Grinding toward Plan A

[Hilde's log]

Yes, this is my first post on this log in three years! To see why, visit my other blog: http://www.unedame.blogspot.com/.

David took the week off this last week for vacation. I use the term loosely, because we didn’t go anywhere and he worked the whole time. I did my regular work for various clients, but took off Friday and Saturday for a long weekend. David worked on boat projects, and that makes him happy. Makes me happy, too! I now have two shelves in one of my storage cabinets, which lets me actually see what’s in the cabinet without fear of causing an avalanche. We also now have two dry storage spaces in the v-berth for off-season clothes. We bought some (supposedly) air tight storage bags at Wally World yesterday, and I plan to put my winter stuff and land shoes in them and see what I can store. (I threw away two pairs of shoes….aaaaauuuugh.) We want all our personal items out of storage and on the boat, and off-season clothes have been a problem from the get-go.

We’re also getting the bimini, dodger, and mainsail cover replaced. They’ve gone from worn to shabby in the time we’ve spent here and it will be a relief to have them replaced. Once the dodger was off, I realized we needed to do the teak that it covers, so we’ve started on that. It’s hard, since summer is upon us and it’s 97 during the day. During the “vacation” we could put in an hour or two in the morning and another couple in the evening. It’s a slow go.

In fact, that’s what David remarked on, is how slowly projects go. He felt as though he hadn’t accomplished much, but I feel as though the barge has started to move, which is a good thing. We have a plan and we’re inching toward it. Before this past week, we had a plan that changed fairly regularly and had made no progress at all.

We have gone back and forth over staying or leaving. Our original plan was to come back to land, get good jobs, fill up the cruising kitty…so we came back to the worst recession in my memory, found $15/hr jobs and stayed even, more or less. We’ve gotten rid of probably 85% of our possessions. The last 15% is the killer. I spent 3 weeks scanning photos from 6 photo albums to clear out one more box.

David saw a story in one of the sailing magazines that started off “…so we sold everything and moved aboard.” What?! It’s taken us 8 years to get as far as we’ve come. Either they are lying through their teeth or they have no sentimental attachment to anything. Maybe their house was furnished in early Wal-Mart. It’s letting those cords to possessions die off that takes so long…I think I’m finally there. Well, I’m there until we go to storage and I see the This or the That which is irreplaceable and belonged to my mom. Ha.

But we’ve agreed to keep one smallish storage unit, 10 X 15, half for “garage stuff” (tools, etc.) and half for the oriental rugs, the silverware, the two end tables from the Middle East, the Arabic screen, etc. that I refuse to part with. Eventually, someday, we will be on land, due to being too old to get on the boat. Or eventually family members will settle down and want these priceless (to me) things.

But the rest goes. One. Thing. At. A. Time.