A NEW DITTY BAG

Coconut Grove, Miami, FL 25º43.533N | 80º84.321W

A year is more than 365 days of aging. It is a big, waterproof ditty bag we're allowed to fill up with whatever we're brave enough to dream -- and just when it's about to overflow, can this be true? We get a brand new one, wide open.

My 2011 bag bulges with our first Gulf Stream crossing, our first time to pass below the Tropic of Cancer, a waterspout, a hailstorm, an earthquake and a hurricane. Travel by boat, by car, by plane, train and bus, and hitchhiking 20 miles down a Bahamian island. Our days were filled with friends, hard lessons, lobster, chores, conch and red starfish as big as a plate. It was a year where I learned more than since I was perhaps 2.

And now maybe you wonder what someone who leads this awesome life on a sailboat dreams of? The list is long. When I look back into my 2012 bag, I hope to find my first book, a long and beautiful sail to somewhere I've never been before, a trip to Paris to visit our daughter, a 6-week pilgrimage down the El Camino and somewhere, somehow a way to give back to this world that has given me so much.

Hold on. I better go get started!

Bonnie and Chip and Cara Mia.

Chasing Cuba-bound Jessie Marie out of Coconut Grove.

Off to greet 2012 and my 52nd year at our favorite French restaurant.