InTheStream

My column, InTheStream, was published in Classic Yacht online magazine from May 2012 to July 2014. The column tracks my first year of cruising, pondering the lessons I learned along the way -- the hard way. The overall theme mirrors the book I'm writing about the life lessons that come calling when a 50-something woman deep sixes her whole life and follows a dream.

WARNING: If you are on limited bandwidth, don't click on the headline links. That loads the whole magazine. Instead, use the PDF version, a low bandwidth option.



I KNOW SQUAT (May '12) PDF Version

"It was October 2010, and I was a five-day-old cruiser. I was in the midst of a hands-on lesson in windlass operation, and I was failing."






SUNSET AT SUNRISE (July '12) PDF Version

"...why am I out here moving at this pace if not to experience each mile, to tune my senses to nature's voice, to plod, to gawk, to have no shame in feeling wonder?"






STILTSVILLE BY NIGHT (Sept '12) PDF Version

"BOOM! An eerie white ghost with gaping black eyes burst up out of the darkness, hovering 20 yards from my heart, which was now in my throat -- screaming."




FEAR AND PARADISE (Nov '12) PDF Version

"Could it be that after years of frightening expectations I had made it across the Gulf Stream with no great sailing yarn to tell, nothing more exciting than a flock of flying fish, nothing more traumatic than yacking over the rail?"




THE REALITY OF DREAMING (Jan '13) PDF Version

"We had reached the confluence of dreaming and reality and were about to discover the difference."

CRUISER FRIENDSHIP (Mar '13) PDF Version

"It is Mother Ocean who weaves us together as our paths cross and diverge and cross again. She stretches out our hours like rubber bands, giving us wide open time to listen and be heard."

IN THE MOMENT (May '13) PDF Version

"I check my watch and the wind speed. I wonder if we'll keep this pace, and if the wind will keep a constant breath, if that cloud far off to the east is headed our way... I am reminded of the things that matter and the ones that don't."

DARE TO HOPE (July '13) PDF Version

"When I climbed this lighthouse the first time three years ago, I only had the vaguest notion about its inner workings and the labor involved in keeping it running. I had the same vague notion of the tedious work that lay ahead for us in the next few years as we arranged our lives to go sailing."

A LESSON IN SEAKINDLINESS (Sept '13) PDF Version

"Cara Mia had paid the price for our mistakes, schooling us in the value of good seamanship -- and a new meaning of seakindliness that would serve us on land and sea."

THE SIMPLEST REMINDER (Nov '13) PDF Version

"This tiny island was proof that dreams are not granted based on gender or youth but rather on the tenacity of your spirit and the strength of your grasp."

THE WIZARD OF BONES (July '14) PDF Version

"Willie's garden was a collection of common driftwood he had found on his own property... He was simply the seer, who looked into the washed-up bones of trees and saw their essence, a guide for those of us who lacked such vision."