December 2000 - Confirmation
Every 45 to 55 days for about six hours, this thing just consumes us.
It starts like this: I am at work. Suddenly, I send an instant message to Michael saying something similar to "Help. I must leave this office today and never come back. Let's sell the boat, buy another for $15K and go to Mexico next summer!"
For the next four hours, we go on a furious search on Yachtworld.com for the perfect 25-30' sailboat. We send messages to each other with links and text such as, "how about this one?", "let's go look at this boat on Saturday!", "How much does a new bottom job cost on a 25' boat?". For hours, we torture ourselves with the thought that if we could sell Jenny P and buy one of these cheap little wonder cruisers, our debt erased, we could give our notice for good in four months. Throw the boat on a trailer and by next fall be floating in the bluegreen water of the Sea of Cortez. Live there for years, just floating around in the sunshine with the dolphins.
I think of all the varnishing I must get done on Jenny P in the spring, determined the next boat will have NO teak. We narrow our list down to boats with an outboard rudder and tiller, to ensure our steering problems are minimized, or so we hope. Plus we've been reading lots of Lin and Larry. We do calculations: if we can make $X selling Jenny P, and buy another boat for $15K, that will leave us $Y for cruising with for years. We think: sails will be cheaper, ground tackle lighter; forget the watermaker, we'll carry gerry jugs for water. And I can get rid of the few dressy clothes that are wrinkled and damp and moldy in our hanging locker -- no need for those in sunny Mexico! For a few hours, hope is restored in our dreary workday lives. No traffic! No rain! No work! Why not?
Then other thoughts emerge: we'll have to remember to grab the solar panel we bought for Jenny P last summer. Oh yes, and what about the E-meter? We'll still have to keep track of batteries and that was a nice addition. I’ll miss all our shelves of books; probably won’t fit those on a twenty-five footer. Oh man, what about the fabulous new cushy custom innerspring mattress we had made for the Pullman berth? That will be missed when we're sleeping on four-inch foam again. Remember all those hours spent designing and installing our wind generator pole, including the time we were braiding 30 foot lengths of wire on the dock? What about the cats? Where would we put a litter box? Maybe we'll have to leave them at home....
Before we know it, the fog has cleared from our minds and we're thinking, geez, we'll miss Jenny P.
Then we panic.
How could we think that? How could we possibly sell our beloved boat that took us all the way to Alaska and back this summer faithfully? How could we ever be comfortable sleeping in any other berth than the one in which we're bathed in her glorious golden teak? All the money, and more importantly the hours of loving care we've given Jenny P... and the strength and protection she has given us so far. And we got engaged sitting on her very settees! We feel blasphemous.
At home that night, we tiptoe onto her decks as we unlock the companionway and creep down the stairs. Silently, I start to clean the bits of crusty food off her galley counter and Michael picks up the latest mess the cats have made with Jenny P's carpets. Besieged with guilt, we don't want her to know what we were thinking earlier that day, and try to make up for it with our silent busywork.
Later, when we feel she isn’t listening, we talk about what happened. Again. We realize that this may be a test, of our own determination, patience, or our endurance; probably all three. Or maybe just a reminder to us that what we have is perfect.
And once again we fall in love with Jenny P. We get out our to-do list and calendar and plan for the day when we will really leave for good with her. The dream is renewed, and us with it.-sdj-
