Tidal Drifts

We're anchored off the "famous" Bloody Mary's here in Bora Bora, where a set of 4'x8' painted plywood wallboards greet the entrants with a list of the "famous" people who have eaten here.  Jennifer immediately spots Charlie Sheen and Roman Polanski, and mentions something about underage sexual encounters ...I notice Marilyn Chambers, famous for her Ivory Soap-to-porn conversion, and we walk inside, to be greeted by the American host and a iced tray of the local catches of the day, from which we three (Kate's next-to-last night with us) choose our dinner entrees.

Prior company notwithstanding, we had a great meal -- and in thinking about WHY we thought it was a great meal, realized that while the fish was no fresher or better prepared than other restaurants, the meal was presented in a Western-style -- appetizer, with a salad, main course, and dessert.  I guess this means we do miss our culture of origin -- and that as much as we embrace the local culture, there's no place like home -- or its faux hybridized interpretation here in decidedly Westernized Bora Bora.

We're moored off their dock this morning as well, as the wireless internet connection is down at the Bora Bora Yacht Club, lying about 3 miles to the northwest.  The wind has shifted to the north, and will continue to swin g to the west over the next few days.  This is about as rare as the tuna Kate had for dinner last night, and the skies are cloudy and spitting down moisture.  Kate and Jen have dinghied into town to mail some postcards ... tomorrow will be busy with Kate's departure, and then it's a few days of getting the boat stowed away, the winches disassembled, cleaned, and reassembled, and a few other chores before we leave for the 550 n.m trip to Rarotonga.

Since arriving in the Marquesas four months ago, our longest sails have been the overnights to Tahiti and then to Huahine.  We're really looking forward to an extended time at sea; the most recent overnight reminded me vividly of the simplicity and distraction-free nature of a passage.  For someone with a limited attention span (!), creating a void where the mind can wander under the lights of billions of stars and a few unnaturally-bright planets is a good thing.

We're in need of internet so that I can download an update to my laptop's navigation software.  Writing that sentence calls to mind George Carlin's (RIP, weatherman!) famous rant against the 21st century, and calls to mind some of the differences between blue water cruisers.  There's a wonderful couple who sail the boat Bumfuzzle.  They left Chicago after earning too much money as commodities traders, having never sailed a day in their lives, and bought a boat and left -- no preparation, no training, no experience.  The mainstream cruising community turned their figurative backs on this couple -- arguing almost en masse that they were irresponsible.  Maybe, but they did it -- they chased their dream. Their wonderful blog is filled with real-life examples of on-the-job training and an irreverent attitude to life, the universe, and everything.  God bless them as they undertake v2.0 on their new boat!

Another guy we met, in his 30s, made enough money in California to buy a catamaran, and for three years he and a motley gang of friends and hangers-on have wandered the South Pacific looking for the perfect surfing spots -- he's a very loose guy, quick with a smile and joke and "whatever," and his blog is worth a peruse even if it's a bit out of date.  I did the math, and it seems the entries began to trickle down once he and his new girlfriend discovered they'd become parents ... she and the baby left for home a few days ago, while he and his mates are sailing onto Rarotonga.  The sight of a Johnny-Jumper (our son David lived in one of these when he was smaller) on the bow of their 52' catamaran may have been a bit unnerving to Kyber, a free spirit if ever we've met one.  He too "just went," and celebrates when only a few things get broken on a passage.  I hope their relationship resumes intact, but it seems a stretch from this observer's vantage point.  Then again, who really knows these things ever?

Us?  We're definitely on the staid, Boy Scout "Be Prepared" side of the ledger.  Almost to a fault, I think, and it's something I plan to ponder on our passage to Rarotonga.  At "home," we embodied the lessons of the famous "broken windows" social experiments -- where if a school's broken window was left unrepaired, soon the rest of the school's windows would also be broken.  We had an unwritten cultural norm in our family -- anything amiss would be remedied immediately, and, ideally, to the better.  This helped us not only keep a clean house (!), but also gave us time and freedom (ironically) to keep a lot of balls in the air at one time (like two teenagers, and active social and community lives.)

On a boat, location and/or circumstance sometimes limit one's ability to fix things quickly, much less to the better.  I've probably spent more time, thought, and emotional energy on these "to-be-fixed/improved" situations than is probably healthy, and while I'm learning to let go, the last three weeks with Kate -- as a vacation-within-a-vacation -- have illuminated for me the importance of letting these things go, and reestablishing a balance between the moment and the so-called necessity.  Not everything needs fixing today.  Not everything will be fixed for the better.  It's a balance -- we're not a school, and our windows are still watertight.

The irony of writing this as I continue to download a 550 Mb file (8 hours at Bora Bora connection speeds!) is not lost on me.  But at least I'm downloading at a slow speed, watching the clouds drift over the volcanic cone that juts skyward from the lush greenery of Bora Bora, lying a few hundred yards from the "famous" Bloody Mary's.  It's not a bad life, and we're looking forward to more disconnection and more simplicity and fewer distractions as we head westward, just the two of us, in our little sailing boat.  A boat with, yes, some "to-do's" but they can wait a few days ... or maybe a few weeks?