We are walking through Central Park on a beautiful May morning, two lovebirds, married these many years. It’s our third day in Manhattan, and it feels as though the city has opened its arms wide and hugged us. Everywhere we look is green and lush. We pass a bakery nestled deep inside the park and decide to return tomorrow for a coffee and treats.
We emerge from the meadows and winding paths to the thrum and bustle of the Upper West Side. We walk up Broadway looking for a stationery store that sells my kind of notebooks and the art supplies she needs for an upcoming drawing class. The store is nearby, and I’m scanning both the businesses along the street and the map on my phone.
Without warning, Lisa stops. She points to a store sign and speaks a series of numbers. A SEPHORA sign comes out as 8-4-3-5. The neon TD Bank sign is another string of numbers. I look at her closely to see if she’s joking. She's not.
My heart begins to thump in my chest. We find a bench on a traffic island in the middle of Broadway. I ask her to read an advertisement on the bus, and she rattles off more numbers. Her tone becomes emphatic, as if it’s me who’s confused. I ask her to tell me her name. She doesn’t know it.
I wrap my arms around her and tell her to take deep breaths. In a few minutes, we hear the siren of a distant ambulance. “That’s for us,” I say. There are people everywhere, but I feel utterly alone. My mind goes quiet. I know what this is.
Twenty days earlier, during a quiet morning at home in Phoenix, Lisa discovers she can no longer read the text on her phone. Moments later, she can’t recall my name or our daughter’s name. We drive to the emergency room, and she is whisked into a triage room where doctors assess her. They say it’s a stroke and administer a powerful blood thinner. In two hours, her memory comes back. CT Scans, MRI Scans, blood tests, and physical evaluations follow. The doctors say we were lucky to have come to the hospital so quickly. The scans reveal no permanent damage. After three days in the hospital, I bring her home, counting blessings.
This is good because in a week, we will drive to New York with a carload of stuff and two dogs to start a big adventure: five months of city life in a furnished Manhattan apartment. We talk about canceling the trip. The odds of a second stroke are high in the first weeks. What if this happens again in New Mexico? Or along the highway in some desolate part of Missouri? She won't hear of it. She feels fine, and we decide to go, but I am nervous.
We follow a northeastern course of freeways over six long days, stopping only for fast food and pet-friendly hotels. Our route changes daily as we dodge weather systems that, a week later, will turn deadly for these midwestern states.
We finally creep through the Lincoln Tunnel and emerge into the chaos of NYC traffic. We feel relieved and lucky to have arrived in one piece, safe and sound, in our Upper East Side apartment.
I move through the following days in a panicked blur. The ambulance ride, the stroke team at Mount Sinai, the urgent questions about medications, allergies, and medical history. The doctors believe it’s a seizure, not a stroke. She has no physical stroke symptoms, and she is healthy. And having such a drastic memory lapse twice in three weeks almost surely rules out a stroke. Yet there is no definitive proof. I begin to understand that modern medicine is still more art than science.
More tests and scans eventually lead to a conclusion. Lisa has a benign brain tumor, a meningioma, pressing on her brain’s language and memory center, which caused the seizures. We’ve known about this tumor for a year, and she had radiation therapy five months ago to treat it, which these doctors say was a grave mistake. An emergency surgery to remove the tumor is scheduled in two days.
I feel pressure in my chest as I work through what this means. We are thousands of miles from home in a new city without friends or family. Our two dogs are alone in the apartment, and I run back through the Park to walk and feed them, then run back to the hospital. Lisa’s amnesia lingers, and I cannot be away from her side for long. When I return, she is confused and crying.
Our daughter, Mallory, flies in from California. I start to get a hold of myself. I make a rough plan to get us back to Arizona, where we have friends and insurance, and Lisa can more easily recover from surgery. We tag-team hospital visits and dog walking.
We meet Lisa’s doctor, one of the country’s best neurosurgeons, who happens to work out of the very hospital the ambulance driver chose out of a half dozen possibilities. The doctor explains that surgery is necessary to prevent her from having more seizures. There are risks, but these are manageable. This cannot wait. He can do it. He will do it. Now.
I sit with Lisa on the morning of the surgery. She is quiet. She knows she might not wake up from this. My vision narrows as I watch a nurse wheel her away to the operating room. I walk slowly back to the apartment to wait.
The surgery is a success. The surgeon removes the tumor without damaging an encroaching blood vessel or causing a seizure. She wakes up in pain, but herself. She loses the ability to read again, which scares her, but she remembers our names. I sit at the foot of her bed in the ICU wing while doctors and nurses poke and prod her. Her head is wrapped in bandages and gauze. The pain is intense, but they can give her nothing but Tylenol. I send Mallory back to the apartment. She shouldn’t see her mom like this. Six hours later, I walk home in darkness and pouring rain.
The next morning, I join the queue of people at the hospital’s entrance as visiting hours begin — the line snakes around the cavernous lobby. The woman ahead of me asks who I am visiting. I tell her in broad strokes what happened.
“Oh my gosh, I have chills” she says. “Imagine if she had the seizure on your road trip? Or if you had been walking in a different part of the city? To wind up here of all places? You have a guardian angel, my friend,” she says.
When I enter Lisa’s room, I see the spark has returned to her eyes. The pain has subsided. She feels better. She shows me how she can read some of the medical notices on the wall. She asks for coffee.
As I enter the bakery across the street from the hospital, the smell of freshly brewed coffee and pastries rouses me. The light of the world grows a little brighter. She’s going to be all right. She is going to be all right. My throat closes up. I study the menu for a long time before I place my order.
Lisa had her surgery six days ago. She was discharged from the hospital the next day. Her memory is intact. She can read. Each day, she is a little stronger, though the recovery from the operation will take weeks or maybe months. We both feel blessed to have come through this, here in the city of new beginnings.
We arrive in New York City in less than a week for our five-month adventure. Normally, we would fly from Phoenix, but because of the dogs, we must make the cross-country drive.
The idea behind this trip has been percolating for decades. When I retired, I wanted to travel and see the world, but not in a conventional way. I didn’t want to see ten countries in two weeks. That’s an exhausting vacation, not travel, and definitely not a pilgrimage. No. I wanted to immerse myself in a place as a local. Rent a furnished flat in Madrid for three months with just a Kindle, a traveler’s notebook, and a good pair of walking shoes.
The problem started with the Ford Expedition I rented for the drive. I chose a large vehicle because I wanted room for the dogs and anything we might bring. But now, as I survey the suitcases and eight loaded boxes of clothing and gear, I know I have forgotten my ideal of traveling light.
The boxes include a blender, two gaming consoles, a box of dog food, treats and toys, thirteen pairs of shoes, a super automatic coffee machine, a fancy electronic scale, fifty pounds of dumbbells, heavy coats, makeup, blankets, vitamins, rain shells, and a box of just computer gear.
Yet, I can’t name a single thing we should remove.
There's a psychological term for this. Stuff expands to the space allowed.
Next time, I’ll rent a Ford Fiesta.
P.S. - Follow my micro blog for more frequent updates on our adventures!
We are sitting on a bench in Madison Square Park in the Flatiron District. Buildings encircle this urban oasis, framed by a blue New York sky. It is our last day in the city, and we have been walking all morning. Small dogs in fancy coats trot by us with their owners. The din of the city is somehow a comfort, like ocean surf. The temperature hovers around 30 degrees Fahrenheit, yet I feel warm in the sunlight, layered as I am in cold weather gear. Lisa sits beside me, taking it all in.
“Would you ever think of moving here permanently?” I ask. It’s a common question we pose when we travel.
“Oh, yeah,” she says without any hesitation. “I’ve always been a city girl.” Her face glows in the chilly air.
When we retired four years ago in our mid-50s, it seemed as if we had life by the tail. We sold the house and moved aboard our 43’ ocean-going trawler, set on exploring the world at a sedate six miles an hour. I’ve always loved the water, and getting this chance to cast off the bowlines was a lifelong dream. We built a home in Arizona in a 55+ retirement community as a mere precaution, a refuge from the soggy Pacific Northwest winters. Snowbirds, or maybe seagulls, might have better described us.
But a family tragedy dashed those plans. Crushed and grief-stricken, we sold the boat and stayed put in Arizona these past three years. We made friends and enjoyed the newness and comforts of a planned community that sprouted from nothing in the desert. Mostly, we worked on finding meaning in an unthinkable loss.
Over the past few months, Lisa and I started brainstorming ideas to escape the heat of these brutal Arizona summers. As someone who spent his entire life a half mile from the beach, I had no idea how scorching the desert during the height of summer could be.
These talks felt like a good sign. We were coming through it, maybe even out of it. Like Odysseus, we have traveled far. We have suffered. We have buried an oar in this place so far from the sea.
As we vetted possibilities, we knew we wanted challenge and variety, not vacation-style leisure. We needed a break from this predictable, curated life that attracts many to retirement communities.
But neither of us wanted the usual travel of flights and hotels and always being on the go. We could live out of a suitcase for a few weeks, but all summer? No. We did that during a family vacation to Europe. Forty-three stops in sixty days, including an attempt to see Paris in a weekend. Ugh. Never again.
As we pored over maps and searched travel sites, New York City kept popping up. I lived there for a year in the 1990s when Lisa and I first started dating. Neither of us could think of another U.S. city that had as much to offer a pair of healthy retirees with ample time on their hands. It would also mean a return to our very beginnings.
So, during an unseasonably warm Arizona January, we dug through our closets for winter clothes and flew to Manhattan. We walked all over the city, through Chelsea, Greenwich Village, Midtown, the Upper West and Upper East Sides, and Harlem. I heard stories that New York had changed for the worse, but in my eyes, the city was even more beautiful and clean than when I left it in 1995.
By the end of the week, we knew we had found our summer destination. We rented a furnished apartment on the Upper East Side from mid-May through mid-October. The brownstone is a half block from Central Park and not far from the five-story walk-up I rented many years ago.
We’ll have all the time we need to explore the city at our leisure, not as tourists, but as starry-eyed transplants. I’ll take writing classes. Lisa will paint. We’ll join a gym. We’ll walk the dogs twice a day through Central Park. I’ll make friends with the docents at the Met, a place I stumbled through in a daze during my only visit, but now I can study methodically.
Figuring out how to live in New York City — where to shop for groceries and how to get around on the subways — is the type of travel that, in time, will change us forever. Paris, to me now, is an irritating blur. After five months of daily life, New York will be woven into our DNA. We will always have it.
Yes, it’s a costly trip. New York is one of the most expensive cities in the world, and we splurged on a deluxe apartment. We wanted the best possible experience for this new mode of immersive travel, which might be something we repeat each summer.
“I can’t believe we rented an apartment,” Lisa says, touching my gloved hand.
“We’re doing this,” I agree.
What is this stirring I feel in my chest? Is it hope? This must be what sunrise feels to the hiker lost deep in the woods. We resume our walk, looking around as if we own the place.
I passed my third anniversary of giving up alcohol today. I thought I would share some background on this milestone and why I decided to stop drinking.
I have a long history with alcohol. Maybe it’s the genetics mapped deep in my Irish blood or an inheritance from longstanding tradition, but alcoholism runs in the family, near and far. I can’t think of a time in my life that wasn’t steeped in the rituals of drinking.
I met the love of my life in a dive bar. Most of my proudest accomplishments and favorite moments were punctuated with a celebration beer or glass of wine. An early love of Hemingway surely contributed to an interweaving of my very identity with alcohol. If I closed my eyes and pictured my true self in my natural element, it was cozied up to a dimly lit bar with a whiskey on the rocks in a brown, brown study.
I was never what you’d call a problem drinker. I never hit that proverbial rock bottom. But I saw in myself the potential to become one. Retiring early brings many joys, but it also provides the means and opportunity to easily tip over into alcoholism. I left my profession for a pirate’s life of boats and docks and drinking buddies, which, in hindsight, feels like a trifecta of trouble for the would-be alcoholic. I think many people enjoy time on the water as an excuse to drink with friends. I know I surely did.
Over a stretch of twenty-five years, I gave up drinking an astonishing twenty-two times. I know this because of an obsessive need to keep track of my life through a daily journal.
When I gave up alcohol on this day three years ago, I looked through these old journals for clues. I analyzed the data and found troubling patterns — empirical evidence my logical, fact-based mind could not refute.
I discovered that most attempts lasted a week or less. On four occasions, I managed more than a month without drinking—the longest, six months. I often complained of headaches and insomnia in the first few days. After two weeks, I slept better and had more energy. On longer stretches of sobriety, I lost weight, my blood pressure improved, and I felt more optimistic.
I asked myself, as I flipped through those scribbled snapshots of my past, why in the world did I ever start drinking again?
Here’s what happened, time after time after time: I enjoyed such a rebound in health and outlook that I considered myself “cured.” There’s a name for this in sobriety literature: the Pink Cloud. Feeling so good, I couldn’t possibly be addicted to alcohol any longer, so I concluded it was perfectly fine to drink again, just in moderation like everyone else. After all, who would want to quit the stuff forever?
As you might have guessed, the dabbling soon turned to the occasional few too many until I eventually returned to my old ways. I gained weight, slept poorly, and fibbed about my alcohol consumption on medical questionnaires.
It took reading this boom-and-bust history in my own words, repeated and repeated and repeated, to fully comprehend the situation. Self-knowledge is a real-life superpower. My journals delivered a message that I could not have accepted so completely any other way.
For most people, controlling alcohol consumption is natural and easy. For others, it’s more complicated. My journals taught me the hard truth that I’m one of those rare cases where moderation simply doesn’t work.
I was still hoping for a third door: another option besides door number one (drinking) and door number two (sobriety). I simply could not fathom that there wasn’t a fucking third door.
— We Are the Luckiest by Laura Mckowen
The thing is, I now know remaining a non-drinker is essential to my health and happiness. At 59, I’m back to my college weight and waist size. I have more energy than I had at 49 and sometimes even 39. I feel very comfortable in my own skin.
Yet my journals have ground into me an inescapable truth: I am not cured. I cannot dabble. I cannot drink even one single beer. I must remain vigilant, which, even after three years, isn’t always easy.
After all, there is a lot of encouragement in our society to drink alcohol. Drinking, plans for drinking, casual references to drinking, jokes about drinking, memes about drinking, and advertisements for drinking are everywhere. Being a non-drinker, at least in my experience, runs against the very grain of societal norms. Alcohol, which is responsible for more deaths each year than cocaine, heroin, and meth combined, is the only drug you have to explain not using.
We sold the boat last year and now live in a 55+ retirement community in Arizona. We’ve made dear, dear friends, all of whom drink. Like boaters, young retirees do like to tip back a pint or two. Sometimes, it feels like we’re all back at college, only this time with nice houses and money. I pack along a little cooler of non-alcoholic beer to parties, though you’ll see me slip away early. A room is never drunker than when you're the only sober person.
I’ve never gone to an AA meeting, though sometimes I think it would be nice to have even one sober friend who understands my reluctance to hang out when alcohol is flowing so freely. I’m not the most social person, so introducing one more mental barrier to attending these get-togethers isn’t helpful.
A few months back, I smoked some pot at one of these parties to try to enjoy myself more. The last time must have been thirty years ago. As it hit me, I felt that familiar glossy curtain sway between me and my surroundings, that muting of the sharp and bright realities of life. With alcohol, I enjoyed that pleasant release. But, as I sat there with my lungs burning and my mind not entirely my own, I felt uneasy and, well, drugged.
With addiction, there’s always something deeper that keeps you drinking from the poisoned well. The legendary Joe Louis once said of a wily opponent, “he can run, but he can’t hide.” It can be difficult to look too closely at the harder parts of life, the miseries so interlinked with the joys, the seeming pointlessness and terrors of existence. Alcohol hides all that away for a time, but it’s a cop-out. These are the things we all need to face. We can’t run. We can’t hide.
No matter how fast I run, I can never seem to get away from me.
— Your Bright Baby Blues by Jackson Browne
When my son was killed in a motorcycle accident almost two years ago, I was desperate for anything that could soften the pain I felt. If I were still drinking, it would have been an easy thing to drown myself in alcohol. Maybe it’s a small blessing that I had a year of sobriety to weather that awful storm. But, if anything, my resolve now is stronger. Connor told me in the last year of his life that he was proud of me for not drinking. My eyes well up with tears as I remember this. How could I even think of tarnishing that memory?
Lisa, the same love of my life this young accountant met playing pool in a bar so long ago, who’s stuck with me for twenty-eight years and drinks so sporadically that I hardly even notice, has been a huge supporter of my sobriety. The following morning, she asked me what I thought of smoking pot. She was a little worried it might have triggered something and cause me to fall off the wagon.
“I didn’t like it. It felt a little too much like being buzzed from alcohol,” I said over coffee. “It feels weird to say it, but I just like being me.”
