Anchors Aweigh

Ahoy maties!  Boating season runs from May first until October first around here so it’s time to put them back into the water.  Lake Michigan has many fine harbors and it’s a very pretty sight to see them come alive with the fleet after a long, gray winter.

I date my enthusiasm for all things nautical to my childhood.  My father was a sailor and the sea fascinated me.  He had been in the Navy in W.W.II.  (“The big one, son,”as Herbert T. Gillis used to constantly remind Dobie.)

My dad had spent his war on the USS Shangri–La, an Essex-class aircraft carrier.  (Ordinarily ships were named after battles or for former ships, but his had gotten her unusual name from FDR himself.)  As a radarman, he saw plenty of action in the South Pacific.

He survived kamikazes, typhoons, and lots of hot fighting.  On one stint, he didn’t even touch dry land for five months.  He was so out of touch- unlike today’s armed forces- that he didn’t know that the Cubs had won the ’45 pennant.

But as much as I longed to follow in my father’s path on the bounding main, I didn’t inherit his sea legs.  From the moment I was pushed in the perambulator, I sent up an unearthly howl.  This happened so often that my bewildered mother finally called the pediatrician who rightly diagnosed “motion sickness.”

And I’ve been a victim of this cruel malady ever since.  And I don’t have to be out on the open water, either.

Once, at beautiful Ondine’s Restaturant in Sausalito, our host graciously bestowed upon me the seat with the incredible ocean view.  As I admired the waves from inside, my head started slumping over until I finally slid out of my chair onto the floor.  I had gotten mal de mer merely by looking through the window.

I have been seasick on Mediterranean cruises, on my friend Ricky’s boat, the Lili Pad, and at the America’s Cup yacht races.  (OMG. The pitch that day was so awful that after an hour of unbelievable agony, I tried to climb over the rail and throw myself overboard.  I remember thinking “It’s cold and dark and it will kill me fast.”  My then husband pulled me back and said, “It’s not your time to go yet.”)

My son Nick inherited the landlubber gene from me.  When he was about five, I remember frantically cramming Dramamine down his throat- and then mine- right before we both passed out on a Carribbean cruise.

Christmas 1998 I took Natasha, Nick,-then eighteen- my nephew Greg, (also eighteen) and a friend of Greg’s on another cruise around some tropical islands.  Nick was gung ho for this sea voyage, and as we celebrated at the party at the pier, he went on and on about all the cool things he was going to do on the cruise. He was stoked.

Until the ship pulled out of port.

Literally one minute after we had left the dock, Nick turned Nile green, excused himself and went to his cabin.  Where he remained for two days until we hit San Juan.  I had  made arrangements by then to have him leave the ship permanently there.  And as we stood, anxiously waiting to disembark before the rest of the other merely day-tripping passengers, I commiserated with him- and held his guitar.

As we stood at the disembarcation point, a ship’s officer came up and asked Nick, “Are you with the crew?”

I couldn’t help laughing.  Nick hadn’t shaved for three days- his usual look for that era- and there I was holding his gear.

“Would any crew member dare look this disreputable?” I countered his query.  “And would a crewman be standing here with his mother?”

The officer was a gentleman and he laughed too as he conceeded that any crew member that looked as grungy as Nick would probably be hanging from the yardarm instead of granted shore leave.  We spent the day in San Juan, and before I left to make it back to the ship, Nick looked me dead in the eye and swore, “Never again, Dude. No matter what.”

Aye aye, sir.  I knew whose those genes were.  Nick was permanently in dry dock.

On the other hand, my daughter, Natasha, took after her grandpa and was an old salt from the get-go.  At three months old, she, too, was wailing nonstop.  Finally, out of sheer desperation- as I was wintering in Palm Springs at the time- I threw on a bathing suit and with her in my arms, waded into the shallow end of our rented vacation house’s swimming pool.

Instantly her tense little body relaxed.  She stopped screaming, looked me dead in the eye and said, “Ahhh.”

I had found a cure for her malaise.  It was called hydro-therapy and she’s been a waterbaby ever since.

Great swimmer and enthusiastic sailor, she was immediately put on her boarding school’s sailing team.  Teams of two raced 420 sail boats against other schools.  (A 420 is a double-handed monohull dinghy with a centerboard, a bermuda rig and center sheeting.  The name describes the length.  It’s exactly 4.2 meters long and it’s considered safe and easy to maneuver for young sailors.)

Natasha, a little girl, was paired with Dawson, a great big boy, and their combined weights and skills made them a killer combo on the race circuit.

Her racing season started in March.  In Newport, Rhode Island.  The coldest, wettest, windiest spot on the Atlantic. (And that’s why it is the sailing mecca of the East coast.)  And although she wore a dry suit, she had a permanent hacking cough by which I could locate her immediately anywhere on campus for the next four years.

As much as she loved racing, she loved cruising, too.  She took advantage of the school’s unique program, when she was selected- along with five other kids- to cruise for two months from Newport to the Bahamas.  There was a captain (poor guy) and they all took off for two months on the S.S. Geronimo to tag turtles for the Wildlife Department.

Natasha Hornblower had many thrilling nautical adventures during her two months before the mast.  (All schoolwork was done by correspondence- and stellar grades were still expected.)  The boom broke during a wild storm off of Cape Hatteras and they had to be lashed to their bunks before they could put in. She also got a very privileged tour of Cumberland Island- the one that JFK Junior got married on.  And she got to take her PSAT’s at the Palm Beach Yacht Club.

But she had to do her laundry on the rocks.  And she complained later that she couldn’t wait to get back to civilization to condition her hair.

“Didn’t you have conditioner with you?” I asked my little intrepid Dennis Connor.

“Nope, I had it with me alright, Mom.  But it’s leave-in conditioner and I couldn’t tread water that long.”

So to all my like-minded friends who love the sea, may you have sunny skies and gentle winds and smooth sailing this and every season.  (And to all of you who have power on your boat, I wish you whatever you guys like as well.)

Just don’t ever ask me to go out with you.

I feel a slight headache coming on.

Bon Voyage.