that doesn’t happen without a lot of work behind the scenes. The last few weeks have been filled with those tasks.
We’re at the end of a long haul-out in which we’ve done some work ourselves (like polishing and waxing the hull and oiling the interior woodwork) and hired experts for even more (like stripping and refinishing the brightwork, and complex work on the engine and marine drive system). Kagán is 22 years old now, and it was time for some deep diving into her engine for more than routine maintenance. This investment will pay off, I hope, with many sailing seasons aboard a safe and well-functioning vessel. And, of course, a beautiful one. But it has, at times, felt like barely managed chaos.
As I contemplated riding those waves of chaos with some semblance of calm, it occurred to me that this is not unlike writing for me. There is so much that goes on behind the, literal, scenes of a novel. All of which has to happen (and happen and happen, in the case of writing multiple drafts) for the final story to sail along.
Doing the work behind the scenes, sometimes for weeks and sometimes years, is what makes a boat, or a book, work. It’s what makes them beautiful.
Visiting with a New Mexico friend before leaving the Land of Enchantment for parts north, and the sailing season on Kagán, she asked me how we decide where to go. The answer is that sometimes there are places we need to be on particular dates, and sometimes we have a general idea of a new place we’ve heard about or an old favorite we’d like to get back to, and then there are times we don’t have any agenda, except to go with the flow. Literally.
This summer, there were a few dates when we needed to be one place or another—like in Poulsbo for a friend’s daughter’s wedding or Bell Harbor in downtown Seattle to pick up other friends for a short cruise, and now, Port Townsend for a much needed haulout. But the rest of the season so far, we went with the flow. By checking tides and currents ahead of time, and planning for shorter trips, we could hoist our sails and ride the wind (and current), even if there was just a light breeze (which is often the case during the Salish Sea summers). Having a loose plan at bedtime, we might alter it over morning coffee if conditions differed from those forecast. Or we might be up at dawn to catch a favorable tide, and be rewarded with a stunning sunrise before casting off.
Sometimes going with the flow means going slow, like really slow—2 knots of speed through the water (which is sometimes what we get) translates to going 2.3 miles per hour. If we were to have a knot of current going in the same direction, at that water speed, we’d be moving at a whopping 3.5 miles per hour. Hence the planning for short distance days. But believe it or not, it’s fun! And relaxing. Wildlife, like the normally shy Harbor porpoises, come closer to Kagán since we’re gliding through the water so quietly. My first mate can take an afternoon nap in that same serene quiet, his snores from below louder than the sounds of sailing.
Other days, with more wind, we’ll get a brisker ride. Less relaxing, and more exciting. But no matter what, when the engine goes off, the magic begins. I have delighted in the magic of those days throughout this summer. Going with the wind and water, riding along with what nature provides rather than bucking it, is teaching me to live with less of an agenda and more patience.
As with so much of life aboard, there is a lesson about life in general, if I’m paying attention. If I could integrate more less-agenda/more-patience moments into my life, I might find another kind of magic—like savoring the satisfaction of a day well lived, even a mellow day. I tend to feel guilty about those—not embracing the value of restoring myself nearly as much as pushing myself to cross just one more thing off my overloaded ‘to do’ list.
I can imagine balancing life, like I’ve learned to balance Kagán with sail trim. Nancy Erley, my sailing mentor, taught me certain principles, then also encouraged me to experiment—pull a sail in or let it out a bit, to see what it gets Kagán in terms of speed or comfort. Sometimes both. It’s time for this sailor to experiment with going with the flow, both aboard and ashore. With that in mind—fair winds and following seas!
I have been writing for decades, but I have only been authoring (which I admit may not be a word, but let’s just say it is) a brief time. I am contemplating the contrast between writing and authoring this morning.
Writing is a process I felt a pull toward, like it was calling me. That call came years before I heeded it. And when I finally responded, it set me off on a journey that challenged me in ways I never would have imagined. I am a writer, just as I am a geologist—those are lenses through which I view the world, as well as how I view myself in it.
After walking the writing path for some time, I began to think about authoring and what that might mean. For me, it means my stories might touch another’s mind or heart. From exploring alone in my library, I stepped out, sending words forth for others to read, and hopefully to connect with. Along the way, they did—with readers. And later, a literary agent. Then later still, a publisher. And on April 9, 2024, I will be the author of the novel, No More Empty Spaces.
What I am learning now is that the skillsets—of writer and author—are quite different. As are the interiority versus exteriority of each. I plan to savor being an author as much as being a writer, without forgetting that writer comes first. In the coming months, I will be marching forward into the world, and out of my comfort zone, as an author. But before I do, I feel the need to retreat a bit, to reconnect with myself as a writer. So I’ll be going inside to find the words, then I’ll see you out there again in a month or two.
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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