I came across a journal entry I wrote on this day ten years ago. I was reflecting on the people in my life that made a difference on how things have turned out for me. I realized that many of these people couldn’t possibly know the impact they had on me and the countless others they helped.
I kept thinking about this one community college professor who did more than anyone to inspire me to pursue a college degree. I thought how sad it would be if he never knew the difference he made. So after a quick search on the internet, I found him. I wrote him an email. I introduced myself and told him a few stories about how he had challenged and inspired me, how he had helped me forge a path to the person I am today.
And he wrote back:
I wish I could tell you what a joy it was to receive your message today. I had been to a “Lives of Commitment” breakfast, and - since I’m just about to retire from teaching - I was in my office thinking about how a person ‘makes a difference.’ Then - voila! - your message comes up on my screen. Thank you.
I went to class and told my students to write to their teachers. I told them that a letter like that can really make an impact in a person’s life. I told them about your letter.
If you have someone that’s made a difference in your life, like a special teacher, write them an email. Tell them a story about how they helped you. It doesn’t have to be long. Just say thank you. And then do everything you can to pay that help forward.
Grieving the loss of a child is a journey through wastelands you never expected to cross. Unlike every other challenge you’ve ever faced, there is no easy way through a loss like this. You stumble and fall. You curse. You are hobbled and bloody. You are not sure of the way. You might be going in circles.
The truth is everyone suffers in this life. It’s our lot to take the awful with the beautiful. We all must face it. In a perfect world, your mom wouldn’t forget you in the fog of Alzheimer’s Disease. You wouldn’t lose a dear friend to cancer in the prime of her life. Your son wouldn’t die in a motorcycle accident before his twenty-first birthday.
In the months before we lost Connor, we crossed a high wire of reinvention. We retired from our careers. We sold our long-time family home and said goodbye to a lifetime of friends on Vashon Island. We bought a winter home in Arizona with the half-sane plan of living a life split between the summer sea and the winter desert. For half the year, home was where we'd drop the anchor.
Reinvention might come easier for some. I felt like a reluctant hermit crab who knows he must shift to a new shell to survive but dreads the transfer. The plans were years in the making. And just at that vulnerable juncture between one shell and the other, that final letting go of the safety and security of the familiar for the heady promise of a new life, a tsunami upends everything, stranding this naked, scared crab, its tiny claws raised as if to fight the wind and water and waves.
And yet, life continues. We settled into the new house in Arizona. Little bursts of joy came from unexpected sources: the convenience of curbside trash and recycling, reliable high-speed internet, and kind, welcoming neighbors. I unpacked the sixty boxes of books that make up my library, caressing each volume, inhaling its scent, remembering its message as I slowly rebuilt my sanctuary, my illusive shell.
A Sanctuary of Books
Reading has always been a solace. I read a lot of history and philosophy these past months: the marvels of early Egypt and the brutality of Ancient Rome in Will Durant’s grand opus, The Story of Civilization; the millions of years of Earth’s geology poetically taught in Basin and Range by John McPhee; and the insignificance of our human existence in a careening, infinite universe in Probable Impossibilities by Alan Lightman. Taking a dispassionate view can ease the sting of personal loss.
We sold MV Indiscretion this spring, saying goodbye to trawler life and our ties to the Pacific Northwest. I have let go of so many layers of my identity — business professional, islander, sailor, son to my parents, and now father to my son — that it felt right to reach back to utter beginnings, where I might remake myself, like Gandalf after his plunge from the Bridge of Moria.
We bought a small off-road capable RV in April and have taken a few trips to explore the deserts and mountains of the Southwest. In June, we crossed into Mexico to camp on the shores of the Sea of Cortez. These months in the desert were the longest I’ve strayed from the ocean in my entire life. I missed the smell of the sea and the feel of dried salt on my skin. We waded in the warm surf, feeling once again that indescribable joy of shifting sand under our heels and between our toes while flocks of pelicans dove for their dinner a few yards from us.
I sat beside tide pools nestled within the rocky outcrops that lay between long stretches of sand: hermit crabs battling to defend their territories, starfish, sea stars, sea slugs, mussels, sea urchins, and tiny brine shrimp, all pursuing the minutiae of their daily lives. Looking up into the cosmos and down into a tide pool, I noted the parallels: we are all one.
A strong south wind picked up one night, and gusts gently rocked the RV on its suspension. I emerged from a heavy sleep to check the anchor, trying to remember how far we were from the rocks on shore. I drifted back to sleep, still dreaming we were afloat. I know the sea beckons on the far side of this wilderness.
Camping on the Sea of Cortez
After a long period of intentional isolation, I have begun the process of reconnecting with old friends and making new friends here in Arizona. This has been difficult for me. They ask me how I’m doing. Am I OK? I don’t have an answer. “What saves a man is to take a step. Then another step,” said Antoine de Saint-Exupery. Every day, I take a step.
I’m writing this tonight from a small campground in southern Colorado. We’ve been traveling for a few weeks, taking the backroads, stopping often, seeing where the open road takes us. We have no plan, no definite time to return. It feels good to roam.
Driving through western New Mexico, I felt a lightness I didn’t expect. The beauty of the colorful mesas and buttes rising around us filled me with awe. We hiked to La Ventana Natural Arch to find ourselves in an ancient, sacred place — a place of prayer and hope and resilience. It left me wanting to see more, to do more. For the first time in many months, my mind tilted forward, a blessed release from so much focus on the past.
La Ventana Natural Arch in New Mexico
Every day brings a little more joy and a little less sadness. On good days, I see a brightening just over the horizon. A clearing? Yet there are still those days when I sink deep into sorrow and recognize the false dawn. There is no way around this, only forward, across this barren terrain. One step. Then another. When I dare look around, I see so many others walking beside me. Grief is the price we all pay for love. Won’t you take my hand? It won’t be long now. If death has taught me anything, it's that nothing persists, not even grief.
After five years of amazing adventures aboard our Nordhavn trawler MV Indiscretion, we’ve decided it’s time for a change. We are coming off the water.
We didn’t plan on this. We dreamed for decades to be at this very spot in our lives — casting off the bowlines to explore the world under our own keel at the unhurried pace of seven knots. But life doesn’t always work out like you hoped.
On September 27th, 2022, our son Connor was killed in a motorcycle accident in Colorado Springs. A car pulled out in front of him on a busy street a half mile from his apartment. He was just twenty years old.
After Connor’s death, reeling with loss, we took what would be our final cruise aboard Indiscretion. We were in shock and did not know what else to do. If any solace were possible for our crushed family, we thought it must be found in the harbors and bays of our beloved San Juan Islands. Our daughter accompanied us, and her partner joined a week later. We met up with dear friends from MV Fortitude and MV Equinox who helped distract us from our misery with companionship and love. Still, every anchorage, every island hike, every trip ashore in the tender, every sunset and moonrise — all of it reminded us of Connor’s absence. We found peace but agony too, as this new reality sunk in.
Connor and Lisa
We put the boat away in November and headed south to our new winter home here in Arizona. We’ve spent these past months wondering how we move forward after such a tragedy.
Each time we discussed our return in the spring, we both felt despondent. Our plans to cruise to Alaska this summer felt empty and joyless. Despite our love for the pristine cruising grounds of the Salish Sea and our wonderful boat friends we’ve met along the way, we just couldn’t imagine resuming our life afloat.
Connor spent his youth sailing and boating with us, and the reminder of the memories we made together is simply too painful. In this new grief-stricken world, returning to the familiar and comfortable fills us with dread; we need to invent a new life that won’t constantly remind us of our loss. And maybe, in the process, allow us to accept what feels unacceptable.
These precious moments …
Here’s a lesson for us all. Despite our best wishes and plans, life is incredibly uncertain. We don’t know what the future may bring. No one does. We insist on having it all figured out before acting on our dreams. But sometimes, before the plan is perfected, the unthinkable changes everything. If there’s one bit of advice I could offer, it’s this: don’t wait. Go sooner. Better yet, go now. Right now is all we have. You may not get another chance.
The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what lies in Fortune’s control, and abandoning what lies in yours. What are you looking at? To what goal are you straining? The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately. -- Seneca
We aren’t saying goodbye to adventure. That’s the last thing Connor would have wanted. Instead, we’ve decided to pivot in a direction that will honor his memory and allow us the chance to heal without the constant reminder of our loss. In the last two years of his life, he developed a passion for off-roading in his Jeep. He and his friends would take old forest service roads deep into the Colorado mountains, looking for challenging routes that might tax the 4x4’s crawling capabilities. The battered underside of his Jeep proves he pushed that vehicle to its limits. We treasure the selfies he sent us from the summits of his off-road adventures, the vivid blue sky and Rocky Mountain vistas framing his smiling delight.
Connor and his Jeep
In that spirit, we bought an off-road capable RV, more akin to a camper van than a plush motorhome, that we’ll use to explore the deserts and mountains that Connor grew to love in the last years of his life. We’ve never been a fan of crowded RV parks, so we chose a rig that can take us far off the beaten path — boondocking as it’s known in RV vernacular — the boating equivalent of dropping the hook in a secluded anchorage. On some trips, we’ll tow Connor’s old Jeep to seek out the otherwise unreachable places he would have loved to see. It comforts us that we’ll follow a path our son would have taken had he lived.
New adventures.
As we close this chapter, we are grateful for the adventures and friendships we enjoyed during our five years of trawler life. Joining the Nordhavn family, even aboard one of the smallest vessels in the fleet, was both a privilege and a joy. I learned so much from the many experienced captains and marine experts who freely shared their wisdom with me time and again. I felt like I was getting to the point where my growing skills and talents could be paid forward to the newest crop of skippers. And oh, will we miss the friends we met along the way. I have to trust that our paths will somehow cross again in the future.
We are incredibly grateful to Devin Zwick of Nordhavn Northwest. In all my years of boating, I’ve rarely encountered a more capable, knowledgeable and compassionate yacht professional. Devin personally skippered the boat from her slip in Seattle to Anacortes, oversaw her annual haul-out, worked with me remotely to iron out the logistics and terms of the sale, and found a terrific new owner for Indiscretion — all in the course of a few short weeks. They say the happiest days in a skipper’s life are when he buys and sells a boat. This is surely not the case with Indiscretion. We dearly love this trawler. But Devin worked extremely hard to make the process as seamless for us as possible. For most people, there’s an “oh shit, what have I done” moment before you sign the papers to buy a boat, particularly one as expensive as a Nordhavn trawler. Our story should lessen the uneasiness for those about to make this plunge. Believe me, that spreadsheet you keep studying won’t help you. Go for it. You only pass this way once.
I kept this blog as a way to share my amazement and good fortune at having the chance to operate and cruise aboard a little ship like Indiscretion. Many nights I sat in the darkened pilothouse when everyone was already asleep, listening to the sounds of the wind, watching the moonlight on the water and the spin of the lights on shore as we circled our anchor, feeling utterly incredulous at my luck. I hope these posts have been informative and inspiring to others who also feel drawn to the wildness and tranquility of the ocean.
And who knows? I’ve skippered a boat for most of my adult life. We might find our way back to the shore one day when the pull of the saltwater in our veins overtakes the grief in our hearts. In a world where nothing is certain, anything is possible.
This is the most difficult thing I've ever written. I’m sharing this partly because I hope that releasing these words will provide some catharsis from the excruciating pain I have carried around these last months. Perhaps the sentiments I’ve conveyed here can be a small comfort to someone who has experienced a similar tragedy. I also know that people are worried about us, about me. Consider this an abbreviated journal of our past one hundred days. Unlike anything else I’ve written, this one contains no epiphany, enlightenment, or happy ending. This one is mired in the messy middle of heartbreak and loss.
On the night of September 27th, our son Connor died in a motorcycle accident in Colorado Springs. A car pulled out in front of him on a busy street a half mile from his apartment. He was killed instantly in the crash. He was riding a motorcycle he had owned for just one day. He was twenty years old.
I mentally replay the call we received from the coroner’s office in the wee hours of September 28th over and over and over again, my mind trying to push this all away, to wake up from the darkest, longest nightmare of my life.
I look back at that person I was on September 26th — that carefree soul with so many blessings — and compare him to the person I am today: darkened, sorrowful, broken. The two of us could be long-separated brothers, but a world apart in life experience. I no longer recognize that other me who swung so happily from the thinnest of threads, not understanding his entire world could crumble in the space of a single heartbeat.
Lisa and I have faced our share of grief together. First her mom, then mine. Her dad, then my dad. With each of these losses, one of us was always the stronger one, there to hold the other, to give comfort, to listen. This was the first time in our marriage that neither of us was strong enough to hold up the other. Thankfully, dear friends joined us on the boat to help us make it through the day, make travel arrangements, encourage us to eat, and simply hold us. I am forever grateful to these friends who also lost a near-family member for their love and help on that hardest day.
When the shock wore off and grim reality set in, we rallied as a family to do what we must. Our daughter Mallory took a leave of absence from work and joined us in Colorado Springs to help with Connor's arrangements. During breaks from our awful tasks, we hiked the hills that he loved. We hungered for stories from his friends about his last days, his last night. We splashed the healing waters of Manitou Springs on our faces, needing their restorative powers to give us the strength to finalize the affairs of such a young life, a life so wholly intertwined with ours that we struggled to find where he ended and we continue.
We returned to Seattle utterly bereft. Unable to face the grief and sorrow of others, we stole away for the San Juan Islands aboard the trawler in an attempt to regain our equilibrium. Connor spent his entire life around saltwater and boats. We knew that if there was any way for us to find peace after something like this, it would be on the water. We could feel his presence in every anchorage, every trip ashore in the tender, every meal around the saloon table, every sunset and moonrise. Visiting these familiar islands over those two weeks was both a comfort and an agony.
Moonrise in Friday Harbor, San Juan Island
We returned to port steadier but still reeling. We held a small gathering of Connor's closest friends to mourn his passing. I was surprised and grateful that so many made the long trip from Colorado to Vashon Island to attend this memorial. It took everything I had to talk with others about my son in the past tense. There were tears but also smiles and laughter as we collectively remembered his life and the impact he had on all those around him. It was the first time since his passing that I remembered him with more love than pain.
In November, Lisa and I drove south to Southern California. We took the coastal route, stopping frequently to gaze at the ocean, to feel the pounding of surf, to take in giant lungfuls of healing sea air. Lisa took this same route in reverse with Connor in 2020, when his university in Colorado Springs closed down because of COVID. She pointed out the places they stopped and the sights they took in together, as if a part of him were still there, waiting for us.
Coquille River Jetty near Bandon on the Oregon coast
We stretched a three-day trip into a week, knowing somehow that it was important for us to linger. We are feeling our way through this. There are no charts, no waypoints to follow, only instinct, love, and shared grief.
I poured my sorrow into a journal each morning and night to help me make sense of what had happened. You can trace the first stages of grief in those early entries: shock and denial, the second guessing and what-ifs, the heartbreak and rage at the universe knowing that Connor would miss the most beautiful aspects of life: falling in love, finding his path, becoming a father himself one day.
On Thanksgiving morning, I forced myself to write what I was most thankful for as Connor's father. I wrote how grateful I was to have had the chance to be his dad, that I took a sabbatical from work to spend more time with him and his sister as teenagers, that he was able to squeeze so much life and adventure into his twenty short years, that he died doing something he loved.
Luckily, we spent Thanksgiving — our first holiday without Connor — surrounded by the comfort of extended family and the welcome chaos only small children can bring to a home.
In December, we moved into our new winter home here in Arizona. The sunshine and change of scenery from our life on the trawler have been a welcome change. Mallory and her partner drove from California to spend Christmas with us. We tried to be festive and honor Connor’s memory on a holiday he dearly loved.
As I write this, It's been one hundred days since he died. I cringe at these words — their harsh reality, their certainty. There are moments, sometimes whole hours, when I forget.
The nights are the worst. I wake most mornings with tears in my eyes. My subconscious won’t accept the truth. It's as if I'm learning, again and again, the facts of this unbearable loss with each new day. My son is gone.
If Lisa rises before me, I approach her quietly, softly, like someone waiting for word in a hospital lounge, anxious for a loved one whose prognosis is not good. "How did you sleep?" I ask her out of kindness, but I already know the answer. I wonder if these splinters that keep stabbing us will ever wear down to mere rough edges.
I looked to the ancient sages who did so much to shape how I live my life: Epictetus, Seneca the Younger, Marcus Aurelius. Their counsel when I was young helped me reconcile our universal longing for permanence in this short life we are given. I tried to apply their teachings to what happened to Connor, to regain my Stoic footing, but Memento Mori feels so hollow and pointless when I consider the death of this young man whose life had only just started.
