Sailors from the Plains

People seem to be under the impression that there are no sailors in the central United States. Or under some strange impression that to learn to sail, you must have lived on the coast.

I have to agree that if you don’t like endless plains, you definitely won’t like the scenery when making long ocean passages. As Matt says, the early pioneers of the plains were sailors, too.

This couple from Texas gives their own response to someone questioning the skill/sanity of a plains sailor.

Annapolis to Puerto Rico Rick & Gayle Kennerly — Xapic I’m sure you’ve heard by now that we’ve run up on the beach in Puerto Rico. A lot of folks had only one question / rant, which I thought we’d take a moment to answer: Have you taken full-moon French leave of your senses? You’re high plains people — flatlanders. Our people don’t paddle across stock tanks much less sail across oceans. You’re like a fish out of…er…what is that stuff? We get it here sometimes. Anyway, I think you’re nuts! Too true. But since we survived, we get to gloat a bit. It wasn’t really all that crazy an expedition to begin with. After all, Gayle and I have been a sailing team for over twenty years now. So this trip was really just a natural progression of two decades of increasing experience, education, and training—not to mention middle age dementia (as far as I am concerned it was either this trip or a candy apple red Miata convertible, a tattoo AND a motorcycle, maybe a gold chain…but then I’d need a chest hair implant—ouch, scratch the gold chain idea). If your life is so small that you’ve been following ours pretty closely, then you’ll remember that we started out as dinghy sailors on Canyon Lake in Texas and since then it’s been a succession of bigger boats and greater experience, all leading up to this trip. Actually, our formative years on the plains prepared us for life at sea. Ocean waves ripple in the breeze and roll past the boat like wind whipped fields of sorghum rolling past a John Deere. Okay, you’ve got a point. John Deeres don’t pitch and roll as much as a boat. But on the other hand, boats are a lot more comfortable to sleep on. Not only that, but the scenery while ocean sailing is similar to that around Lubbock—big sky, vast spaces and lonely places, no matter which way you look. So we felt pretty much at home while offshore. Our training as plains kids really paid off when the wind began to blow because we weren’t nearly as distressed as many people are by the moan of the wind in the rigging. Also, just like on the plains, wind driven salt spray stings like a spring sand storm. Finally, the dried salt residue covering every external surface of the boat was just as annoying as the dirt a good duster leaves behind back home. from http://www.mouseherder.com/xapic/pr/pr1.html Some Other Interesting Stuff They Had to Say Xapic’s solar panel array and windvane steering gear Our other concern was collision at sea. Not that it’s all that busy out on the ocean, particularly once you get away from shore, but the chances of surviving a collision with the Love Boat are pretty slim. We saw a good deal more traffic than we thought we would. In fact, during one 24-hour period south of Bermuda we saw six vessels, four other sailboats and two tankers—rush hour on the high seas. On the other hand, we also went five days without seeing any other vessels. Obviously, with such light traffic the challenge is being sufficiently motivated to stand up every 20 minutes and scan the horizon 360 degrees, but scan we did. Nap time on the Sargasso Sea There are also submerged or partially submerged shipping containers (big ships lose about 1000 containers a year overboard) and whales to worry about, but because they are submerged you really can’t see them until you hit them. In fact, one night west of Bermuda I felt the boat slow a bit and heard a big rush of air. The slowing was so slight and the sound so soft I’ll never be sure, but I think we rode up on the back of a dozing whale. However, I never saw it and our certified whale detector (Seaman Scruffy) never acted as if he smelled a whale. The dog smells whales? Yeah, Seaman Scruffy (he did so well on this trip that we’re thinking of promoting him to Chief of the Boat) smelled all the whales we came across long before Gayle or I saw them, which makes sense. After all, Scruffy is nothing but a huge nose propelled by a tiny cairn terrier body. To some extent it’s a matter of sensory deprivation. There aren’t that many different smells for a dog to revel in mid-ocean, so a dog’s life at sea is understimulating. When Scruffy’d catch the scent of a whale exhaling (imagine your breath if you ate nothing but sushi all day), he’d arch his back, point his nose skyward, and indulge in a happy, dancing, singing, sniffing, sneezing fit. Yes, singing. He’s a very vocal little fellow. Scruffy is also an ace island locator, not a bad trait to have when you’re looking for a little island on a big ocean. While Scruff was happy to finally experience the smells of Bermuda, he went absolutely wild when, after eight days at sea, he caught scent of the rich, humid, tropical smells of St. Thomas, USVI. He’d dance on the coach roof joyfully sniffing and barking, barking and sniffing. Then as we got closer he settled down to the serious business, if you’re a dog, of systematically cataloging the island’s exotic odors grass, shore, smoke, man, goat, goat, goat, goat. Scruff was in hog heaven. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them. I shall use my time. – Jack London

Too cool.

Rick and Gayle own a Westsail 32, the type of boat that survived “The Perfect Storm.” Many people don’t realize that it’s safer to stay in a sailboat in a storm than to try to leave it. The movie version of “The Perfect Storm” (unlike the book it was based on) doesn’t mention that the sailboat in the movie was found unharmed and intact just off the coast of Maryland.

