We’ve lived on the boat for about two months now. It’s great to live on a sailboat when the weather’s been fantastic since we moved on board.
We’re lucky and privileged. But, it can also be quite demanding. Living the everyday life, going to work every day, children at school, normal everyday life combined with all the preparations for a long trip. What about sailing? We’ve hardly had time to sail. Ironically enough. That’s one of the things we’re truly looking forward to. Setting the sails and being on our way into the unknown.
The last preparations have been to lift the boat “on the hard”, and now we live “on the hard”. Salty long distance sailors describe this as a challenging experience. Now we know why, after living “on the hard” for over a week. It’s hot and chaotic. It’s like living in a renovation project. The boat has to be “primed”, polished, fixed and arranged. Unforeseen things arise that one has to take care of and find solutions to problems one didn’t know existed.
When the day’s over you peel off your work clothes, stretch the old stiff shoulders. You feel the ache between the ribs after falling off the ladder whilst polishing. You go to bed in a dead boat without movement. Without the soothing sway and the water trickling across the hull. The typical characteristics of a boat in its right element.
Whilst “living on the hard” you find the unexpected. The mast has to be dismantled. It needs fixing, upgrades, strengthening and improvements.. Extras and tools pile up. You have to keep track of all the details, and all the details in your own mind. Keep order in your own chaotic little universe. You have to be there for the children that have just started their summer holiday. They don’t realize that living on the hard is tough. How come they don’t see that living on the hard is hard? We’ve got something to learn there. Can’t everything just be like “living softly”?
A few days left until departure. We’re “living on the hard”. We’ve got so many projects going on. Will we ever finish all these preparations?
It’ll be soft again soon.
We’ll set sail soon.
That’s our goal. Soon done living on the hard. Set sail. Live soft. Live hard