I've never been religious, but I suddenly ache for the certainty and hope the faithful possess. I have listened to Mozart’s Requiem dozens of times these past months. Though I don’t understand the Latin, there’s something universal in the music that communicates comfort and awe on a spiritual, perhaps even molecular level. Since Connor’s death, my uneasiness with mortality has softened. I look forward to the chance, however slim, of seeing my son again, and if not, to know at least that we'll be together in that vast universal void.
Our plans to cruise the northern reaches of British Columbia and Alaska next summer aboard our trawler feel somehow awful, as if our fairy tale life could possibly continue after such a loss. I feel like making a new start in the desert, to follow the dirt roads and mountain passes where Connor found such happiness in the last year of his life, to cauterize this paralyzing sadness and emerge somehow transformed, reformed, like Phoenix from the ashes.
I remain a proud father to my beautiful daughter Mallory, who inspires me daily with her kindness, intelligence, and generosity. There were days when she was my lifeboat, the one who pulled me to safety from the wreckage. After all those years of holding her hand, she held mine. We need each other more than ever now.
And I have my Lisa, my best friend and soulmate. We may look at the world through different lenses and leverage different strengths, but we never waver on the big things — what’s most important to us and our family. We’re apart for the first time since we lost Connor as she celebrates the birthday of her grand-nephew in Los Angeles. I miss her dearly. We’re two leaning pillars that can only stand upright because of the other’s weight and support. I like to think of myself as mentally and emotionally strong, but I know this: she’s the reason I’ve maintained my sanity through this ordeal. Without her love and support, I don’t know where I’d be.
A family friend who suffered the loss of her 24-year-old son called us shortly after Connor died. Her loss was still very fresh — just three months — but she was strong enough to help us in a way that no one else could. She understood exactly what we were going through.
One stranger who understands your experience exactly will do for you what hundreds of close friends and family who don’t understand cannot. It is the necessary palliative for the pain of stretching into change. It is the cool glass of water in hell.
— Laura Mckowen, We Are the Luckiest
She recommended a book that helped her: Finding Meaning by David Kessler. In his career as a grief counselor, Mr. Kessler helped develop the now-famous five stages of death and dying, and tragically suffered the loss of his 21-year-old son before writing this book.
Reading this book did help me. I began to see that what happened to Connor, though horrible, wasn’t that rare. Many, many parents have gone through this same torture of the loss of a child, some much younger, or through circumstances riddled with regret and even more heartbreak. I learned that the agony of grief is equal to the devotion and love you had. It’s no surprise that I am utterly gutted. I loved that boy so much.
About three months after Kessler’s son died, a colleague sent him this note: “I know you’re drowning. You’ll keep sinking for a while, but there will come a point when you’ll hit bottom. Then you’ll have a decision to make. Do you stay there or push off and start to rise again?”
And that’s where I find myself today: at rock bottom or very near it. I too have a choice to make. Will I stay down here to flounder? Or will I swim for the surface? A part of me knows there are many magical moments yet to be shared with family and friends, to begin again to appreciate the everyday joy of life. Will I ever again choose joy? I hope someday I can.
Thank you for reaching the end of this meandering post. If you made it this far, you must either really care about me and my family, or you’ve been part of a similar tragedy yourself and are looking for some comfort. If it’s the former, I am grateful for your concern during this most difficult time. If it’s the latter, I hope you find peace in your own way, and in your own time.
Connor Dennis Alfred Breen (January 29, 2002 - September 27, 2022)
If the first half of life is about growing and accumulating, then the second half must see us disbursing, letting go. Life is full of cycles — like the seasons, or perhaps more dear to me, the flooding and ebbing of tides.
In the past few years, I’ve let go of my aging parents, my career and a lifetime of associates and colleagues, a dear friend, and this past year I watched my two kids leave home to start their own lives of growth and accumulation.
At its best, letting go brings an emotional release, a lightness, a feeling of immense relief, like putting down a heavy weight you’ve been carrying around for too long. At its worst, it brings a paralyzing sense of irretrievable loss. I’ve been thinking about these two very different outcomes as we navigate our next phase of letting go.
I’m told your house never looks as good as the day you sell, and after twenty-three years here on Vashon Island, we’re close to reaching that particular zenith. White paint has stained my fingers and forearm, and a big smear tattoos my right cheek. The list of projects has dwindled over the past weeks, and we’re down to just a few beauty marks.
After each section of trim I painted today, I found myself looking out at the water on this sunny Spring day. You’d think after all these years I’d take this view of Puget Sound for granted, but I don’t. For a spell, I watched a container ship make its way southbound to offload in Tacoma, its wake stretching out for miles in the flat water.
On clear days you can see Whidbey Island from our front porch. Such a wide, unencumbered expanse of water provides a theatrical experience for watching weather systems roll through, especially the northern gales in deep winter. Dark gray squalls march across the water, relentless in their intensity, unstoppable in their progress. Bald eagles float just fifty yards off the porch, contorting their wings in tiny increments to remain utterly still as they study the whipped up sea for a meal. The Firs and the big Japanese Maple tree groan and shudder in the gusts. The biting sting of the wind on your cheek makes you appreciate the warmth inside the house as you take all this in.
They say it takes a special kind of person to live on an island like Vashon. Betty MacDonald wrote her memoir Onions in the Stew while living here in the 1940s. Most of her humorous observations about the eccentricities and shortcomings of island life still ring true.
Anyone contemplating island dwelling must be physically strong and it is an added advantage if you aren’t too bright.
Vashon is nestled in southern Puget Sound halfway between Seattle and Tacoma. The island population of roughly ten thousand hasn’t budged much in thirty years. There are no bridges that connect us to the mainland. Ferries on the north and sound ends of the island are the gateways to visit or leave.
Unlike more tourist-minded destinations, Vashon grooves with its own unique personality. Some say that driving off the ferry boat and winding your way through its rural roads is like going back in time. “Keep Vashon Weird” bumper stickers adorn VW buses and BMWs alike. Eco-friendly farmers, artists, hippies, celebrities, weekenders, old families, newcomers, commuters, eccentrics, musicians, professionals … a hodgepodge brought together by a love of saltwater, an unconventional lifestyle, and geographic seclusion.
I’ve lived here far longer than any other place. I’ve put down deep roots. In 35 years of life before Vashon, I moved some twenty times, from one house or apartment to the next, every year or two, which at the time seemed perfectly normal. Growing up, my parents had this ache in them to roam. We moved every year in my four years of high school. I was a shy kid. By the time I made any friends, we were packing up for the next town.
Lisa, my partner these many years, also led a wandering life as a child. Instead of traipsing through small Washington coastal towns, she lived abroad, calling places like Singapore, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, and Thailand her home. Her father worked in construction, and when the job ended, they moved on. Again and again.
From the early days of our relationship, we kindled a dream of running off together. A ranch in Montana, a seaside villa in Mexico, a flat in Madrid. Six months into our courtship, we spent three weeks touring Greece and decided, after perhaps a bit too much Ouzo, to get married there and then on the island of Skiathos. Neither of us had met the other’s parents, and our stunned friends were sure the marriage would not last out the year. But when you know, you know.
When our daughter was born, we vowed to give her something we never had: a consistent, unchanging childhood home. We moved to Vashon just shy of her first birthday, and she and her younger brother grew up in the same house, in the same little town, with the same friends from pre-school tots to angsty high school seniors. When the time for college rolled around, both were desperate to get away from a place so small and remote. Yet, later in life, I wonder if the deep-rooted memories of sandy beaches, quiet forests, and a one-block town without traffic lights become a subconscious yardstick for the ideal life?
The house, built in 1917, turned one hundred during our time here. At one point or another, we’ve remodeled just about every inch of her, but we always stayed true to her spirit. She’s an old soul, sitting atop this hill looking out over the water. I realize we’ve just been her caretakers for a time.
I left the island every morning by ferry for twenty years and suffered through my fair share of business travel. Returning home, breathing seemed easier, the sea air and open vista perhaps working together to inflate my lungs more completely than anywhere else. The sound of the gentle surf through the open skylight lulled me quickly to sleep when I fell into my own bed at last. This island home has always been my sanctuary.
Every so often, a grandchild of the former owners stops by to see the house. Fully grown now, they look around, starstruck. “I spent every summer here when I was little,” a lady in her mid-twenties tells me, close to tears. They will have brought their partner along as witness to a living piece of their childhood.
I learned to sail on Vashon, and the connection between boating and island life is inexorably linked. I’ve sailed along her forty-five miles of coastline countless times, and my family knows to spread my ashes in Quartermaster Harbor should the sudden need arise. For years, we kept a mooring buoy in the deep water in front the house. It became a summer tradition to sail the boat around from the marina for crabbing and sailing and floating picnics.
On clear nights, I would sometimes sneak down the long flight of beach stairs to sail alone under the stars. Lying back in the cockpit, steering with my leg over the tiller, trimming the sails in the darkness by the feel of wind on my cheek. Sailing at night feels so magical: the lift and fall of the gentle swell, the hiss of the waves against the hull, the green glow of phosphor trailing astern, and that dizzying feeling of falling and merging into the galaxy of stars splayed above you. I’ve never felt so utterly connected to the cosmos as on small boat under the stars on a summer night.
Selling the house and moving off island has been our plan for years, so why do I feel so pensive as our time here draws near? My glances around the house and the water are slower, more considered, like Ahab gazing at the sea before his final showdown with the white whale. I strain to hear the tolling of an iron bell, for it’s possible the end of this chapter of island life is followed by mere epilogue. A little voice inside me tells me to stop, to reconsider. The house looks so good; why not stay, the voice implores. I am sorely tempted.
But no. What haunts us late in life are the things we didn’t do. In letting go our island home and life, we step into a new life of two distinct halves: from May through October we’ll live and cruise aboard Indiscretion, our expedition trawler, with Shilshole Marina as our new home port. Near enough to see our friends on Vashon and the perfect launching off spot for exploring the Salish Sea during the best weather the Northwest offers. In October, we’ll drive south to our new home in a 55+ community 40 minutes west of Phoenix, AZ called Victory at Verrado. Six months of warm winter weather, desert hikes, Seattle Mariners spring training, and poorly played golf is just enough time to begin pining for the greens and blues of the beautiful Northwest. We’ll lock up the house in early May and make our way back to Indiscretion for another season.
Lately, I’ve been having this recurring dream of riding in a hot air balloon. The gondola is staked to the beach in front of our house with anchors that seem much too small for such a large craft. An offshore wind buffets the big balloon and I know those anchors can’t hold much longer. The two of us pile in the gondola, which, once aboard, looks weirdly like the pilothouse of a trawler. We release the mooring lines and float up and up into the sky. We clear the tree line and watch our house and the island grow small, insignificant. We keep rising, our view expanding in all directions. I point out the rugged west coast of Vancouver Island and the Sunshine Coast. We float over Desolation Sound, Princess Louisa Inlet, the Broughton Archipelago, and the wide expanse of Queen Charlotte Sound. Ahead, just over the curved horizon lies Alaska. The dream always ends when we toss out the sandbags of ballast at our feet. Maybe we simply fly upwards into the stars. Or, perhaps we set down in Greece to renew our marriage vows, but this time, we stay the whole summer, traveling light.
As I walked through the throng of travelers at LAX recently on my way to a flight that would be canceled the minute I got to the gate, I reflected on how change is the only real constant in life. In less than a week, I found myself hurrying through crowded airports in Seattle, Denver and Los Angeles (fun fact: these three airports accounted for 60% of all holiday flight cancelations). From Denver, I drove 1,200 miles to Los Angeles in a Jeep with Connor and his ten-month-old puppy, listening to baseball podcasts (yes, that's a thing) through Colorado and New Mexico. The music changed to hip hop in Arizona, and I felt nostalgic for the podcasts. I paid nearly $7 per gallon for gas in California and felt nostalgic for Arizona. We survived freeway driving in the rain as we neared Los Angeles with Connor relying on his 19-year-old reflexes -- or the Force -- to weave in and out of 80-mph traffic.
Mallory hosted us at her beautiful apartment near Santa Monica. She's only lived there a few months but showed us around her bustling neighborhood like a native. I can't believe this young lady who grew up on an island of 10,000 is now so at ease in a city of four million. We picked up Lisa at LAX later that night in a downpour. And defying the promise of the song and our much-needed dose of Vitamin D, It really does rain in Southern California. Serious drenching rain, like the kind I used to see in the rain forest near Forks.
With the four of us together, we did the usual holiday stuff, but in a new way: last-minute Christmas shopping at an open-air mall in the pouring rain, Christmas Eve ramen, a marathon Monopoly game made longer by Lisa's insistence on gifting money to her children and thereby violating the very premise of the game (!), a requisite walk through Marina del Rey to gawk at boats, and Christmas Day with extended family in Costa Mesa. Here I got to meet the next generation of little ones -- Jackson, Avery and Effie -- and as I helped them play with their Christmas toys, I couldn't shake the feeling that time had somehow looped back on itself, and I was a new dad, and Mallory and Connor were little again, and that life stood still.
For many years, our holidays repeated a predictable pattern at our island home. The same setting, the same meals, the same corner with the same kind of Christmas tree, the same wintry night on the same porch, looking out at the night sky and sea. Yet, life is forever changing, renewing, and reshaping. As Alan Watts said, "the only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance." Long-standing traditions can be a comfort, but on this family holiday, with its unexpected detours and moments of sheer bliss, I learned a new kind of music. And it's time to dance.
In my office, I keep an old photograph of the Buckaroo Tavern in the Seattle neighborhood of Fremont. The photo truly captured the character of the place: two chrome-festooned Harley Davidson motorcycles parked up on the sidewalk out front, bright orbs from the lights hung over the pool tables, and an outstretched arm and pool cue of a patron poised in mid-shot. I spent many nights at this dive bar as a young man. My eyes burned from the cigarette smoke, and the rough-looking biker crowd that congregated at the bar would often chuckle over their beers at this clean-cut accountant toting a pool cue case, but I loved the place. I had the photograph framed when we first moved to Vashon Island. It hangs between a picture of Mark Twain standing before a pool table considering his next shot and a signed photograph of Jack Dempsey in his famous boxing stance. But, it’s the tavern picture that has caught my attention lately as I think back on that long ago life before kids.
You see, Lisa and I returned from a 3,000-mile road trip to drop off our son at college last week. And then, a few days later, we waved goodbye to our daughter as she drove off in her loaded-down Nissan to start her public accounting career in Los Angeles. In the space of a single heartbeat, the house went from cacophony and laughter to a hushed stillness.
We’ve been moving toward this day gradually for decades, but the suddenness caught me off guard, like a stiff poke to the solar plexus. For the first few days, I felt listless, perhaps depressed. It helped to keep busy, cleaning out the clutter and detritus left behind in the wake of these departures. My daughter’s old bedroom is now a nicely furnished guest room. I pass by it on the way downstairs each morning, and the shock of seeing her personality stripped from the room has not worn off. I should probably close the door.
Now I’m doing what any reasonable dad would do in this situation: I’m organizing the tool shed. I’ve measured out the available wall space for an elaborate tool storage system to deal with twenty-five years of disarray. I woke up last night dreaming of tools and freshly-shined equipment hanging in perfect order on the south wall of the shed, which I’m pretty sure has a clinical name in psychological circles.
At night, I’m reading Pema Chodron’s When Things Fall Apart to see if some old-fashioned Buddhist wisdom might help. The title felt appropriate for my situation. The advice here is blunt: lean into the loneliness and despair. Accept that life is impermanent and hopeless. “Nothing is what we thought,” she writes.
Even Rosie, the robot vacuum that haunts our rooms and hallways in search of dust and dog hair, seems out of sorts. Amidst the typical family clutter, I swear she steered for the stray charging cables and hair scrunchies that littered her path, opting for a short night’s work as she squealed out error codes in protest. Now, with no obstacles in her way, she carries out the nightly routine in sullen silence. I’ve watched her run into a wall, back up, and run into the same wall, again and again. I know how she feels.
The phone rings daily with questions and puzzlement: what kind of pots and pans should I buy? Why isn’t the internet working? And most recently, a texted picture of a massive drift of white suds covering the kitchen linoleum after using Joy dish soap in the automatic dishwasher. Still, I know these calls are numbered. Their lives will soon blossom out in every direction, with little time left for mom and dad. Cats in the Cradle has become the soundtrack playing in the back of my mind.
I’ve pondered my own abrupt departure from home at seventeen and the impact I must have had on my parents. I don’t recall any remorse at leaving, so desperate to begin a life of independence. It seems Karma has found me on the receiving end of that same natural impulse.
To be fair, we did plan for this eventuality, knowing the two of us would need to fill in the vacuum of our departed children. We bought an ocean-going trawler yacht that will take us on amazing adventures up to Alaska and down to Mexico — something Lisa and I dreamed of doing long before we started a family. And we still have each other: two lovebirds and best friends who laugh and grow quiet at most of the same things.
