I ran back to the cockpit to throw the engine in gear and get the bow turned off and away from the other vessel. Everything was going smoothly when I suddenly heard a loud “CLANK,” and a “SPLASH,” followed by a “RATTLE-RATTLE-RATTLE-RATTLE!!” …
As I headed into the no-man’s land and pointed my bow at the distant markers, a well known saying in the sailing world that came to mind: “There are two kinds of sailors – those who have run aground … and those who will.
In another couple of hours, it seemed that my visual landmarks were gradually shifting further and further upwind. A check of the GPS confirmed my fears. The zig-zag line that marked my boat’s pendulum motion on its anchor line was starting to lengthen – looking kind of like an EKG. I was dragging my anchor!
“SNAKES?? Forget the snakes! Look out for the GATORS!!”
Times like this give one ample opportunity for reflection. You know – all the “ifs” and “hows” and “whys.” I try to avoid “wouldas,” “couldas,” and “shouldas.” Those rarely do any good. But, I do like to take a personal inventory, and ask myself if I’m happy and, if not, what I am going to do about it. And, honestly, I realized that, indeed, I’m the happiest I’ve been in a long, long time. I had a big dream of living on a boat and …
I crawled out of my cockpit, stood out on the middle of my deck, lit a cigarette, and stared at that captain and crew with my best peed-off, backwoods Florida-boy look that said, “I’m about to SWIM over there just to slap you around a bit.”
I put it back into forward gear, and tried to shift into reverse again. Nothing. You cannot stop a boat without reverse and I was running out of deep water quickly!
