RC Louise

We are a couple from the Pacific Northwest, most recently Hood River, OR, but our boat was born in Brittany in 2013. Collectively we have had everything from a Portuguese rowing dory to a Pennant sloop to a 32′ Rhodes Chesapeake. Most recently we sailed with our son Nolan Willett from Seattle to the South Pacific from 2007 to 2009 in a 1988 Mason 44 named Hannah.  At the end of that trip, I wrote on Sailblogs about our time on Hannah:

“A man named Gerry McNamara who was aboard the US Air flight 1549 that landed on the Hudson River wrote (and I paraphrase) that his take home lessons were 1) Cherish you families as never before and go to great lengths to keep your promises, 2) Be thankful for everything you have and don’t worry about the things you don’t have, 3) Keep in shape..you never know, and 4) Wear practical clothing.  I have been avoiding writing because so much has happened and so much is unclear, and I keep feeling the need to pen “Everything I Need to Know I Learned Going Ashore in the Dinghy”. Here goes…

1) Anyplace is improved by arrival by sea rather than by land. Be it reeking of tuna guts or fragrant with fruit and flowers, whether one has come across an ocean or just a bay, arrival by sea recapitulates humankind finding a port in the storm. Every single time, one comes home. Even if one has never been to a place before. And the people who live by the sea already know the people who come from the sea, no matter what their differences of class or nationality.
2) The Maori concept of balanced interdependence between people and land is true, however easily it may be forgotten in a shower of annual audits, alarm clocks, pollution, too busyness, scheduled get-togethers, and oblivious complexity. The Maori word “whenua” means land and placenta. It is in our bones now. It is not about mere stewardship.
3) Setting sail is compelling, sailing home invokes uncertainly and ambivalence and greater challenges, once one has been out. Only after sailing so far was I able to savor reading Homer’s Odyssey. The author Norman Fischer analyzed the drama of Odysseus and his son Telemachus in ousting the suitors in Ithaca: for “the force necessary to purify and occupy our own house…the wisdom and craft of age need the innocence and desire of youth to be effective”. We hope we don’t forget. We are not finished with sailing: the RC Louise, our beloved 32′ Rhodes Chesapeake, awaits our return and will be sure to keep us “setting sail” and thus allowing us to return home.”

Obviously, we were not done.  After three lovely years in Hood River coaching middle school running sports, working in local public health, and growing our own food, we are venturing out again in a brand new aluminum sailboat.  We have three kids and seven grandkids, and sometimes it seems like the proverbial 50 year old guy buying a red sports car, but it feels like where we are meant to live right now.