As I consider my options for pegboard (galvanized steel, ABS plastic, or good old-fashioned fiberboard?) and the kind of hooks and baskets I will need to organize all my tools and gadgets, I understand this present obsession isn’t healthy. I should be provisioning the boat for an extended fall cruise through the Gulf Islands and Desolation Sound, glad we’re not encumbered with school-age children. Or taking my beautiful wife to Tacoma to find a new dive bar where we can resume a 25-years-in-waiting game of nine-ball.
Yet, I can’t shake this feeling that If I could walk through my little shed and admire the nicely spaced rows of hammers and garden implements, the gas trimmer hanging just so, the old jumble of tools and tarps and junk transformed into calming straight lines and order, then ... well, then I could begin to accept this new reality, to acclimate to a universe where the axis is just slightly off-kilter, like the deck of a sailboat under a broad reach. Call it a last-minute negotiation in a deal already struck — a vestige of permanence before we set ashore in this undiscovered country while the ships burn, leaving no trace but rusted keels in the shallows.
When we purchased our Nordhavn 43 trawler a little over two years ago, we had big plans for the fall of 2020. We’d leave our newly emptied home and sail off to far away destinations — a longtime dream come true.
In fact, we did cast off, but not like we expected.
We left our home port on Vashon Island on September 1st aboard Indiscretion headed generally for the San Juan Islands, some of the most beautiful cruising grounds in the world. No fixed itinerary. No set time to return. For once, we were cruising in September, a time long reserved for settling our kids into the new school year. Not this year. You see, we’ve reached that waypoint in life where the captain and first mate are mostly retired, and our children have flown the coop, left the nest, hit the road.
Well, sort of.
Our daughter is completing a master’s degree at the University of Washington, but her classes are all online because of the pandemic. So, she’s given up her apartment in Seattle and returned home. Our son left for his freshman year college in Colorado Springs in August, but the university told its incoming students to pack light; they will close down in the event of an outbreak. Since classes began, there have been 26 cases of COVID-19. We’re on alert, waiting for the phone call that he’s loaded up his Jeep and driving the 1,500 miles home to Washington state.
Indiscretion has the range and seaworthiness to go almost anywhere, safely and comfortably. Before the pandemic struck, we planned to voyage to Alaska this year as our first major expedition before heading down the west coast to Mexico. With closed borders, we can’t venture very far north. And with all this uncertainty over COVID-19, we can’t risk an extended trip down the coast.
So, while our voyage into Marriage 3.0 has begun in shoaling water with the possibility of uncharted reefs ahead, we’re still grateful for the position we’re in. We are healthy, live on an island which remains largely COVID-free, and have the freedom and flexibility to jump on our trawler and leave port for weeks or months. Life is good.
Port Ludlow and the Strait of Juan de Fuca
We spent our first night at anchor in Port Ludlow, a fine, protected harbor and well-suited for those traveling with dogs. It’s a good stop-over spot for South and Central Puget Sound boaters looking to cross the Strait.
There’s a place to tie up a dinghy just past the fuel dock and a nice network of walking trails near the Resort at Port Ludlow. Our evening walk took us near the restaurant at the resort with its beautiful, candlelit porch dining. We’ll have to try that on our next time here.
We thought we might stay a couple days in Port Ludlow, but the weather window to cross the Strait of Juan de Fuca was too good to linger. We made the crossing the next morning in mostly flat seas and blue skies. Our destination was Westcott Bay on the western side of San Juan Island, so we steered for the open water of Haro Strait.
About an hour from San Juan Island, we could make out a dozen or more boats huddled near the south end of the island, including three whale-watching boats. Whales! We’ve boated here for twenty years and have never encountered the famed Orca whale that plies these waters. This was our chance! We adjusted course to intercept, but we were too slow at our trawler speed of seven knots and the boats disbanded before we arrived. Oh well... We steered again for Haro Strait. Lisa took over the helm and I went down below for a nap.
From a comfortable snooze, I awoke 30 minutes later to a change in the engine’s RPMs and a shout from Lisa. I flew up the stairs to the pilothouse to catch a huge whale fin surfacing maybe 30 yards to port of us. We were all alone with no other boats anywhere around. We steered off to starboard to give the whale sea room and stopped the boat while this beauty put on a show, at one point lifting her entire body out of the water. We drifted along for ten minutes, totally mesmerized. What an incredible treat for our second day of cruising!
Westcott Bay, San Juan Island
We arrived in the islands on the Thursday before Labor Day weekend and wanted to find a place to anchor that wouldn’t be overrun with boats. Westcott Bay is a ten-minute tender ride from Roche Harbor, but far enough away that it didn’t feel crowded during the five days we spent there. We enjoyed a wonderful feast of oysters and wine at the Westcott Oyster Company before it shut down for the season. We took many hikes with the dogs through the historic English Camp inside nearby Garrison Bay.
Oysters at Westcott Bay Shellfish
During our time at Westcott, we endured two days of brisk wind out of the north. The bay seemed better protected from a north wind than other areas. We experienced 15-20 knot winds with occasional gusts of 25, but no higher. We slept well with our trusty Rocna anchor with Mantus bridle on the job.
Sunset in Westcott Bay
Reid Harbor, Stuart Island
We next ventured north to Reid Harbor on Stuart Island. This anchorage has been a longtime favorite of ours for its protected harbor, dinghy dock for easy access to shore, and great trail system.
We spent two nights here on a mooring buoy. We admired three fellow Nordhavn trawlers that joined us in the bay.
Nordhavn 47 Kelli Ann
After a few aborted attempts in past years, we completed the long hike to the lighthouse on the extreme western edge of Stuart. The dogs slept very well that night.
To the lighthouse!
A Stuart Island fixer-upper …
Friday Harbor, San Juan Island
We made a two-day stopover at the dock in Friday Harbor to pick up our daughter and her boyfriend for a visit. They drove up to Anacortes and took the ferry to meet us for a couple of days. We enjoyed the hospitality of Friday Harbor and took on provisions.
We moored up on the inside of breakwater D, the same place we tied up last year. The stern of Indiscretion faced the opening of the marina channel, so we got to see and wave at all the boats coming and going. After walking back to the boat after a nice dinner ashore, we noticed many boats had their underwater lights on for ambiance. We decided to turn ours on as well. Once illuminated, hundreds of squid swarmed the lights, and just moments later, a very agile seal swam in figure-eight loops right around our swim-step, devouring the squid. It stunned us all. We were slow to get our camera out, but here is the seal near the end of his feast:
The smoke from all the forest fires burning in Eastern Washington, Oregon and California finally reached the islands as we motored from Friday Harbor to Blind Bay on Shaw Island. A little patchy fog mixed in with the smoke to made the trip visually challenging, though we could see quite well with radar.
Blind Bay living up to its name …
After twenty years of cruising in the San Juan Islands, this was our first visit to Shaw Island. We anchored in about 45 feet of water near the opening of Blind Bay, close to Blind Island and the little marina/store.
We did some shopping at the store, which was surprisingly well-stocked, and chatted with a few Shaw islanders who were patiently waiting for one of the limited ferry sailings off the island. The store’s dock is the only place in the bay to land a tender, but it is limited to just patrons of the store, and off limits after hours. After buying $150 worth of food and supplies, we hoped we could use the dock that evening to take our two dogs ashore. But when we asked at the store, the answer was a firm no. This left a bad taste in our mouths, so we probably won’t visit again. Voyaging with dogs with a tender that can’t be easily beached has its limitations.
Fossil Bay, Sucia Island
We departed Blind Bay in a smoky haze on our way to Jones Island in hopes of snagging a mooring buoy, and if not, onward to Sucia Island. The haze began to thicken and once we cleared Orcas Island we were traveling in dense fog, the thickest in my boating career. Fog is common late summer in the San Juans and usually burns off by late morning. Indiscretion has radar and AIS, which becomes our electronic eyes in times like these.
As we approached Jones Island, the fog was so thick we couldn’t make out the island though we knew we were close based on the chart plotter and radar. We slowed down and steered for the north entrance. About halfway in, we still couldn’t see the shoreline or any boats, though we could tell the small bay was full based on radar and AIS signals. Visibility couldn’t have been more than 25 yards, making entry here too dangerous. We carefully reversed course and made way for more open water towards Sucia Island.
This thick fog persisted through the ten nautical miles up President Channel. Boat traffic was light and we were able to steer clear of other vessels. Most had AIS, which allows you to see their course and speed and whether you’re on a collision course. We passed a dozen or so boats during this 90 minute trip, but other than a blip on a screen, never actually saw them. Eerie.
The fog cleared on queue as we approached Fossil Bay on the southeast side of Sucia Island. We like Fossil Bay because of its two docks that allow easy access to shore in the tender. You can anchor in Fossil Bay, but the dozen or so mooring buoys take up the greater part of the anchorage.
We spent three days here, taking advantage of the network of hiking trails that span the island with long walks with the dogs, and simply relaxing in the gorgeous bay. Most evenings, we found ourselves gravitating to the flybridge to take in the sunset, dusk and twilight together. It doesn’t get much better than this.
Hikes in dorky hats on Sucia Island
Deer Harbor, Orcas Island
We took a slip at Deer Harbor Resort and Marina to charge our batteries, fill up the water tanks, and enjoy some shoreside activities. A little rain loomed in the forecast, so it was a good time to be at dock (dinghy rides in the rain with the dogs are not so fun). We bought more food and supplies at the marina store, enjoyed pizzas from Island Pie, and walked the half-mile up the road for a BBQ meal at the Deer Harbor Inn.
Deer Harbor Marina
We enjoyed ourselves so much at this quaint marina that we decided to stay an extra day to explore more of Orcas by car. We rented a minivan and traveled along the rural back roads of the island. Wineries, farm stands, and stunning seaside vistas welcomed us. We made our way to Eastsound, the largest “town” on Orcas. We bought some gifts for friends back home, ate an OK meal at the town’s Irish Pub, and stocked up on more groceries at the first full-fledged grocery store we had seen in a few weeks.
Cap Sante Marina, Anacortes
We left Deer Harbor with charged batteries and a rested crew. We would normally look for an anchorage to while away a few days on the hook, but after reviewing the upcoming week’s weather forecast of strong south winds and rain, we decided it was time to make our slow progress home.
We steered for Cap Sante Marina in Anacortes. We’d never been there, but kept hearing such good things about the marina and town, we thought we should check it out. I’m so glad we did.
A quick call to the marina, and we had an assigned slip on C dock. The entrance to the marina involves winding your way through a wall-marked dredged channel and maneuvering through and around a lot of boat traffic, but once inside you’re treated to wide, well-marked fairways and easy slip access.
Once safely moored, we walked the busy docks to see four other Nordhavn trawlers moored on our dock alone. Nordhavn has a sales office here in Anacortes, and Yachttech, a renowned Nordhavn service center, has an office here.
So many Nordhavns!
A short walk from the head of the dock brought us to a huge fenced off-leash dock park. Whoa! Our two dogs had a very fine time stretching their legs at speeds their human counterparts could never achieve. What kind of town dedicates an acre of prime waterfront real estate for a off-leashdog park?
On the recommendation of a fellow boater, we walked another six blocks to find the Brown Lantern Tavern. We watched the first half of the Seattle Seahawks game while we enjoyed terrific food and beer. We were falling in love with Anacortes.
On the walk back to marina, Lisa and I wondered aloud: “why not keep our boat here?” We applied for permanent moorage later that night. It’s that good.
Kingston Marina and Home
We left Anacortes with some hesitation. We could have easily holed up here during the rain and wind and enjoyed ourselves at the dock and town, but we decided to push on.
We took the Swinomish Channel south to avoid the adverse currents we would face in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. We took this route a few times in our sailboat, but I found the tight maneuvering through the narrow dredged channel tiring. And we still fought an adverse current. In hindsight, I would have preferred the open water approach through the strait.
We arrived at Kingston Marina after a nine-hour trip, both of us tired. An errant boater had taken our assigned side tie slip near the marina entrance, so we backed into an awkward slip deep inside. This is when bow and stern thrusters come in super handy.
Indiscretion tucked into a slip at Kingston Marina
We hadn’t visited Kingston by boat before, so it was a treat to walk the grounds and have our choice of fine restaurants. We had a lovely dinner at the Kingston Ale House. If you go, try the deep-fried green beans. Trust me.
We left Kingston Marina around 9 am for our last leg home, a six-hour trip. Neither of us were anxious to be home, but the looming heavy winds and rain convinced us to head to the safety of our own slip. Other than dodging hundreds of hard-to-see logs, the trip to Vashon was uneventful. We docked around 3 pm, cracked open our arrival beers, and reflected together on our empty nest cruise.
Reflections on Empty Nest Cruising Aboard a Nordhavn 43 Trawler
First off, the boat seemed to expand significantly in size as our crew complement shifted from a family of four to a single couple. With just the two of us, the boat seemed palatial. We’ve considered larger Nordhavns, but after this trip, I don’t think it would make any sense to move up. This is the perfect size trawler for a couple and occasional guests.
We expected to find the island chain emptied out in September, but that wasn’t the case. We had never seen so many anchored boats in Roche Harbor during our visit over the Labor Day weekend. Later anchorages weren’t quite as crowded, but we found we needed to arrive earlier in the day to make sure we found a spot — not what we expected for September cruising.
Dogs on a boat are a pain in the ass, but I can’t imagine cruising without them.
We cooked some terrific meals aboard the boat without much more effort than our home kitchen. Provisioning with a specific meal plan for the trip made sure we had everything we needed onboard, and took the guesswork out of what to make.
We are getting pretty damned confident at docking this trawler. We had a rocky start, but since then, every docking maneuver has been straight-forward and controlled. I still get nervous, but I now think of this as just good seamanship.
Our confidence in anchoring has also greatly increased. We made some improvements to our anchoring system with new anchor rode, a Mantus bridle and Mantus swivel. We had a chance to put the new gear to the test in a bunch of new anchorages and in some stiff winds. Our Maretron Anchor Watch system proved we stayed put even as boats near us dragged.
We had no mechanical or equipment failures during the cruise, now over 2,000 trouble-free nautical miles put astern since owning Indiscretion. I’m diligent about preventative maintenance and stocking spare parts, but I’m starting to believe these Nordhavn trawlers really are bullet-proof. I’ve probably just jinxed everything by writing this.
Our longest stint away from a dock was seven days, and except for needing to pump out the holding tank, we could have gone much longer. Normal generator runtimes in the morning and night with our new charging system kept our new house batteries topped off. The watermaker kept up with our daily water usage. The trash compactor helped keep our trash to a minimum, at least in storage space. And our ample freezer and refrigeration units held more food than two people could possibly consume (we packed too much food, again).
We met some wonderful people during our cruise that share our passion for the water and boat life. With COVID-19, these encounters can’t expand beyond a chat across a dock or swim step to dinghy, but you know right away that you’re meeting special people, perhaps lifelong friends. We look forward to welcoming these kindred spirits aboard for a drink in future anchorages.
Cruising the San Juans in the final month of summer was amazing. We returned to our home slip at Quartermaster Marina on the first day of fall, just ahead of some torrential rainfall that our area desperately needed. I’m taking a few days to wax the boat and complete a few other scheduled maintenance tasks. Call it a short pit stop before we cast off again for more empty nest fall cruising. Hope to see you out there!
I'm told I say it every year, but today was certainly the best Father's Day ever. Being spoiled by my two children, and seeing how they've become wonderful adults has put me in a thankful, reflective mood. I'm sure every generation thinks this, but I believe what it means to be a father has changed a lot over the past thirty years. I had the benefit of having two dads as I grew up, first one and then the other. I loved them both, but I looked for other role models when I became a father myself.
For me, it was my coaches and teachers, both as a young person and as an adult, that I tried to emulate. A great coach is someone who gives a part of themselves to make you a better person. They are generous, selfless. Coaches come in all ages, genders, races, creeds, sexual identities and beliefs, but they all share an unrelenting and often thankless passion for bringing out the best in others.
When Connor was five, he signed up to play baseball (well, T-Ball), and continued to play for the same coach for the next twelve years. David Prouse was that coach. Now, David is a cherished friend and I love him like a brother. But it's his role as coach and father that has inspired me the most. I got to watch David coach hundreds of kids over more than a decade of wet weather, distant road games, losing seasons, winning seasons, long practices, and every kind of juvenile attitude you can imagine. His coaching style relied on encouragement, a sense of fun, and sharing tips on how the next at bat could be more successful ... never, ever stressing how poorly that last at-bat or defensive play went. The only time I ever witnessed a scowl cross David's face on the field was directed at either an opposing coach or an umpire. Never a player.
It didn't take long before David and I became best friends and our two families did a lot of things together - weekends away, boating, clamming, and just hanging out over long holiday weekends. I got to see David as a father to his two boys and saw that his parenting matched his coaching style (OK, maybe a few more scowls!). I drank all this up, because at the time I was searching far and wide for ways I could be a better dad. Over the years, we raised our families, side by side, learning from each other, helping each other. Without question, I'm a better father to my own kids because of my friendship with David. And as proof, our kids have turned into amazing, kind, and generous adults. We are both super-proud dads.