For more information on Westsail 32s, visit Rick and Gayle’s site.

http://www.mouseherder.com/xapic/

Or for more information on Satori, the Westsail 32 that survived “The Perfect Storm,” here is a tribute site to this sailboat:

Satori, Westsail 32

Many people question the integrity of a fiberglass sailboat. However, the Westsail 32s were manufactured when fiberglass was just beginning to be used. So the first builders to use fiberglass made sure to lay down extra layers of glass using quality resins. Fiberglass boats made during these early periods far exceed the quality of later fiberglass work.

Still, steel would be my preferred material.

Plagarism and Copyright Laws

I know there have been some lyrics sites on the Web that have gone under because music companies claim that having these sites up makes people less likely to buy CD’s or some other strange reasons. I have discovered more music from people breaking copyright laws on the Web than I did living in the dorms in college where my dormmates and I traded our albums all the time.

And so I justify my own law-breaking. So there! Nyah!

I love this song. It makes me think of all the people I know who dreamed a dream, and then died thinking they didn’t succeed. Those people send a message to me that resounds in my brain, everytime I think things are not going as planned. And my dad’s advice reminds me, “You always have another chance. Well. . . except if you’re dead.”

Dreaming a dream? Keep trying! The dead can’t try anymore.

Building a Boat by Eileen Quinn
He’s not getting any younger so the doctors say and he wonders how it is all that time has slipped away it’s not that he’s unhappy with the farm or the wife it’s just that haunting feeling that there may be more to life may be more to life he’s no stranger to hard work and he’s good with his hands so he sends off to Seattle for a set of plans and the harvest is in now autumn’s on the run and he figures come the spring he’ll be done though he never did say the spring of which year he is building a boat, building a dream building the finest vessel ever seen in his mind’s eye she’s already afloat so sweet, so complete he is building a boat every now and then he fights that old familiar pain as the planet circles round the sun five times again and that boat takes every dollar and every hour that’s free and he spends his days upon the tractor dreaming he’s at sea, dreaming he’s at sea	when the sun is sinking low he pours a little rum and gazes out across the fields to watch the evening come and the wind blows the wheat into waves of gold and green the loveliest ocean he’s ever seen the only ocean he’s ever seen he is building a boat. . . a dream’s a fine and fragile thing borne upon the frailest wing doesn’t mean that it won’t fly who can name the moment when a boat is finally done? she’s fair and sound and rigged six years after he’s begun now he’s on to proud work the varnish and the brass when he feels that twinge within his chest and waits for it to pass but this time it won’t pass it wraps its arms around him it tightens like a band and sitting in the cockpit now he comes to understand that he’s finally on his way now though not quite as he planned and the last thing he’s aware of is the tiller in his hand that’s how they found him with the tiller in his hand building a boat. . . a dream’s a fine and fragile thing borne upon the frailest wing take yours with you when you fly. . . .
Donald’s Roberts 434 Under Construction A Mississipi Dreamer

Idiots on Xanga

Okay. I do not normally like to call people names. But I gotta say this. I seem to attract some real weirdos to my Xanga site. And the funny thing is, these weirdos don’t even sail.

They just want to post on my site to further some weird agenda of theirs that has NOTHING at all to do with sailing.

Here are my RULES for commenting and signing my guestbook.

If it is NOT sailing related, you will be summarily deleted and blocked from commenting on my site. Also, if it contains swearing or other foul language, you will also be summarily deleted and blocked from commenting. I get enough crap in my daily life, that I REALLY don’t need someone insulting me online. If you have a hard life, and you’re looking for someone to crap on to make yourself feel better because of your low self-esteem, that’s fine. You can do it to someone else. I don’t allow people to treat me that way, and you probably don’t need me to tell you that you shouldn’t allow it either.

Nonsailors are welcome to ask me questions about sailing. Otherwise, you are kind of lame to be spending so much time online that you’re looking at sites about things that don’t even interest you. I mean, REALLY, people. There is a life outside of the computer.

I repeat, non-sailing comments will be summarily deleted.

If you want to mentally masturbate about the State of the Union, please do it on your own site. NOT MINE. Xanga is free, after all.

Carpe Ventum!

Thank You Letter

Three weeks ago I posted that I had a big exam coming up, and that I would subsequently find out where I am going to be for the next three years.

Thank you to those who posted encouraging comments during that period of time. It really meant a lot to me. When someone is kind enough to step into someone’s life and to give a stranger a kind word, that is really something Divine, and I thank all you Goddesses for that.

“The tamale has never been seriously represented in American cinema.“

War and Peace — or “How a Doctor Saves Vs. How a Soldier Saves”

What does it cost to have peace?

“The Americans are morally weak and like paper tigers, after a few blows they fall. . .”

– Osama bin Laden

Could he have been right? I sure hope not.

I love my grandfather and I respect him for many of the good things he has done. My grandmother says he would go to work, walking along the railroad tracks to the neighboring towns to treat the sick. She had to buy him shirts and shoes often because, he would always come home without them, having given them to his patients who had none. This was after the war.

