5/29/16           7 Lavers Pond Rd, Freeport, Maine


Back on land for exactly two weeks, almost to the hour . We've refinished floors in two rooms of our house. We've located the tax records that have been missing since we started looking for them last week. They are with my NC cousin, Dale, left with him for safe keeping way back in October. Gotta get those back to complete our 2015 taxes. I've planted most of my flower pot garden and hired our next door neighbor to mow the leech field. I danced for two hours with my wonderful Authentic Movement friends last week. I've made several trips to sis-in-law, Sharyl's, to visit and help with some cleaning and organizing. I've seen 4 of Maggie's lacrosse games and heard her spring concert. She's a fierce  LAX defense player and an accomplished flutist. Both David and I have had eye exams and individual medical consults/exams. Amelia is adjusting to land life, as are we. Goodness, I love this house and site and neighbors and family and land-based friends. Goodness, I miss being on the boat and on the water.

My Garden!

Amelia relaxing at home

Our house feels too big. We moved all the living room furniture into David's room while refinishing the floor and I love living in his room. Cozy...like the boat. There is more to take care of here on land and I don't have the energy, time or desire to do all the required activities to manage and sustain all this space. And I love the space. I'm having difficulty holding all these contradictory feelings and realizations. Is it time to downsize? Get a roommate? How about a condo? Or senior housing? Not senior housing here in the winter.

Mail sort - one of many sorting projects

Some realizations - I don't want to spend 8 months on the boat again, traveling. Would 8 months but NOT traveling be okay? Or 6 months living/traveling? I loved our adventure and the learning and all, all, all the friends and helpers we made and met along the way.  I love the new skills I have and David has. I love the confidence we each have...in ourselves, in each other and in Grace. We're thinking how to get Grace south this fall without my having to do all the trip with David. Maybe get him some help going as far as NC and leaving the boat there for a couple of months while he comes back. Then we both join the boat after Christmas (?) to go farther south. We figured it was 40 travel days, ME to FL. Perhaps we could do a month to NC or even three weeks. Park and come back to Maine for a couple months? As a southern/winter port, Marathon was good for me and we both enjoyed the community there. I'm not committing to the Bahamas now (having just arrived back in Freeport) but I'm willing to consider considering it as a future trip, especially if I haven't spent 4.5 months getting to the Keys. And/but what to do about having a boat in Maine during the summer if we decide to leave Grace south for the summer, thus avoiding all the travel time back and forth?

I want to change my language regarding "work".  New possible words: rearranging, playing, renovating, upgrading, enjoying, being, resting, refinishing, decorating, cleaning, visiting, imagining, watching, looking, dancing (of course), planning....  Our/my habit is to call everything work...working on the house, working on the boat, working in the yard, working on the boat shed. If we're going to call it work then I'm not going to do it. So there! I'll clean the interior. I'll scrape the bottom. I'll haul the dirt. I'll cover the shed. But I'm tired of working. And, anyway, "working" is an excuse for not doing other things I/we might not want to do as much as "messing around on boats" to quote a favorite book of David's or "digging in the dirt", a favorite activity of mine. And "working" is not nearly as descriptive as all those other above words. I AM changing my language and encouraging David to do the same or at least examine why/how "working on" is so compelling a choice of language. Of course, some things ARE work - somewhat hard and somewhat distasteful.

 I want to do some land traveling. I want to go to NC. I think I want to drive there and do some visiting or sight-seeing along the way. I'm very aware that I have fewer years ahead of me than behind me. I'm not clear how I want to focus my time for these years ahead. I know I love dancing. I know I love David. I want to be present rather than using time/energy uselessly in efforts to control my future. I want to plan as much as possible so that I get the future I might think I might want. I remember a consultant friend from years ago saying "We're going to have a future (if we're lucky) so what is your preferred future?" I have multiple "preferred futures" and doubt that I'll get all of them. Ho hum. In some few cases I have had "preferred pasts" and I couldn't have all of them either.

Dear. Dear. I'd hoped to innumerate so many "realizations" and now I've only a few in my brain. I know there were more but just as I don't have my elevator speech to let people know of the fullness of our 8-month boating journey I don't have a concise list of learnings. Already, what I might have learned alludes language. Perhaps, hopefully, all those learnings and experiences have already become part of my DNA...and/or I've forgotten them.

Now that forgetting makes me pensive and a little sad on this grey day before Memorial Day.