Most captains pay close attention to weather forecasts and will postpone departures to protect the comfort and safety of the ship and its passengers. But what if the skipper has a track record of being too cautious? And what if the ship is an ocean-capable Nordhavn trawler?
I’m the first to admit it: I’m a cautious skipper. Even with decades of sailing experience across a half-dozen vessels, my nerves still rattle when the wind pipes up. Unlike a car, maneuvering a boat has an inherent wildness to it, an out of control feeling more akin to riding an elephant than the surety of a stick-shift, particularly in close quarters around docks and other boats.
Before any trip, I read the NOAA marine forecasts and will, as a rule, postpone a departure if the winds are expected to exceed 20 knots in velocity. It can be windy here during the winter, which has prompted more than a few trip cancelations by this careful captain. I often second-guess these decisions later, especially when the forecasted storm fails to materialize.
Since moving from a sailboat to our Nordhavn 43 trawler, I have relaxed my caution a little. This little ship is built for heavy weather and can safely transport its passengers just about anywhere in the world we dare to sail. In our year and a half of trawler life, we’ve made long passages and pushed through weather systems that I wouldn’t have enjoyed at all on a sailboat. Yet, on every passage, I’m continually assessing wind speed and direction and thinking through the conditions we’ll face when we arrive at our destination.
This aversion to docking in high winds conflicts with our desire for adventure and exploration as we make our plans for open ocean voyages down the Pacific Coast to Mexico and beyond. We will undoubtedly face our share of dicey situations in our travels. I know the boat can handle it, but I have questions about the captain.
Which brings me to our most recent trip from Vashon Island to Bainbridge, a leisurely four-hour cruise. It was the first week of school closures from COVID-19, but before the stay-at-home order, and we planned a little social distancing on the water. Our daughter is home from college, and our son invited one of his friends to join us for the three-day trip. I had been monitoring the marine forecasts for the previous few days and it hadn’t budged:
Small Craft Advisory, N wind 15 to 25 knots, wind waves 2 to 4 feet.
This same forecast has been issued for days on end with short-lived bouts of foul weather, but nothing really troubling.
***
We pile in the car and drive to Quartermaster Marina, where we find a blustery scene. The yacht basin is exposed to north wind, and the bay is foamy white with wind waves and spray. We pack our food and gear for the trip into a dock cart and head for the boat. Our slip faces north, and plumes of sea spray pelt the dock and Indiscretion’s stern. The extra bedding we packed in the dock cart for our guest takes a good wetting from the spray before we can stow it inside.
The view from the cockpit inspires awe: large cresting waves march toward us like an endless army of orcs. The waves break on our swim platform, launching showers of spray as we watch.
We gather in the pilothouse to listen to the marine forecast on VHF and consider our options. The starboard door catches a gust of wind after being left slightly ajar and flies open. The slamming noise is shocking, and everyone jumps. I tell myself there is no way in hell we are going out in this. I begin to formulate a new plan: we try again tomorrow, or make a day and night of it right here at the dock.
I watch the wind speed gauge while the marine observations continue on the radio. 15 knots, a boat lurching 25 knots, then 10 knots, 25 knots again. Gusty. I feel eyes on me, particularly Connor’s. At eighteen, his love for adventure and excitement has yet to be tempered by risk or loss. Our eyes lock and I don’t need telepathy to know his thoughts. “We can handle this! It will be fun! Let’s go!”
I turn to Lisa. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know.” The concern in her voice matches my own. “It’s really stormy. You’re the captain. It’s your call.”
Connor chimes in: “Dad, we’re in a Nordhavn. She was built for this.” He is repeating what I’ve said about the boat dozens of times. He has a friend along and doesn’t want me to abandon our plans.
Ah, the loneliness of command. I climb up to the boat deck to get a better look at the exposed sea. I’m nearly bowled over by a gust. I decide to return the cart to the head of the dock to give me time to think. The crew, watching my every move, interprets this to mean we’re really going to do this. Which I guess is right. Our destination should be well-protected from strong north winds. And, if I’m honest, I don’t want to disappoint my son. The world feels like it’s unhinging from this pandemic. Some time on the water will do us all good. After all, ships weren’t built for the safety of harbors. With misgivings, I decide we’ll give this a go.
Departure
The comfort of a decision and practiced routine settles my nerves. I fire up the main engine and energize the stabilizers. I power on the navigational instruments and maneuvering thrusters. I walk around the perimeter of the boat while the engine warms up to check fenders and gauge how we’ll be blown once we release the dock lines. I give instructions to the crew: Mallory will catch dock lines at the bow, Connor will handle the stern line, and Lisa will release the remaining lines from the dock, beginning with the bow, and leave the stern spring line for last, the only thing keeping us from bashing into the dock. Lisa and I don our wireless headphones. I climb up to the flybridge where the visibility is better.
From my high perch, I see Lisa standing on the dock near the bow, ready to cast us off. With headphones, we can talk without shouting over the wind. “Let’s wait for a lull,” I tell her, and she nods up at me. I test the bow and stern thrusters as we wait.
I look astern once more at the whitecaps and rolling waves. A heavy gust pummels the boat, pushing her hard against the dock. 28 knots. “Shit,” I say to myself, but Lisa of course hears me. The fenders groan in protest. And then, the lull. The wind drops to ten knots.
“Let’s go,” I say.
In surprising rapidity, the bow line flies through the air to Mallory who’s there to catch it on the foredeck. Connor unties the stern and steps aboard the swim platform, which is awash in sea water, his sneakers now drenched. I engage slow reverse to keep us in place while Lisa unties the spring line and steps aboard. We’re free. So many things can go terribly wrong in the next five seconds.
A fresh gust hits us as we begin to back out of the slip. I give the engine a boost of power, and we glide out, weathervaning directly into the wind, more gracefully than my anxious mind had imagined. The bow clears the dock without a scrape, and I give the engine more power.
“We’re away,” Lisa reports from the cockpit.
“I’m going to back us out a ways before I try to turn into the wind. I don’t want to chance being blown back into the dock.” I say this with confidence, but I’m in new territory here.
We get about three boat lengths away and I put the engine in neutral. The wind stops our momentum abruptly. I engage forward gear and give her some throttle as I turn the wheel hard to starboard. I use both the bow and stern thrusters to help with the turn. I inch up the throttle as the ship starts her slow turn. As we come abeam of the wind, I feel a gust, and the entire boat begins to heel to port, ten degrees, then twenty. A scene from The Perfect Storm pops into my head, and I give her more throttle. Lisa’s dismay floods my headset: “we’re tipping!” She cries, but the ship rights herself, and we plow ahead, into the wind, on an even keel, making way.
Gale Force Winds
Once clear of the marina and the congestion of inner harbor, we proceed south through Outer Quartermaster and then east along the southern end of Maury Island. The crew settles in for the four-hour trip, and I steer from inside the warm and dry pilothouse. Blue skies and a frothy blue sea make the weather seem a little less ominous. The diesel engine pushes us along at seven knots, and its low rumble from the engine room provides a familiar comfort as I scan the wind-tossed sea ahead. Wind speeds hold around 25 knots until we reach the southeastern edge of Maury Island, past the Point Robinson Lighthouse, and make the turn north into the wide open expanse of East Passage.
Two things happen at once: first, the wind speed climbs to 35 knots with gusts now topping 40. A fresh gale. Second, the waves grow much steeper. An ebb tide and strong opposing winds create a maelstrom of cresting waves before us, bunched closely together. Indiscretion has active fin stabilizers that limit the boat from rolling side to side, but these can’t stop this fore-and-aft pitch. Unlike ocean swells which have a certain cadence, the motion is constant and lurching. Sea spray instantly showers the pilothouse windows and the upper flybridge. On several occasions, larger waves crest over the bow, and green water floods the foredeck.
Lisa stands next to me in the wheelhouse, hanging on to the helm chair for balance.
“This is bad,” she says. “Should we turn back?”
“Nah. It wouldn’t be safe to take her back to dock in Quartermaster. We’re better off forging ahead and trying for Bainbridge. The boat’s doing just fine.”
And fine she is. Other than some clanking gear that hadn’t been stowed properly, and the hinged salon TV requiring some makeshift tie-downs to secure it, our little ship simply puts her shoulder down to the winds and waves and plows forward at a respectable six knots, slowed only slightly by the gale force winds and whipped up seas.
My daughter turns a little green with the motion, but finds sanctuary in one of the teak chairs in the open-air cockpit facing aft. She soon feels better.
As we proceed north, the wind doesn’t dip below thirty knots. Most of the time, we see true wind speeds in the high thirties and low forties. Other than ferry boats and one southbound container ship, we have the sea to ourselves. I keep my eyes peeled for logs that might be hiding in the steep waves.
A canvas cover on the windlass comes loose at the bow, and I ask Lisa to refasten it. She struggles to open the pilothouse door and retreats after feeling the full force of the wind. Better to buy a new cover than risk venturing forward in these conditions. With the door closed, It astonishes me how quiet and insulated we are within the pilothouse of this sturdy trawler.
It’s times like these that I wish my Pop was still alive. He ran fishing boats in the Bering Sea in his younger days, and I know he would have loved to be here with me, to feel the surge of the sea beneath his feet again, his eyes shining with the blue and white of the sea and sky, regaling me with stories of storms, and drunken misfit crews, and heroic repairs at sea.
Time seems to creep, matching our slow but steady northward progress. Lisa takes the helm while I check on things in the engine room. Nordhavns have handholds just about everywhere, and I find I need these to get around. All is well with the engine, the hydraulics, and the stabilizers. The bilges are dry. I take over at the helm and smile to myself. We’re in the worst sea conditions I’ve experienced as a captain, and yet I know we’re safe and secure.
I learn that Connor’s friend has no previous boating experience. He comes up from the salon to the pilothouse on his way to the head, apparently no worse for the wear. I tell him these are unusual conditions, but he doesn’t seem to mind or care. I hear him whoop down below a few minutes later as we navigate a particularly large wave.
“Are you OK?” I holler.
“Yeah! This is fun!” He yells back. I like this kid.
Safe Harbor
As we approach Bainbridge Island, the wind and seas show no sign of letting up. So much for the marine forecast of 15 to 25 knots, I think to myself. I worry about maneuvering within Eagle Harbor in these conditions.
We tuck behind Blakely Rock and hug the shore of Bainbridge to avoid the massive ferries that serve the island. The wind drops to a calming 25 knots. We time it right and follow a ferry into Eagle Harbor. Once inside the harbor, we are greeted by flat seas and a manageable 15 knots of wind. Whew.
We put out fenders and dock lines and tie up smartly to a vacant spot on the outside of the public dock. Once shore power is connected and the ship is properly secured, Lisa and I return to the pilothouse for beers to celebrate our safe arrival. The boys take our two shell-shocked dogs ashore.
“Well, that was an adventure,” I say to Lisa. I feel happy here in this calm harbor, having brought us through a tempest.
“Next time, let’s stick to our 20-knot rule,” Lisa replies with a smile.
“Definitely,” I agree. We tap beer cans. Deep down though, I am thrilled we did this. We all gained confidence, skipper and crew, in our abilities to handle the ship in rough water and heavy winds. We tested some limits. Conditions we are sure to face, again and again, both on land and sea.
I am reminded that Shakespeare introduced the word Indiscretion, our ship’s namesake, into the English language some four hundred years ago, giving the term a positive spin:
Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well When our deep plots do pall, and that should teach us There’s a divinity that shapes our ends Rough-hew them how we will1.
Even the great Bard suggested a little indiscretion now and then might be a good thing. I am coming around to his way of thinking.
Safe and sound at Eagle Harbor City Dock
The crew of Indiscretion remains in harbor during this period of quarantine and social isolation. Fair winds and calm seas to all as we navigate the unsettled times ahead.
I stood mostly naked near the bow of the boat in the early hours of a Thursday morning. The sun hadn’t risen, and it was damp and chilly in my underwear. I hoped other boats anchored nearby wouldn’t witness this act of indignity. Desperate times require desperate measures, I told myself, as I contemplated the orange traffic cone standing before me atop a square yard of fake grass.
It was our sixth day into a month-long cruise aboard Indiscretion, and neither of our two dogs had availed themselves of this onboard privy, despite long passages and persistent coaxing by captain and crew.
On walks back home, they’d let go great streams on every one of these we encountered, barely sniffing it first. Even at the end of a long walk with bladders long emptied, they would find a way to dribble urine at the base of these bright orange beacons. They could not resist.
This gave us the brilliant idea for of a “Porch Pottie” for the dogs to relieve themselves without the hassle of shore leave. We even bought an aerosol spray to mimic the scent they most desire before the act.
“Maybe you should pee on it first,” Lisa suggested on the second day of the cruise. We had chugged along for 14 hours our first day out, with many fruitless trips underway to the traffic cone with the dogs.
“There is no way I’m doing that,” I said. “They’ll figure it out. They’re smart dogs.”
Thus, every morning began the same way. A persistent urging for the dogs to do their business at the traffic cone just beyond the Portuguese bridge. Zero interest. They wouldn’t even smell it. Tugging them to the cone with the leash felt like pushing the wrong ends of powerful magnets together. After ten or twenty minutes with both dogs looking at us like we were crazy, we’d relent and go ashore in the tender.
By the fourth day at anchor, the dogs took sport in the morning routine. If they humored us long enough with confused looks and a strong aversion to the orange cone, they would get to go for a walk afterward. Joyous barks and yips erupted once I began futzing with the tender. They had won again.
“You need to pee on it,” Lisa encouraged. Like that would make any difference.
Cruising with dogs is very popular. I’d say most trawlers we meet have a dog aboard. The necessity of frequent trips ashore means we explore beaches and inland areas of the anchorages while other boaters might stay afloat. Dogs warm up a cold sea berth and stand watch with you on blustery evenings at anchor. Even on our smallest sailboats, we had a dog along. I can’t think of a better way to travel or vacation with a dog than on a boat.
We didn’t know how good we had it with Bouncer, a small Boston Terrier that traveled with us on every cruise we took aboard our sailboat. Bouncer seldom barked. She slept a good part of the day and night. Her bathroom duties were carried out without fuss: she would step carefully into the dinghy in the morning, taking in the watery surroundings as we rowed or motored along, her front paws up on the bow of the inflatable. We had a leash for her somewhere rolling around the bottom of the boat, but we rarely needed it. She would jump out as soon as the dinghy touched the sand, trot about ten yards and pee, then poop. She took no notice of other dogs. She was usually back in the dinghy before I had a chance to properly tie up, ready for breakfast, and then snuggle back into a berth with one of the kids.
Bouncer on a kayak
“I miss that little dog,” I muttered, feeling sorry for myself as I stared at the traffic cone, and thought about how different our life is now aboard the trawler with Franklin and Preston.
Franklin is a four-year-old Puggle, a cross between a Pug and Beagle, and the only dog we’ve owned that can’t be trusted off-leash. Should our front door be left ajar momentarily as you carry in the groceries, this sly little bastard will dart between your legs and race to freedom, looking over his shoulder with a look of delight and mischief before disappearing into the woods. Calling him is pointless. His brain is routed through his snout, and the outdoor smells are much more interesting than our shouts to come back. We’ve tried chasing him, but he sees this as a terrific keep-away game, his eyes flashing with mirth as he darts in and out of reach. Eventually, he grows tired or hungry, and trots home, clearly pleased with himself. It’s hard to be mad at him when he loves these romps so much. We live in a rural part of Vashon Island, so there’s not too much trouble this little fella can find here at home. However, afloat and in strange ports, we all worry about what might happen if Franklin were to escape on one of his adventures. One hand for the ship, one hand for Franklin’s leash.
Franklin
He did escape in Roche Harbor, leaping in a flash from the cockpit to the narrow port side deck, and then down to the dock. In his excitement, he took a wrong turn down a dead-end, but soon reversed course and galloped at full speed toward the dock entrance and freedom. It was blind luck that Connor and Lisa intercepted him on their way back to the boat. We might still be looking for him had he made it to dry land.
Franklin defends our home against would-be intruders with a combination bark-howl that you have to experience to understand. It’s impressive. He employs this howl-bark to repel the UPS truck when it visits our home. Franklin runs from door to window, making a god-awful ruckus for a good three minutes until, sure enough, the truck decides the danger is too great and drives off (after leaving our packages and shaking his head). This near-daily occurrence has reinforced Franklin’s belief that if he barks and howls as loud as possible, the dreaded enemy will eventually retreat.
