Finally one about sailing

I remember a time when we were good at sailing. In the latter half of our San Juans trip, leaving Friday Harbor to start a 30-mile sail across the strait, we encountered a 50’some-foot trimaran with an experienced sailing couple aboard going the same way. Without either crew recognizing it, we started to race. To get out to the larger Sound, we had to pass between two arms of the island, upwind through a wide passage. The day was slightly overcast and the wind was strong and steady.

Harmony and I became a machine, running through tacks frequently and with precision and speed. The trimaran took long, swift, swooping zig zags, at once behind, then in front. When meeting on a tack we offered courtesy, then received it on the next. Overall despite our smaller size, our line was closer to the wind and we emerged into the strait at the same time as the large and graceful trimaran – if not a little ahead. Seeing as how we’d pretty much taught each other how to sail over the past year, starting from next to no knowledge, it was a big moment for us.

The VHF crackled to life. “Nice to meet you! You should look for us in Port Townsend when you get there!”

Punks.

That was almost three years ago. This year, we’ve been sailing twice. One, two. There was a third attempt, but it was cut short due to an engine overheat alarm soon after leaving the dock. What with Harmony’s school and my work and trip prep, not to mention a rainy spring and early summer, it’s no surprise that it hasn’t been more often. Though it is regrettable.

The first of these times was with Harmony’s Mom and her six-year old niece on a blustery April day. The last time we’d been sailing was probably last August, maybe September. In hindsight, this is perhaps not the most forward-thinking situation I’ve gotten myself into.

Captain, might I suggest we tack away from shore? Say, in 10 seconds? Or right now? Captain? Captain!

We got off the dock just fine, but already Harmony and I were not in sync with the steps that come immediately after – the closing of the lifelines, hauling of fenders, coiling of rope that makes the old girl ready to travel. The kind of crappy thing about being the “Captain”, a designation that changes hands with the tiller, is that you’re confined to the middle of the cockpit. Instead of doing all the tasks in front of your eyes, you’re relegated to gesturing and giving orders, or in the case of Harmony making increasingly polite and urgent requests.

Then it came time to raise the sails. Harmony hopped up to the front to tie the sheets (a.k.a. ropes, don’t ask me why) to the jib, which was something I had forgotten to do before we left like I used to.

We spent the next minutes drifting in the river slowly toward shore as Harmony, hunched on the boat’s peak, tried over and over again to remember how to tie a bowline knot. On our first day as sailboat owners, our guide and Harmony’s family friend showed us this one (pronounced bo-lin) and said that it would be the most useful knot we ever learned. We should know how to do it one-handed with our eyes closed. Then he demonstrated.

Harmony finally conquered the knots and I hauled the jib up with the tiller end wedged into my lower back, trying poorly to keep us on course. When the sail unfurled, the other ends of the jib sheets flapped across the deck and into the air. I’d forgotten to preemptively wrap them on our winches. With Harmony back in the cockpit, she grasped a sheet and doe-see-doed it from one side to the other on the winch, trying to decide which way it goes. The riverside was only a stone’s throw away and getting closer, and there were pilings in the water. Without air in the jib, we were about 20 seconds from catching our keel on the bottom of the river, maybe fewer.

I reminded her that the sheets wrap clockwise, low to high, and suggested that she hurry. If you can imagine polite barking, that’s probably an apt description for the tone of my request as I gripped tightly on the tiller.

Then we were sailing! Total elapsed preparation time: 20 minutes, at least. Harmony looked at me and blew her hair out of her face. We smiled and shrugged.

The sailing itself probably only lasted another 45 minutes. The gusts of wind had our toe rail about a foot off the river, which was extremely entertaining to the six-year-old as she slid down one side of the lazarette and down the other again on each tack. Those tacks were clumsy affairs, full of discussion where once was choreography.

Harmony’s Mom was valiant, positive, and stoic, which made it pretty clear to me that she was a little freaked out but didn’t want us to feel bad. Harmony and I looked at each other for a few moments as the wind aggressively freshened our faces. We were a little freaked out too. It was time to quit while we were ahead.

Now that’s more like it!  Totally worth 3 hours of waiting for wind.

The second sailing outing this year was with friends and had the tenor of a booze cruise, and it’s hard to practice precision sailing when one hand is always dedicated to snacks or beer. Plus it was one of those days on the river where the wind is low from the west and the current is strong. This means that you’ll spend 3 hours going downwind and upriver (if you’re lucky), then spend 10 exciting minutes coming back the other way as the only payoff. Not exactly an Olympic training ground, but a confidence builder nonetheless.

The point of all of this is that we have some practicing to do. I think it’s also a fair description of what it’s like to have a partner through graduate school. You cut some of the usual pleasures out of your life and lash yourselves down to survive together. Once it’s over, you have to clean up and come back to those old pleasures and hope it doesn’t take long to remember how to do them so they can be as fun again. I very much look forward to our next race.

Harmony has started to play with a knot practicing kit for before bed. Every now and again she’ll grab up a piece of string in the cabin and start whipping her fingers around it like a conjurer. A few moments and then VOILA!

A slip knot. Half the time at least. I take the string and a moment later hand the correct knot back to her to dissect.

Don’t tell her, but to this day my bowlines are still only 50/50. I just usually do both ways really quick so no one notices. But with her, I can just do whatever way she didn’t try. I gotta get those manly moments in somehow.

Silly hats are key to sailing prowess.