My grandfather’s high school education was interrupted by a war.

People came to Philippines with the intention of changing the way the whole country ran. It would not be Philippines. It would be. . . Japan.

So my grandfather hid from the terrorists. He and many others from his town took to the mountains when the Japanese came. My grandmother tells me, there was a Japanese soldier who stumbled into their camp one day. They couldn’t understand him very well, but from the looks of it, he was a deserter.

He asked to have something to drink.

And the people in the camp pointed to the well.

As he stood by the well drinking, one of my grandfather’s friends assigned him to cut the man’s head off. Why? Well, if the soldier wasn’t a deserter, he was probably a spy, and if they let him go, he would lead the Japanese to their hidden campsite. (They couldn’t keep him in the camp either, as food was limited during the war.)

My grandfather is a doctor. And I don’t know whether that part of him that wanted to save people is what kept him from doing it, but he could not bring himself to kill a man.

So his friend had to do it for him. Using a large knife, he severed the man’s head as he drank from the well. The soldier probably didn’t know what hit him. But, a deserter is not wanted by any side.

What does it cost to have peace?

Jesus says to “turn the other cheek.”

Where does one draw the line?

Do you tell a woman whose husband is abusing her. . . to “turn the other cheek, dear.”
Do you teach her children not to fight their father when he beats them?

Where does one draw the line?

I’ve got relatives on both sides of my family who ran away from the Japanese during World War II. And the generation before that, they ran from the Communists who were overtaking China and forcing people into war.

I think sometimes people forget that war is not a choice.
War is something that is forced upon you.

Someone does violence upon you or your family. And you can “turn the other cheek” (as my grandfather did). . . or you can protect your family, at the cost of your own soul.

I really admire all those soldiers who fought for my grandparents in World War II. I am only sorry that so many of them died to save people who have forgotten. . . what they died for.

It’s strange to see my relatives running away from terrorism, just as they ran away from the Japanese. History repeats itself once more, and I am sad.

They ran to America. But if America falls to terrorists, where will they run then? Is anything worth fighting for? Or do you use up your time in one country, and then when it is spent, do you toss it away like a used rubber? You’d think they’d get tired of running away all the time. I am not Filipino. I am not Thai. I am not Chinese. I am an American.

So many people come to this country from Philippines, Thailand, and China and send money back “home.” How do they bite the hand which feeds it? Do you want to know where your U.S. money goes? It goes overseas to help those in other countries. People may make fun of the U.S., but why then do they keep coming here?

And why does the media make it sound like everyone hates the U.S. After 9-11, one of the first people to email me was one of my friends in Japan, who wanted to make sure that I was okay and that my family was safe.

This from a country that America bombed less than 60 years ago.
This from a country that created soldiers that killed my relatives in three separate countries.
How can war and peace coexist? It just does.

There was one Japanese soldier that spared my grandmother’s life. Soldiers came into the market one day, and my grandmother hid behind a jar of fermented shrimp paste. One of the soldiers saw her anyway, and came up to her and took her baby from her. According to my grandmother, he held my dad and talked to him and then started to cry. My father thinks that perhaps he had a son back home as well, and that he reminded him of that.

There are other stories, not so nice, and very cruel.

My cousin used to take singing lessons when she was in elementary school. I’m not sure that she really understood what she was singing. I doubt many people really do.

I’m proud to be an American Where at least I know I’m free. And I won’t forget the men who died Who gave that right to me And I’d proudly stand up next to her And defend her still today. ‘Cause there ain’t no doubt I love this land. God bless the U.S.A.

Yeah, I really don’t think anyone listens to the words. It’s just a song written by an over-patriotic hick.

Eileen Quinn

This woman’s songs make me pee in my pants.

http://cdbaby.com/cd/quinn3

Most of them have to do with the trials and tribulations of sailing with your spouse, although “Building a Boat” is more of a ballad. She pretty much sums up the cruising life in every single one of her songs. . . .

5 am, my turn at the helm the sky above is a shimmering realm on an endless velvet sea we glide along through the night i know how insignificant i am and somehow that seems just right the wind like a lover whispers my name the sun kisses the horizon aflame oh the sun’s coming up, another day at sea all is right with the world and me here and now this is just where i belong reaching silently into the dawn under a clear sky on a rolling sea where there’s time and room enough for me the smell of baking bread coffee strong and hot there’s nothing I want that I haven’t got and i can’t think of any other way i would rather be greeting the day oh the sun’s coming up, another day at sea all is right with the world and me from “The World and Me” No Significant Features © 1997 Eileen Quinn

The Winds of Fate

The Set of the Sails One ship drives east, and another west With the self-same winds that blow; ‘Tis the set of the sails And not the gales That decides the way to go. Like the winds of the sea are the ways of fate, As they voyage along through life; ‘Tis the will of the soul That decides its goal, And not the calm or the strife. – Ella Wheeler Wilcox from http://home.att.net/~e.zeiser/poetry/winds_of_fate.htm from which you can view his entire collection of sailing poems