We hoped Franklin might be less possessive on the boat. Not so much. He soon learned that if he sits on the upper pilot berth in the back of the wheelhouse, he can enjoy a near 360-degree vista surrounding the boat. A fellow trawler captain dared to slowly cruise by and wave - to Franklin’s shock and outrage. He launched into howl-bark mode until the trawler was out of sight, saving us yet again. Ugh. He also defends the boat from kayakers, paddle-boarders, and any form of bird, in particular, the tame Cackling Geese we encountered in large numbers at Sucia Island. These, it turns out, are Franklin’s arch-enemy; his Moriarties. No amount of treats or admonishments could convince him otherwise.
Dog number two is Preston, a five-year-old Boston Terrier, the same breed as our beloved Bouncer, yet so, so different. He’s massive, tipping the scale at 35 pounds which is an outlier for Bostons, yet all muscle and gristle. He’s a rescue dog with extreme anxiety issues. He warmed to Lisa and the kids right away after we adopted him, but he wouldn’t come near me, especially if I wore a baseball cap. After a few months he decided I was OK, and now loves us all unconditionally. Other people or dogs outside our family unit, however, are Not OK. He has nipped more than one of our house guests and has a complete fit should another dog have the nerve to meet us on a walk. He’s a bundle of nervous energy that no amount of love, or CBD, seems to diminish.
Preston
Also, he has poop anxiety. He must have been abused as a puppy, for he refuses to poop while in the presence of others. This is a problem on a boat. On a cruise last summer, he went three days without pooping. By day two of the trip, his eyes appeared even bulgier, and his butt was definitely puckering, but he refused to go. Finally, after a long trek on the third day, a volley of poops shot out of his bum while he carried on down the trail. He did not squat or even stop. They just flew out, and he kept walking, apparently making the case that the impossibly large pile of poop on the trail came from some other dog. He’s done better on this trip, but it’s still a celebration when Preston has a bowel movement.
While Preston has his issues, he is without question the smartest dog we’ve ever owned. His understanding of English is unrivaled. He communicates his intentions and desires very clearly and responds with joy once you finally understand him. He runs circles around Franklin’s somewhat dimmer intelligence. Should Franklin have a toy that Preston wants, he runs to the basement door and barks until Franklin races down the stairs, through the doggie door, and outside to our fenced yard, seeking out the intruder. Preston then takes the dropped toy for himself. Franklin falls for this every time.
Franklin’s whimpers had commenced early this morning. I nestled further into the blankets to block out the sound, which repeated just often enough to reawaken me.
“The dog needs to go ashore,” Lisa informed me from her side of the berth. Her voice contained a trace of accusation as if peeing on the damn cone would solve all our canine issues.
“Aah ump,” came my muffled reply.
As sleep faded, I began to think through the sequence of events that must soon unfold to stop that dog’s whimpering. I would get up and dress. I would get the dogs ready for sea: collars, leashes, doggie life jackets. I would bring the tender around to the stern and warm up the engine. Our anchorage doesn’t include a dinghy dock, and the tender is too large and heavy to beach, so I would need to deploy an anchor. I would load the dogs into the tender and head for land through the chop. About 20 feet from shore, I would hurl the Anchor Buddy over the stern, goose the engine a bit, and quickly raise the prop, so it doesn’t hit bottom. I would lash the leashes of the dogs to the rail while I leap off the bow into the frigid water to pull the 800 pound craft up near the shore. Wet and sandy, I would secure the tender and hoist the dogs out on to the beach to do their business.
This assumes, I mused, that the beach at this early hour is empty. Meeting another dog would spell serious Trouble.
Each dog comports himself reasonably well alone, but some pack chemistry born into their genes a millennia ago transforms them into would-be killers when they meet another dog together. On a quiet walk up the dock, they are angels, taking in exciting smells, jostling each other good-naturedly, smiles apparent on their canine mugs. Yet, the second we encounter a dog - a Poodle or, heaven forbid, a German Shepherd, the fangs come out, and pandemonium ensues. Restrained by their leashes, they often set upon on each other, snarling and biting. Folks emerge from their boats to observe the carnage, and dog people along the docks look on in dismay. I know that feeling. I’ve been there with my docile dog, wondering what in the hell is wrong with those awful dog owners who can’t control their dogs. And yet I am now that guy, tugging ineffectively at the leashes of two gnashing demons, blood-lusting for the nervous Poodle, the tail-wagging Lab, the puzzled Shepherd.
As a result, one person cannot take both dogs anywhere we might meet another dog. Two humans must form an escort to maintain any semblance of order.
“You’ll have to go with me,” I told Lisa as I came fully awake.
“Why won’t you just pee on the damn thing?” She moaned back.
And so, it finally happened. In the growing light on this Thursday morning at sea, I let go a great stream of piss, covering the cone, grass, and a bit of my bare left foot as I misjudged the strength of the breeze.
Did it work? Did the dogs finally grasp the purpose of the great orange cone after their alpha dog modeled the way? No. If anything, they viewed the apparatus (and me) with even more mistrust.
I cleaned most of the sand out of the tender from another morning expedition with the dogs. I was finally ready for that first cup of coffee.
And still, despite the hassle of frequent trips ashore at ungodly hours, and the anxiety of what might happen when we invite friends with dogs to the boat, we wouldn’t consider cruising without our canine mates. They’re part of our family, after all. And they bring us joy in their own peculiar ways.
“I can’t believe you did that,” Lisa said, smiling at me. Both dogs were fast asleep on the settee beside her. “I didn’t really think it would work.”
I’m writing this tonight from the settee of Indiscretion’s wheelhouse — one hell of a place to put down words. It’s just past twilight now, and I’ve turned on the red courtesy lights that provide just enough glow to see my surroundings, but not enough to spoil vision while voyaging at night. Ahead of me lie the helm chair, the ship’s wheel and the wrap-around pilothouse windows that look out over the bow and Quartermaster Marina.
From my perch, I can take in a wide swath of the lighted marina as it shifts from the gusting north wind that buffets the stern and starboard quarter, twisting and turning the boat so that the view is endlessly moving, as are all the other boats ahead and around me. A loose halyard slaps on a sailboat’s mast off to starboard. Waves lap along the hull. Indiscretion’s dock lines creak and groan from the pressure of the wind, the sounds softened from the heavy insulation of Nordhavn construction. The slapping halyard somehow beats in time with the rhythm of the country music playing on the radio.
When I was ten, my new step-dad took me out on a commercial fishing boat, the Nushagak, which had a roughshod version of this pilothouse. Wires dangled from above the helm and giant charts covered the navigation station — more like Hemingway’s Pilar than this modern trawler. I remember a feeling of complete enthrallment aboard her, the unique smells aboard a fishing boat, the steady vibration of the engine felt through my feet, the swells making my movement unsure, and the dawning recognition that we could point her bow further offshore, chugging along inside that windowed world, and leave the world of land life astern.
On the hundreds of nights we spent on sailboats, we stayed belowdecks on the hook or at dock. But in a trawler, the promise of adventure tugs at you day and night from the beckoning pilothouse windows. It would be so easy (and comfortable!) to slip the dock lines and go. Or stay and plot out the next passage or port, while taking in the beautiful surroundings, and dreaming of more distant ports.
In all my years of sailing, I rarely felt the same sense of belonging as I do on Indiscretion, particularly here in the wheelhouse, like coming home and discovering an unfound door of childhood dreams.
When we purchased Indiscretion late last summer, we knew we needed help in getting to know our new vessel, the systems on board, and in particular, maneuvering her 60,000 pounds around docks and other boats. Coming from a smaller and lighter sailboat, operating this trawler was a whole new experience for us.
To our delight, we had the best teacher possible: Don Kohlmann from the Seattle office of Nordhavn spent a full day with us on the water, showing us first hand how to operate the boat, along with a detailed review of all its systems. Don is a terrific teacher and an all-around wonderful person. I don’t believe I’ve connected as quickly with another soul - part mentor, brother, and best friend. Getting to work with Don is one of the fringe benefits of buying a Nordhavn trawler.
Indiscretion has bow and stern thrusters — joysticks at the helm that magically allow you to turn the bow or stern in the direction you want to move. From my sailing days, I admit I was entranced with the notion of these thrusters. It felt like cheating to be able to spin the boat in this way after all the years of gliding a sailboat into a slip on momentum and prayer. And backing a sailboat in any direction was always an adventure. I certainly could have used such a thruster system a time or two over the years.
During our sea trial and later on-the-water training, I noticed Don seldom used the thrusters, trusting instead the prop-walk and prop-wash afforded by the ship’s propeller and rudder.
“Why not use the thrusters?” I asked as we left the dock and again as we returned, eying the beautiful little joysticks at the helm.
“You don’t need them, and you really shouldn’t rely on them, especially with this trawler’s big propeller,” Don counseled.
I heard none of this. This new trawler had bow and stern thrusters, and I was going to use them, dammit.
You might sense where this is going.
Once we had the boat moored at our home port of Quartermaster Marina, we were keen to take trips before summer finally ran out on us. With all of us aboard and all systems ready, I would confidently back the boat out of the slip. Any strong wind, which would tend to blow our light sailboat around, had little effect on this big trawler, giving me a greater sense of control and confidence. But then the damnedest thing would happen: as I turned the wheel to port, intending to back that way, the boat would turn to starboard.
“Wow, this boat has a powerful prop walk to starboard,” I said to myself from my perch on the flybridge. Our last sailboat had a similar issue, and it was almost impossible to back to port. “No worries,” I thought. “I have thrusters,” as I pressed the joystick, spun the stern around, and headed on our way. This same sequence repeated every time I left our marina.
A few trips later, I found myself backing out of Dock Street Marina in Tacoma. I was looking forward to this maneuver because it required backing to starboard — clearly the boat’s preferred backing angle. It was a windy morning, and I was a little nervous as a new captain, noting the wind waves on the water and the flags flapping along the quay. Everyone climbed aboard, the dock lines were retrieved, and I backed out of the slip into the fairway. People seem drawn to these Nordhavn trawlers, and a group assembled on the docks to watch us depart. I turned the wheel to starboard, smiling to myself, and the boat started turning to port. What the … ?! I gave her a little more throttle, and the boat turned faster to port, heading in the wrong direction with the wind soon pushing her further off course.
I quickly started firing thrusters, both bow and stern, like phasers and photon torpedos on a starship under attack from the Klingons, and eventually positioned the boat to safely exit the fairway, but not without first rubbing a neighboring dock and suffering the scorn of a handful of fellow boaters standing out on their bows, clearly nervous at my wayward meanderings. My confidence at docking this boat was severely compromised.
I downplayed this to my first mate Lisa, suggesting the wind was just a little too much that day, but I was concerned.
The holidays came and went, and there were a few opportunities for winter cruises that I found reasons to skip. In each case, the marine forecast showed too much wind, and I was worried about docking mishaps, especially when such basic maneuvers as backing to port or starboard seemed to elude my capabilities as skipper. I hated having to rely on those damned thrusters, which honestly aren’t that great when the wind is blowing. Since these trawlers are meant for serious open ocean passages, I knew the problem lied with me; I must be doing something wrong.
We took the boat out for an afternoon a few weeks ago for the sole purpose of figuring out this weird backing problem, something we should have done in our first week. I backed out of the slip and turned the wheel to port. The boat slowly turned to starboard — not the direction we needed to go. I took a breath and turned the wheel to starboard, gave her some reverse throttle, and she gracefully turned to port.
So here’s the thing: in all my years of sailing, I know that backing a boat is tricky. You need to have a certain amount of luck and gumption and physics to make it work, particularly in strong winds. One certainty on a sailboat is you must turn the rudder in the direction you want to go. If you want to back to port, you turn the rudder to port. This is as basic as which way you rotate the handlebars of your bicycle or the direction you unscrew your gas cap.
And yet, in this new trawler universe, the physics of backing is somehow reversed. Starboard turns to port, left becomes right, and Spock is evil and wears a beard. My brain hurt.
I motored out into the middle of Quartermaster Harbor and stopped the boat. I practiced backing the boat and confirmed what I had begun to suspect. Putting the helm hard over to port and backing down, the boat will pivot to starboard. She will equally rotate to port with the rudder hard over to starboard. In fact, with a little jockeying of forward and reverse, the boat will spin in a tight circle, in either direction, though in an opposite way from my years of experience aboard sailboats.
Don’s first-day advice came back to me as I continued these maneuvers, eventually heading over to Dockton Marina where I practiced approaching the public dock from different angles. If I gave up my preconceived notion of which way to turn the helm in reverse, the boat performed flawlessly.
As usual, Lisa got the idea more quickly than I did. “Just steer the bow,” she yelled up from the cockpit. With this mindset, it all clicked, and maneuvering became dead simple. I found that Indiscretion’s large propeller and rudder provide amazing slow-speed maneuverability, even better than thrusters. Near the dock with the stern kicked out, turning the helm to port with a burst of throttle in forward gear (“steer the bow!”), the stern will pivot as if by magic to starboard.
I realize now I should have spent more time listening to Don on that first day on the water. In later discussions with other trawler captains, I’ve learned that the force of water from the big propeller against an angled rudder creates a powerful sideways thrust that is incredibly helpful when docking or maneuvering. I used this new-found knowledge on a recent trip and found my new mastery of this ship near docks and other boats damn satisfying. And relieving.
Once I accepted this change in the laws of boat-steering physics, it made me wonder what other deep-rooted beliefs I hold about the world that are patently untrue under a different set of circumstances.
I recall driving in Ireland when everything seemed backward. I sat on the right side of the car, with the stick shift in my left hand, while driving in the left lane of the road. Even the brakes on bicycles in Ireland are reversed. Talk about a challenge to long-held preconceived notions.
I think the lesson here is two-fold: first, I recognize I still have a lot to learn as a new captain of this beautiful trawler, and I will do my best to continue my crawl up this steep curve. And second, I need to be more open-minded and flexible in my thinking, both afloat and ashore, to make sure I don’t turn into an older dog that can’t learn new tricks. Life can surprise you at just about any age.
I spent last weekend in Las Vegas to attend my niece’s Little White Chapel wedding on the Strip. Frequent flier miles paid for our tickets, placing us in the far back of the plane. On the way home to Seattle, my family took the whole row on the port side of the aircraft, while I settled into the opposite aisle seat. A couple soon appeared and clambered into the seats next to mine. They had flown down for the weekend to see Billy Idol perform and were on their way back home.
I felt my seat grow a little smaller as I wedged my body and gear inside the proper confines of my aisle seat. I’ve flown in a lot of middle seats in my life. Those armrests go with the seat-bearer. Trust me on that.
The woman, dressed in sensible travel clothes, sat in the window seat and soon busied herself with a book. Her companion, fitted out in trim, athletic apparel, was personable enough upon introduction, but soon fell silent, back straight, eyes open and staring forward. Unmoving.
Before every plane trip, I make sure I bring along enough distractions to keep me occupied for the duration of the nerve-rattling tin can captivity of air travel. While I’ve flown nearly a million miles over my life, most of it shuttling between airports and corporate conference rooms, I still maintain an unshakable dread of flying. I’ve woken from nightmares of being stuck in the middle seat of a plane with nothing to read. Seriously.
In the old days, to take my mind off the jolts of turbulence, I weighted down my bag with two or three books and a couple newspapers, along with an ample supply of work projects. For this particular trip, I brought my Kindle with a newly begun 1,000-page novel, an iPad loaded with the day’s Wall Street Journal, a movie and a few episodes of a TV show I’m following, and an iPhone with 300 hours of music and a slew of games. Pair all this with noise-canceling headphones, and I carried more entertainment gear than the tiny seat back pocket could accommodate — my electronically-insulated cocoon.
While the man beside me continued his meditative trance, bugging the shit out of me, I considered my obsession with keeping busy on planes. I try to meditate every day, but I cannot imagine a two and a half hour meditation while hurtling along at 34,000 feet in intermittent turbulence. Taking a car ferry every day like I do is far more dangerous than flying, based on the data. Yet I need something at hand to occupy my mind in any confined space, especially a multi-hour strapped-in plane ride.
I thought this fellow, in his enthusiasm for seeing Billy Idol, must have forgotten to bring along reading material. You know, rushing out the door with your bags and tickets, excited for the bright lights of Vegas and to see a beloved entertainer. This can be forgiven. I think. But wait. The Airline Magazine was resting at eye level in the seat-back 11 inches from his direct line of sight. Did he ever flip through it, even as a diversion? No, he did not.
My air travel anxiety began even before I made that walk down the gangway to board my first flight. When I was seven, my mom shared a story with me about a strange feeling she had at the gate before boarding a plane to Guam when she was in her early twenties. At the last minute, she followed her instincts and decided not to board. The plane crashed with all passengers lost somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. A horrifying event. Looking back now, I don’t think this actually happened to my mom. I think she made the whole thing up after reading about something similar in the National Enquirer or watching a TV show on ESP. I can’t ask her now, but even if it wasn’t true, it instilled a healthy fear of flying in me at an impressionable age.
