The Great Wander

Persistence

We have been visiting family and friends lately back home. Something that has come up more than once is people’s amazement at our persistence.  I’ve heard more than once, “From what you’ve written, I would have bailed a long time ago!  I’m impressed by your persistence!”  This has been a difficult year.  Without a doubt. There has been more than one day that one of the three of us woke up and said, “The hell with this idea, let’s sell this and move on.”  Sometimes the other two would talk that one off the cliff, other times, only one would be away from the ledge.

Usually the one that kept the others off the cliff would remind us that we were learning a lot about the boat or that we were learning new skills that we needed to maintain the boat.  The others would then grudging grumble their agreement and sulk while they began their jobs for the day.

The reality is that any dream takes work.  The problem we’ve experienced is that we haven’t seen the benefit of the work yet.  As one of our neighbors said, “You’re experiencing the shit side of boat life, you haven’t been able to enjoy the fun side yet.”  That takes a toll on you.

We are of course now beginning to wash the shit off of our toes with boat life.  Hurricane season is heating up as I write this.  It will cool down and we will feel more confident leaving the safety of the river and exploring more. 

Without persistence and perseverance things won’t get done. You can’t rely on that alone.  You have to have a support group too.  For us, it came to being each other’s support group.  Outside family has also been incredibly supportive. Of course, there’s a lot we probably didn’t share, but it helped to know that others had our backs.

We do have a certain amount of grit.  I would suggest  that our “ grit”  has grown this year. 

While we have had our share of problems this past year, we have also had some good times too.  I’ve tried to write about those as well.  Our trip to Silver Springs State Park and Merritt National Wildlife Refuge are two that come to mind.  Even the drive home from Key West had some  great highlights too.

When people ask how I like boat life, I usually respond with, “The highs are high, and the lows are low.”   Our highs  have been more about us getting away from the boatwork, but like I said we are starting to enjoy some other highs as well.

Knowing that we were anchored solidly in the 55 mph winds was certainly a high for me..after the fact.  During the storm, maybe not so much.

I used to do CrossFit and Spartan races to get myself into uncomfortable places.  I always thought it was important to be comfortable being uncomfortable.  I don’t know that I need to do those anymore for that reason.  I’ve learned that while I might be ready to jump off the ledge of selling the boat, right now there’s still some good reasons to hang on to it and continue being comfortable with being uncomfortable.