Looking foolish is part of sailing, yet we come back for more.
Issue 144: May/June 2022
After motoring into a popular Chesapeake Bay harbor on a holiday weekend, my first mate and I experienced a level of humiliation that we couldn’t have possibly imagined given our glorious day of sailing out on the Bay.
While visions of crab cakes danced in our heads, I pointed our deep-draft sloop straight for a marina on the far side of the harbor and headed off, oblivious to the multitude of day markers indicating the harbor’s perimeter channel.
We abruptly parked in the Bay bottom’s notoriously muddy grip, and among the al fresco crowd looking for some entertainment to go with their happy hour libations at two harborside eateries, it soon became apparent that we were the opening act. Our efforts to extract ourselves led to ever-increasing levels of raucousness as the beer flowed freely and we didn’t. The sound of their cheering haunts me to this day.
Instances like these remind me that few, if any, recreational pursuits offer more opportunity for embarrassment, indignity, and self-recrimination than sailing. Many would say that golf holds that honor, but I disagree. Embarrassingly bad shots are the norm in golf. Bad sailing isn’t the norm in our sport.
Much has been written about a new sailor’s trepidation when docking in front of a knowledgeable crowd. The thought of accidentally ramming a pristine 48-footer sitting at the fuel dock is nightmarish, or floating helplessly in purgatory, unable to get close enough to the dock to even toss a line to someone. Such thoughts lead many to “stop back later when it’s not so crowded.”
A finger-pier neighbor once shared her docking phobia with me. She always tried to return to her slip early, she told me, before the racing crowd got off work and made their way down to the docks. The fewer witnesses to her attempts at docking stern-to, she figured, the less likely she’d be the topic of conversation around the keg that evening.
And who among us hasn’t forgotten to untie a dock line as they hurried out of their slip, or caused an ugly jibe through their inattentive helmsmanship? Mortification goes with the territory.
Even skills peripheral to actual sailing can be rife with ignominy. For me, one source of personal embarrassment over the years has nothing to do with maneuvering my boat, but rather with rigging and securing it. In short, I tie terrible knots! Oh, I’ve seen all the tutorials. I know all about the rabbit and the hole and the bridge over two rivers, but when it comes time to deliver under pressure, I usually don’t.
While I’m able to eke out a decent half-hitch or two, and my reefing knot and stopper are passable, the two knots a sailor most frequently uses—the bowline and the cleat hitch—rarely go as planned. Fortunately, I know what each is supposed to look like, so after some fiddling and fooling, I find my way—but not without angst when someone is watching.
So, the obvious question is, why do we do it? Why are we sailors willing to risk exposing our fragile egos to ridicule every time we climb aboard?
The answer to that, at least, is simple. If you’ve ever sailed when the wind and water were in perfect harmony with the sails and helm; when the only sound you heard was the heeling bow slicing through the rippled sea; when Serenity became much more than just a name painted on a sailboat’s transom; then you know why. That occasional indignity is a small price to pay for the peace and joy that sailing brings.
L. Alan Keene, a retired mental health professional, began his second career as a boating writer in 2005. His articles, columns, and poems have appeared in numerous Chesapeake Bay and national publications. He and his wife, Peg, have sailed their 1982 Capri 25 on the Bay for the past 25 years.
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