Then, in my teens during my short-lived boxing career, Chuck Robinson, a 17-year-old welterweight, two years my senior, made it on the Muhammad Ali Boxing Team all the way from our little small-town Washington state boxing program. He got to spar with the great one himself at Ali’s gym in Santa Monica. Chuck was an exceptional athlete, and to me and many others, a real local hero. He and 13 other amateur boxers flew to Europe in the Spring of 1980 to compete in the qualifiers for the 1980 Olympics - a dream of mine and near reality for Chuck. Somewhere over Warsaw, the aircraft suffered a catastrophic mechanical failure and spiraled out of control for 26 seconds before crashing. The muscles and tendons between wrist and forearm of most of the athletes were severed on impact, suggesting these young men were awake and gripping their seats at the time of the crash. The plane disintegrated as it plowed into the ground, killing all 87 aboard.
Wreckage of LOT Polish Airlines Flight 7
I think about Chuck and that awful half-minute of terror every time I fly.
As I considered my seatmate, I realize the two of us must exist on separate ends of a personality spectrum. Me, with with my gadgets sprawled on my lap as we taxied down the runway, intent on distracting myself from the potential of immediate demise; he, with his zen-like serenity, oblivious to the unnatural motion and angle as we made our ascent to the heavens, only to plummet to our deaths should one of a hundred possible mechanical failures present itself.
When the drink cart rolled through after a rough bit of turbulence, I ordered a beer, maybe my last, I reasoned. He took only water.
Near the end of the flight, I stole a glance his way, sure to find him asleep, perhaps a spot of drool pooled on his fitted microfiber shirt. But no, I saw his eyes were open and intently focused .... on nothing. I turned away, abashed. A part of me wanted to be like him, to be relaxed and calm, to be present, even during this suspended limbo of plane travel, maybe crafting a beautiful sonnet or the perfect line of code as he stared at the seat back ahead of him. Yet, at that moment I found myself hating him. His smugness and self-assuredness. His straight spine and posture. His stillness.
After the plane landed safely and people began the slow disembarkment ahead of us, we exchanged pleasantries. Welcome home, I said. You too, he said. That must have been some show, I said. He and his companion smiled and nodded. I helped take down their bags from the overhead compartment.
While we waited our turn to leave the plane, I wondered again at my nervousness of air travel. Do I need all these distractions underway, or am I obscuring an opportunity at more profound personal enlightenment to fully experience the present moment and embrace the wonderful but temporary life we have been given? Maybe this man has the right of it.
I looked around and found entire rows of people with their heads pointed down, intent on their tiny screens, catching up on what they had missed in our three-hour sojourn from tarmac to tarmac. The siren song of voicemail and text message pings filled the stale air of the plane all around me like the sounds of a pinball machine. I was not alone in this constant need for distraction.
As I followed my seatmate and his companion up the aisle, I vowed to myself: next time, I will face down my demons and experience the joy and terror of the moment even as we careen and jostle through the skies above.
Writing this from the Alaska Airlines Boardroom as I await my flight to San Francisco, I have already broken that promise. I would save a child from a burning building, but I won’t board a plane without a well-stocked iPad.
In my acceptance of these shortcomings, I tip my hat to the well-found soul in seat 34B.
Lisa and I have celebrated 22 wedding anniversaries. For at least the past dozen years, we haven’t exchanged gifts beyond small tokens like flowers or chocolates. Instead, we go out to dinner, just the two of us, to celebrate the occasion. This year we celebrated at May’s Kitchen, a Thai restaurant on Vashon that is so good, it is worthy of special occasions like anniversaries. As we were heading out the door on our way to the restaurant, Lisa surprised me with a package.
“Wait, what’s this?” I asked with apprehension. She was breaking tradition. “I didn’t buy you a gift.”
“Don’t worry. It’s for both of us. It’s a marriage saver,” she replied with a cryptic smile.
I opened the box and found a pair of Eartec wireless radio headphones. These are two-way radios used by crews of larger yachts to talk to each other during critical boat maneuvers like docking. I can don a set of these up on the flybridge and Lisa can wear a set down in the cockpit and we can talk to each other without raising our voices. A marriage saver.
Eartec UL2S UltraLITE Wireless Radios
I had wanted a set of these, but couldn’t quite justify the cost, and honestly, admit to the implication that the two of us needed to improve our communication skills afloat. But I was delighted to have them as a gift and over dinner brought up the prospect of geeky code names we could use while docking.
“We’ll definitely need code names when we’re on the radio,” I ventured. “Let’s see, how about we go with fruit names? You can be Blackberry and I’ll be Pomegranate,” I suggested. I had already given this some thought on our way to the restaurant.
“Blackberry? I’m supposed to be Blackberry? Where did you come up with that name? I don’t want to be Blackberry! In fact, I don’t want to use code names at all. We have enough to think about when we’re docking, I can’t remember a code name for you. Plus it’s dumb.”
I decided to let this go for now, given the initial negative response. But oh yes, we will use code names with these cool radios.
We could have used them a few weeks earlier as we were docking in our own slip at Quartermaster Marina on a blustery afternoon. The wind was gusting to 20 knots as we made our approach, the strongest winds we’d faced in a docking situation so far on this trawler. At the most critical juncture of the procedure with our bow inside the slip, now mere feet from crunching into a dock or another boat, a neighbor fired up a circular saw. The loud piercing whine obliterated any communication from Lisa three decks below.
“What?” I yelled from the flybridge. “Port or starboard?”
I could hear nothing but the whine of the saw and an indistinct yell from Lisa. The visibility is great from the flybridge except for the immediate area close to the hull. Time was of the essence.
“I think she said ‘port’.” I pushed the stern to port with the thrusters, toward the dock.
Seconds later, as the saw’s shriek finally died out, the words “Starboard, starboard, STARBOARD!!!” came hurtling up from Lisa, clear as a bell to anyone within a mile of the marina, each successive command rising in volume and urgency, the last one a full-throated yell loud enough to wake the gods above.
Just as we were about to crash into the dock, I pushed the stern away with a mere touch of the thruster joystick. Disaster averted. Every return to dock without a fiberglass repair bill is considered a success, but you can see how we might have benefited from these two-way radios.
We tried out the Eartecs on our very next trip. We were docking Indiscretion at Poulsbo Marina for the first time and needed to back into the slip, a new maneuver for us.
The thing about docking a large trawler yacht that no one tells you is how slow the process is. About twenty minutes prior to arrival, we start preparing. Fenders put out on both sides of the hull, dock lines ready to cast over the sides, marina maps consulted, stabilizer fins centered, thrusters powered on, perhaps a call to the marina to confirm our slip is vacant, and for me, a shift of helm from the pilothouse up to the flybridge for better visibility. Meanwhile, as we get closer, we slowly drop our speed from seven knots to around two or three knots when we close with the marina itself.
The View from Indiscretion’s Flybridge Helm
We decided we would don our radios early since it was our first time using them. I clicked on my unit and adjusted the headset. The ear cushion is comfortable and the adjustable microphone juts out in front of my mouth, making me feel like a fighter pilot.
“Blackberry, Blackberry, Blackberry, this is Pomegranate, do you copy, over?” I said in my most serious radio voice.
“Stop calling me Blackberry!” came the immediate response, loud and clear. With these radios, everything is self-contained within the headset itself. There are no wires to clip on your belt, no buttons to push to talk. It’s very natural to communicate this way. You can also raise the microphone up to mute it should you decide you need to say something your mate shouldn’t hear. Battery life is a staggering six hours with these radios. I hope we never face that long of a docking process.
We made our slow progress toward the marina with me up on the flybridge and Lisa down below readying fenders and dock lines, yet now able to easily talk to one another.
When we were first dating, I got transferred to New York for a six-month assignment, so we spent a lot of time on the phone during our courtship. Lisa has a fantastic telephone voice and I’ve always loved talking to her on the phone. These ship radios reminded me of those times and I found myself flirting with my wife of 22 years while helming the boat. We also took in the sights together of a new harbor and commented to each other about various boats we passed. I noticed that she was out of breath a lot as she hauled out fenders and muscled the dock lines in place, while I sat comfortably at the flybridge helm, meditating on the ever-changing sea below. I will enjoy this division of labor for as long as it lasts.
Docking is my least favorite activity on the boat. I’m always nervous even after 20 years of damage-free encounters. Having flirty small talk with the love of my life as we made our way toward the slip helped relax me. I found myself smiling and laughing with her as we carried out the much-practiced dance of docking … stopping the boat as we came even with our slip, spinning the stern with prop walk and prop wash, gauging the impact of wind and current, backing down slowly, small adjustments as needed with the bow and stern thrusters, in and out of gear to slowly move her into the berth, then a touch of forward to bring her to all stop.
This was the point where Lisa was supposed to say “the package is secured,” as I had suggested to her multiple times beforehand. But no, all she said was: “we’re in. All good.” She has some practicing to do on our code words and radio spy talk. But in the end, a safe stress-free landing without shouting is good enough for me.
After two decades of sailing, we have crossed over to the dark side.
A few weeks ago we bought a powerboat, a Nordhavn 43 trawler, that we’ve named Indiscretion. She isn’t a typical go-fast stinkpot kind of powerboat. Her cruising speed of 7 knots isn’t far off from sailing. We won’t win any races. But she’s a stout little ship, with the displacement and hull design to withstand open ocean conditions, and an engine and fuel supply to take us from Seattle to Hawaii on a single tank of diesel. A sistership circumnavigated the world a few years ago. We don’t expect to cross oceans, but we do have plans to go places that require blue water passages, up to Alaska or down to Mexico, and going there in a boat that can handle just about anything provides real peace of mind.
I knew letting go of sailing would be tough. For a long time, my happy place was at the helm of a boat under sail. No matter what might be stressing me out at work or at home, it fell away as my hand grasped the tiller, the engine noise died away to a blissful quiet, the sails filled and the boat put her shoulder down into the waves and wind. There’s so much to do to sail well, it took my whole attention, leaving little room to fret about anything else. And the connection to the wind and waves and water was magical, particularly at night with with the feel of wind on your cheek for sail trim and the amazing glow of phosphorous lighting your wake.
Yet as the years piled on, I found that my aging body wasn’t quite as lithe and agile as it once was to cope with the physicality of sailing. Low back pain turned into something worse a few years ago and it literally pained me to go sailing, though my desire for voyaging remained strong as ever.
So we turned to a logical alternative for old sailors: the trawler yacht. It turns out trawlers and sailboats have some things in common. First, as mentioned, they take a leisurely pace in getting places, relishing the journey more than the destination. Second, they are both fuel efficient, at least for boats. A trawler nearly rivals a sailboat for fuel efficiency while motoring, and is laughably better than those planing motor yachts. Finally, blue water models are quite seaworthy with many, many ocean crossings under their belts. These similarities brought us comfort as we climbed aboard trawler after trawler over months of boat shopping. We knew we found our boat when we stepped aboard a Nordhavn. Overbuilt, incredible build quality, redundant systems, a track record of open ocean journeys and a terrific support network of existing Nordhavn owners. Our 43' version is on the small side for Nordhavn, but perfect for our needs. After a little back and forth, a sea trial and survey, we proudly became the owners of this beautiful vessel.
For our maiden voyage, we “steamed” Indiscretion from Elliott Bay in Seattle to our home port here on Vashon Island, getting our first opportunity to experience what trawler life is like. Conditions were superb, temperatures in the eighties and calm seas, hardly a challenge for this go-anywhere vessel. The coastline streamed by faster than when sailing. I’ll admit that making a consistent 7 knots in the direction you actually wanted to go is damn refreshing after years and years of zig-zagging under sail. The boat is 60 thousand pounds with a full displacement keel which makes the ride steady and sure. Hydraulic stabilizer fins work like ducks feet below the water serving to smooth out the side to side roll from passing boat wakes. The low-RPM diesel engine buried deep in the bowels of the ship’s engine room serves up more of a low rumble than the high-pitched roar we suffered on our sailboats.
There have been a few times when I’ve been out in the rain and wind in the cockpit of a sailboat and cursed aloud at these big trawlers as they passed, the captain visible behind the steamed windows in the wheelhouse, perhaps sipping a hot cup of coffee from his high warm perch, maybe taking pity on my miserable wet self. Now that I have held that same perch myself, I marvel at the comfort and ease of passage-making these big trawlers afford. Had I known then what I know now, I would have cursed all the louder out there in my damp misery.
It’s not all downwind sailing though. This boat houses the equivalent of a small municipality’s worth of systems to decipher, operate and maintain. There are three different diesel engines, each with its own peculiarities and needs, a watermaker which can magically turn seawater to pure drinking water if you know how to keep it clean and happy, heating and cooling systems, hydraulics, pumps of all sorts and sizes, electronics spanning two different helm stations … the manuals alone for all these systems take up a good size shelf. In our first weeks of ownership, we have had these manuals out on the pilothouse table, scratching our heads over all the new terminology (what exactly is a galvanic isolator fault?) and trying to inch our way up a very steep ramp of learning. We have already enjoyed the generosity of our fellow Nordhavn owners who actively participate in an online forum to help out rank novices like us. So far, every question or problem we’ve encountered has been addressed before by someone in this treasure trove of online help. I’ve been thinking I needed a new challenge in my life and I think I may have found it with the upkeep of this sophisticated vessel.
We keep the boat at Quartermaster Marina on Vashon. It’s a low-key friendly marina without pretensions. I find myself down on the boat a lot these days, poring over system manuals, contorting my body into strange positions within electrical cabinets or storage lockers, and sometimes just relaxing in the wheelhouse, listening to music or a Mariners game, enjoying the beautiful nautical space. During my time on the boat, many longtime marina friends have stopped by for a tour and a beer. The novelty of a new boat at the marina has a magnetic appeal and I’ve already met a lot more of my fellow boaters here at the marina simply by being aboard and welcoming a tour of the boat and a cold drink. As you should know, boaters are some of the best people on earth and our marina has more than its fair share of these kind souls.
While relaxing and socializing at the dock is fun, it’s the voyaging we truly love. So far, we’ve only taken short shakedown trips around Puget Sound: Blake Island, Elliott Bay, Penrose Point, all within a half day’s motoring. These have been useful trips as we learn the boat and all its intricacies. Last night we anchored off the port of Silverdale in Dyes Inlet for a couple of days of gunkholing. We’ll take more weekend trips like these through the fall and winter as we gain confidence. We’re talking about spending Christmas in Victoria aboard the boat, an absurd idea aboard our sailboat, but warm and inviting on a trawler. Then, next summer we’ll return to the San Juan and Gulf Islands to see what’s changed in our old sailing stomping grounds, with a bucket-list trip up the inside passage to Alaska the following year, and beyond that? We’d love to take this boat down the coast for a winter in Mexico. I know this boat could handle it. We’ll have to see about the captain and crew.
So that’s it, then. We’ve shed our sailing skins and are slowing finding our way in this grand trawler. This morning as I sip my first cup of coffee and look out over the quiet bay with the boat’s mirror image captured in the still water from my perch on the flybridge, it’s hard not to be moved by the amazing vista an anchored boat provides. Sailors, kayakers, fisherman, stinkpotters, 150-foot mega yachters, and us trawler types all share that same passion for water. Perhaps the salt content of our blood is just slightly higher than normal, pulling us back to the ocean of our long ago birth. I count myself a lucky member of that large seafaring tribe.
When I was starting out in public accounting, nearly thirty years ago, I got the chance to work for a new partner who had just joined our firm. His name was Joe Sambataro, an Italian-American from New Jersey, full of blunt honesty and character, and we hit it off right away. He became an important mentor and eventually recruited me to join a small staffing firm in Tacoma as a financial analyst when he joined as CFO. He would later retire, then come back as CEO. Joe is now the Chairman of the Board of this multi-billion publicly traded staffing firm.
Back when I first began working for Joe, he shared three wishes for me: Marriage, Mortgage, and a Boat. In that order. He figured that an employee with a spouse and a mortgage would stick around longer than a single guy with no ties to anything. The boat, he said, was just for fun. Joe liked boating and especially fishing off a boat.
I took Joe’s advice and in short order got married to my beautiful wife Lisa, and signed a mortgage on our Vashon Island home. I soon began looking for a sailboat.
In 1999 we bought our first boat, Wildfire. She was an Ericson 35 racing sloop that I dreamed of sailing around the world, but she was too much boat for a beginner. We had some crazy adventures, and learned a lot, but we soon downsized to an 18' gaff-rigged Marshall catboat that was much more manageable by a novice sailor, then traded up for a larger 23' model.
After a few more years as our family and boating skills grew, we traded up for a 32' Catalina sloop, a cruising sailboat we named Parlez that we took on month-long trips up to the San Juans and Gulf Islands. We made a lot of memories as a family aboard that boat: crab feasts in the cockpit, game nights around the saloon table, hard-driving sails in pounding waves and rain, and windless days where we barely ghosted along, the boat mirrored perfectly in the calm water all around, the sails gently flapping.
After six or seven years of actively sailing and cruising aboard Parlez, I began to think of myself as a real sailor.
As the kids reached their teens, the appeal of long summer trips in the islands lost some appeal; they preferred instead to stay closer to home, their friends and a high-speed internet connection. I found myself spending more time maintaining the boat than sailing, and decided it was time to sell her.
That period of boatlessness lasted about two months. I bought a beautiful 33' daysailor called Red Head that was perfect for summer daysails around Vashon, either alone or with a crowd in her glorious 16' cockpit.
I’ve never felt more alive than at the helm of Red Head sailing into a fresh breeze, tiller in hand, feet braced against the opposite side of the cockpit as the boat heeled in gusts, the water racing by, the mast and rig groaning in protest, a grin on my face as I took in the shape of the sails, the wind anxious to fling my upturned cap into the sea; and something else too: a healthy sense of fear as I pushed myself and the boat maybe a little too far, Adrenalin surging as I caromed through the bay, tack to tack. At those moments I became part of the boat, one hand connected to the tiller and rudder, as if by electric current, my free hand ready to trim the main or the jib, a living thing cavorting through the water, exuberant.
These moments of sailing bliss mostly outweighed the drudgery that goes along with a sailing vessel. The long periods of motoring when the wind has died or is blowing from an inconvenient direction, the cramped quarters below decks, and the exposure to the wind and elements in an open cockpit on a long voyage at just a bit faster than a brisk walking speed.
Over the past couple of years, substantial doubt has plagued me about my future as a sailor. Beautiful sunny days would present themselves only to conclude there was too much wind, or not enough wind, or my back was acting up and I didn’t feel up to the exertion of hoisting or trimming sails. Or worse, I would wish for calm days without so much wind to bother with, enjoying the sense of tranquility of Quartermaster Harbor on a still afternoon. These are not the thoughts of a real sailor.
My desire for adventure afloat hasn’t waned. As we approach that empty nest waypoint in our lives, I dream of voyages up the inside passage to Alaska, a vast section of earth mostly uninhabited and pristine. Or braving open ocean to explore the Pacific coast of Mexico to escape the rains and darkness that pervades the Northwest in winter. I’d relearn my Spanish from high school, and attempt to slow the following seas of time slipping by.
Even before we began a family, Lisa and I dreamed of such voyages. Sometimes the destinations were landlocked - a ranch in Montana or a flat in Madrid - but they always involved a departure from ordinary life, selling up, traveling light, vagabond shoes. Of course, a sailboat would be a logical choice for such an adventure, needing only the power of the wind to push us along, free and easy.
About four months ago on a beautiful February day, Lisa and I were out for a walk along one of Vashon’s country roads. We passed a section of road with a terrific view of Puget Sound, the water blue and ruffled with an afternoon wind on our first perfect day of the year.
“Why don’t you go for a sail this afternoon?” She asked. “There’s wind and the time on the water would do you good.”
It hadn’t even dawned on me that I might sail, and as I considered the water and wind waves, I shook my head. “No, I’m not really up for it today.”
And as I said these words, I realized with certainty that I was no longer a sailor. And for Lisa too, it seemed. We were both ready to put that chapter of our life astern, though neither of us were prepared to move off the water to become normal land people. As we continued our walk, the seeds of a new boating life began to germinate.
I’ve taken over 6,000 ferry rides since moving to Vashon Island. Most of these were uneventful passages to work and back. But everyone once in a while, say 1% off the time, or 60 sailings, I’ve been the very first car on the ferry.
Being the first car on the ferry has some unique benefits. Unless an ambulance or police car has priority loading, the first car loads into the first spot of the center lane, perched out on the bow of the boat. The view from this vantage point is unencumbered and fantastic. On summer days, you can roll down the windows and open the sunroof and take in the glory of sun and sea. In winter, you feel the rollers and spray even with the windows up. No reason to go up on deck when you have such a wonderful ringside seat. I almost always put down my book or laptop on these journeys and soak in the raw beauty of the waves usually lost on me back in the bowels of the car deck on other sailings.
But being the first car on the ferry also has its downsides. Earning this spot means you missed the sailing of the previous boat by just one car. You were the lonely vehicle left on the loading dock while all the cars in front of you sailed off, the ferry worker dolefully shaking his head as the traffic divider bar slowly descends, dooming your fate. You’l wait about an hour stewing on this before you get to enjoy your prime viewing position.
In the probability analysis all commuters calculate every morning and night, wondering when is the last possible minute you can leave and still get on the ferry, being this first car is tangible proof that you blew it. That pause over a last sip of coffee in the morning, that last small talk at the elevator at day’s end, the missed traffic light, all these you think about as you wait.
New York commuters rushing to their trains have a distinct advantage. All they have to consider is travel time and a fixed departure. With ferries, you have to also estimate the volume of other commuters, dump trucks, tourists, and delivery vans that fill up the ferry sometimes well before the sailing time. If only it were so easy to plan on time alone.
This is why ferry commuters usually have a diversion with them: a book, a journal, a musical instrument to while away the time. I’ve filled many journal pages with private thoughts over the years during these unplanned delays.
After over twenty years of ferry commuting, I now see this as just another part of life. Normal. Simply driving straight to work with no waiting, no surge of the sea as you make the crossing, no unplanned hour of waiting to read or think, or maybe write… without that, my life would feel diminished. Incomplete. So, I’ll keep this up, practicing my daily probability analysis, and while I’m sure I’ll be frustrated, I’ll deep down relish my perch on the bow of the ferry when I find myself there once again.
Back in my early thirties, my uncle Jim died unexpectedly. He had a lifelong passion of sailing, particularly the sell-everything-and-sail-off-across the-horizon variety. He had years and years of Cruising World magazines stacked up next to the toilet in his bathroom. I remember him waxing on about his plans to cast off, the destinations he’d visit, the freedom he would feel. He bought a sailboat, a very seaworthy vessel, capable of sailing anywhere in the world, and spent years in the boatyard getting her ready for sea. The conversations changed from if he would go, to when. And then, out of the blue, he passed away. To my knowledge, her keel never floated while Jim lived. He never achieved his dream of casting off and chasing the horizon.
I vividly recall the day I learned of his death. I was shocked. His was the first close death in my life. He was still a young man and I struggled to comprehend the awful fact that he was gone. Living near Puget Sound afforded access to many marinas. I drove to the nearest one and walked the docks thinking of my uncle Jim. I looked at each boat on the dock, most of the boats sadly forlorn, and was miserable at my loss. And then something happened to me, literally on that dock. I was struck by an idea that I must carry on his passion for sailing.
Me, a guy who’d never once given sailing or even boating a passing thought, despite living my whole life around water. In less than three months, I had completed sailing lessons and owned my own 35 foot sailboat. Now going on 20 years and four sailboats later, I owe my uncle Jim for bringing me to this wonderful passion of sailing. Ten years ago, while sailing alone and falling out of the boat on a riptide, I was fished out of the sea by a passing boater who, after careful reflection could not have possibly been there to save me. If there truly are visiting angels, I believe that my uncle Jim saved me that winter day. And now, like uncle Jim, I often toy with the idea of buying a boat in the Caribbean, sailing from island to island, relishing the freedom and adventure of exploring ports unknown. Casting off.
A few years ago, I began losing my mom day by day, month by month, to Alzheimer’s disease. For the nearly thirty years since I moved away from my small home town, my mom was that person I would call or visit for comfort, to help me through tough times, and to celebrate life’s victories. In other words, she was a wonderful and caring mom. If you have first hand experience with Alzheimer’s, you know the course this brutal disease takes. About five years ago, I realized that my mom was slipping away. Our weekly phone calls took a similar form. Me repeating what I had just said, over and over again, my mom putting on a good face, trying to hide her memory problems, and failing. She was diagnosed with breast cancer around this same time and I was able to spend some quality time with her as she recovered. There were times when she was her old self, and I cherished those hours, or sometimes just minutes.
Throughout my life, my mom had always loved birds. We had an incredibly talented parakeet when I was young that could talk and do tricks, and there were always some kind of birds around my mom - chickens, geese, ducklings. As a teenager I witnessed my mom adopt a goose as a pet, Lucy, bringing the big bird into our home when it got too cold, shitting everywhere. My mom didn’t care. I worried then a little for her sanity. But she was a caring soul, and always just thinking of her birds. I remember her telling me that she encountered a playful wild bird that visited her time and again after her dad passed away. She was sure that this bird, always perching in a spot in a workshop that my grandfather used before he died, was her reincarnated father. After that, she always had bird feeders outside for the wild birds and hummingbirds. In her last years of her life, she would dump birdseed on a picnic table outside her living room window and spent hours marveling at their frenetic and swooping activity. One blessing of Alzheimer’s is the newness of every moment. She would spend happy hours in front of that window, watching her birds.
I started noticing birds here on Vashon as I was losing my mom. I bought a few field guides to get to know the birds on our island. But that wasn’t quite enough, so I put up a single feeder off the porch. The squirrels quickly taught me what kind of feeder would actually allow the birds to eat, and after a year or so, I added a second feeder. I still don’t know all the different kinds of birds that visit my feeders, though I do recognize the glorious goldfinches in summer and have spent many hours watching them spat with one another over a perch on the feeder. Later I added a hummingbird feeder, only to be expanded to a full fleet of feeders across the north side of the porch, with a whole process of making hummingbird food to keep up with these thirsty and beautiful birds. I marvel as I refill the feeders at the audacity of these small creatures to buzz my head and squawk their complaints at my tardiness. I always smile and think of my mom who so loved these birds. For a while after my mom passed, I spent some time watching the birds, wondering if one of these might have taken on the life spirit of my mom. I think I realized that no one bird could do that, but all these birds together did a fine job of capturing her essence. And I know I’ll keep feeding these birds for the rest of my life.
A few weeks ago, my dear Pop passed away. He was ill a long time and suffered from dementia in his later years, also a horrible, horrible disease. My pop was many things, a boxer, a fisherman, a carpenter, a politician, a great grandpa, and a sometimes crook. But he was also a fantastic cook. He was happiest in the kitchen, making up one of his signature dishes, a frittata, an Italian goulash, a polenta pizza, or big pot of Mexican chili. He was always experimenting with different cooking styles and ingredients, sometimes making wonderful dishes he could never recreate because he never followed a recipe, or sometimes making horribly inedible meals. He once made something he called Goong-Ga which was truly awful. I remember gagging when I tried to eat it. My mom scolded me, but had the same reaction when she tried it and forgave me. We laughed about this for many years. But usually, my Pop was a fantastic cook. When he and my mom moved in to our cottage here on Vashon with the hope of spending their remaining golden years on the island, I was excited to have him in the kitchen. Maybe I could finally learn some cooking skills from this old man. But alas, the years were cruel and Pop had forgotten most all of what he knew of his freewheeling kitchen style. He tried to make his famous goulash, a dish he must have made a hundred times, but could not muster it, burning it and cussing himself for forgetting such simple things.
These past few weeks have been tough for me. I miss my Pop and I miss my Mom. So, imagine my surprise today in realizing that my life had changed once again, in a simple comfortable way. I’ve found myself focused inexplicably on the kitchen and pantry of our Vashon Island home. I reorganized our pantry to make spices, oils and baking goods more accessible. I’ve spent time putting our pots, pans, bowls and utensils in order, resolving a year or more of clutter. And I’ve been cooking more, but now disregarding the recipe books for more creative cooking, like my Pop would have appreciated. This is not like me at all, always wanting to follow directions for repeatability, but I’ve been throwing caution aside, making meals like Pop would, and laughing a lot more at the stove top.
I’ve lost a lot of dear souls these past years. But I am comforted to know they are still with us, in various forms, to carry on this gift of life.
I’ve always been a big reader and dreamed of having my own private library for as long as I can remember. One of the things that drew me to our house here on Vashon was the book-lined room with views out to the water. We’ve expanded the shelves over the years and now have all my books in easy reach from two antique leather wingback chairs. I’ve spent many a quiet evening reading from one of these chairs in perfect peace, feeling very fortunate to have such a sanctuary.
And then … we got a puppy. Not just any puppy, but a Puggle (mostly Beagle), and my private space quickly became his playground. First, he chewed through a half dozen rare leather-bound books I spent a small fortune to acquire. He then tore through the leather cushion on the starboard wing chair. Later he gnawed through the ancient leather base of the port chair. The kids would avoid me on the nights I would come home to discover another puppy atrocity in the library. I am on a first-name basis with an antique furniture repair place in Tacoma.
We ended up covering the chairs and putting baby gates across all the bookcases to prevent further damage from the little fella. Since then, the damage has stopped, though the charm of the place has lost some of its magic. Yet tonight, as the two of us sit together ruminating on the day, I think it’s become a good place to share after all…
When I was a boy, younger than twelve-year-old Connor is now, I believed all the stories my dear Pop told me. He sailed across oceans, traveled down the Nile, jumped out of planes in the 82nd Airborne, drank with Hemingway, conspired with Castro, along with many other misdeeds and adventures. While my kids are constant skeptics of any tales I tell, even the true ones, I didn’t question the stories I was told. Pop was a great story teller. He would get this gleam in his eye while he drew you in and threw in such vivid details of the surroundings and the things that happened to him that you couldn’t help but believe.
One of Pop’s favorite tales was about his time in Valencia, Spain. I don’t recall why he was there. Maybe the army? It didn’t matter. All I knew is he loved Valencia. Its beaches, women, wine and music. Its history and machismo and bullfighting. This was captivating stuff for a ten year old.
He liked to whistle and sing the Valencia song, originally done by Jose Padilla in the 1920s, but made popular again in 1950 by crooner Tony Martin when my Pop was himself a young man. He whistled this song most every morning as he started his day. I would find myself whistling and singing it too through my early teens until our tastes in music diverged for thirty or so years. I smile as I see this happening with Connor now as he sings Bob Marley’s Three Little Birds when he’s in the shower or making himself a sandwich. Or finding old Bruce Springsteen songs on Mallory’s iTunes playlists.
So, when we were planning our trip to Spain, I knew we had to visit Valencia.
In the car as we approached the city, I found myself whistling the song, just like Pop did so many years ago, to the dismay of the kids. “What’s up with Dad? Why is he grinning like that? And what is that horrible song he’s trying to whistle?!” Even Lisa grew concerned, and she knows the back story.
We spent two days here in Valencia and Pop was right to admire the city. In contrast to the crowds of Barcelona, this place is tranquil, even languid. The charm and authenticity of the old quarter is refreshing compared to the more tourist-minded areas of some of the other parts of Spain we’ve visited.
And it’s warmer here. Today it was nearly 90 degrees. The wine is good and the women are indeed very beautiful. Lisa and Mallory have hinted that the men here aren’t bad looking either. Connor is non-committal, though he turned beet red when I asked him what he thought of seeing so many topless sunbathers at the beach.
We rented bicycles and explored the old part of town, the many tree-lined parks, the new science and technology center, the port with its Americas Cup headquarters, and the beach. The water is warm and the sand is perfect. I’m writing this while the rest of the family dozes on beach chairs under an umbrella. The sea beckons with a half-dozen white sails dotting the blue horizon, making me wish I were out there sailing on a broad reach, feeling the angle of the warm wind on my cheek.
And as I take in the beauty of this place, I wonder if Pop ever came here himself, or if his Valencia was just another of his tall tales. I could ask him, but most of me doesn’t really want to know. I’d like to believe he walked these streets as I did today and breathed in this orange-scented air; that he left some part of himself here long ago, a strand or two woven into the fabric of this beautiful place.
I wonder if any of my own tales have found purchase with my kids, strong enough that they might some day go out and experience it for themselves, to see what their crazy old Pop was always going on about …. maybe sailing off to a remote Caribbean island, singing three little birds with big dreamy grins, every sight and sound and smell unlocking childhood memories long tucked away, relishing the swell of the sea under their feet.
A nice thought. Maybe this is how dreams are meant to pass down the line after all.
Oysters at Westcott Bay Shellfish
Sunset in Westcott Bay
Nordhavn 47 Kelli Ann
To the lighthouse!
A Stuart Island fixer-upper …
One fast seal!
Blind Bay living up to its name …
Hikes in dorky hats on Sucia Island
Deer Harbor Marina
So many Nordhavns!
Indiscretion tucked into a slip at Kingston Marina
Empty Nesters
Safe and sound at Eagle Harbor City Dock
Bouncer on a kayak
Franklin
Preston
Happy dogs on shore leave
Wreckage of LOT Polish Airlines Flight 7
Eartec UL2S UltraLITE Wireless Radios
The View from Indiscretion’s Flybridge Helm
Love Birds
