EXCITING, SCARY, INTRIGUING, BIG, STRESSFUL, ANCIENT, UNUSUAL, AMAZING EVENT SCHEDULED!

My box of chocolates has been full of surprises!

Each day has brought news or events both wonderful and frustrating.

Wonderful achievements with Ben and Ben combined with setbacks with Cassi’s engine and bottom. A beautiful visit from Layla and astonishing personal news that we will be travelling to Texas! A new concept is considered about the format of my stories and thus the book. More new pledges and transfers have come through and with another push the long awaited “moment” is possible. Send it if ya got it as what is next for Cassi is big! As always thanks to those who have sent their pledges on. It is WORKING! 

THE SHORT VERSION

CASSIOPEIA

EXCITING, SCARY, INTRIGUING, BIG, STRESSFUL, ANCIENT, UNUSUAL, AMAZING EVENT SCHEDULED!

It seems illusive, that moment when it will feel as though the good ship is back in order and the battles are not urgent. It is close I know it. I set this project up knowing full well it would not be an instant recovery. I considered a six month attempt but then realism came into my view and thus I knew a year was required.

Now a big step is to happen this weekend, a Careening.

ME

I am lucky that I am going to get to attend my Dad’s 80^th Birthday with Layla! A trip to Texas is scheduled for August. It has been nine years for both of us. Family, old friends, TexMex restaurants, live music, sailing on the lake where it all started. Book marketing. Yeah for US!

BOOK

As I try to tell all I want to, and say all I want to, and portray all I want to, I am slowly coming up with the way it can all fit together. Adventure, philosophy, insights questions, solutions, ideas. Bumbling about is creating direction on its own, showing me the way. It is so rich and juicy and provocative and I am still not sure of its final form.

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THE LONG VERSION

A CAREENING !!!!!!!

Or those of you who don’t know what that is, I am going to wait until just after this full moon high tide at the crack of dawn and purposely drive Cassiopeia right up onto the beach. Then as the tide goes out I am going to pull on her mast to force her to lay over on her side. Then I am going to furiously work on her bottom as it exposes itself. Hopefully when the tide comes back in I will have patched some spots and rolled on some antifouling paint.

The urgency of all the projects has been due to the amount the bilge pump has been running. The batteries needed to be rewired and some replaced to keep that pump running. The engine needed to run to charge those batteries for that pump but that also meant the alternator had to work to charge those batteries for that pump. Meanwhile the batteries are being lugged back and forth to town on the scooter for hot charging along with running the borrowed generator all night to keep that pump running. 

So the starter finally started the engine and but the alternator blew so I bought a new alternator and rebuilt all the mounts and it was working but then the water pump failed and so I used a big press and pushed new bearings in it and seals and today I am to install it and hopefully that will be all for the engine.

The dive tanks have been going back and forth a lot as well since I have also been diving urgently to use underwater epoxy to stop the leaks to ease the pressure on the the pump and the batteries. It seems each time I fix one a new one appears! The last few dives and handful’s of epoxy have not slowed this one illusive and rather significant leak. Today more bubbles will be blown I hope to find it this time! I have actually been pulling out old seams and driving in new cotton underwater!!!

At night I listen to the pump automatically coming on too much and it, well I have to admit, it stresses me out.

The end is near.

This week is to be big as I must get the engine totally running and get the anchors unstuck after months of being tugged into the mud, gather all of the materials for the careening, and put together a crew for the event.

I have never done this so It is undoubtedly to be full of surprises!

This could be it though. The moment I have been waiting for. Leaks fixed, paint on her bottom, engine running, batteries good, tunes playing, sails on, dining on deck again!

Just a thought,

You know that gate latch that does not quite line up anymore? Sometimes you even have to put down the groceries to fiddle with it and get it open. It’s been that way for months, annoying you daily. Then a mate comes and stays and you come home with the groceries and reach for the latch and with the slightest touch it springs open like magic.  It took him fifteen minutes to tighten the screws and line it up.

Every day sometimes twice, three times, you have been fighting that latch. There never seemed time to fix it. We are funny creatures and we get used to things. We allow daily annoyances because we have grown accustomed to them, at least some of us do that. I do that, I admit it. It is absolutely fabulous when some one eliminates a daily annoyance for you.

Ben and Ben brought a prop for the dingy. I am a motor head and hearing that poor engine whine with the old bent and chipped prop made me wince every time I drove home for months. Now the dingy jumps onto a plane and purrs along. Now every trip is a joy.

Thanks for fixing my latch guys!

THE BOOK

One of the major stories has been struggling as it has so much to say. Thus it has made me think of separating some of it’s parts to allow the flow. There is a lot of looking at how things are here and there, differences, positives, negatives, that I want to include. It can get in the way of the adventures so I am experimenting.

The “philosophy” parts about dreams, values, fear, war, love, learning, comfort zones, etc. are important to me.  Trying to express how a life outside the square shapes a mans thoughts on those subjects comes through in the stories but the full discussion about conclusions is more challenging.

Not to make my trip home to see my dad seem self serving but some time in the states will clarify some of the above mentioned differences. Presenting and talking to live Americans will bring some more modern insights into my perceptions since it has been nine years since I was immersed in that vibe.

I am also quite certain it will be a successful addition to the marketing program for the project and the book. I suspect some fabulous interest and surprises in the funding and publishing arenas will be presented by the many friends I will be seeing.

SNIPPET

I have actually been writing for a number of years and I am to include some of the old work I believe, including some mildly poetic moments. The new stuff is bumbling along, but I am also reworking some of the old ones. This weeks snippet is a newer version of an old piece.

Magic

            She tortured, she teased, she protected.  It seemed I could never know her. I was forced to trust her utterly, with my life, my dream, it seemed my very soul. She was everything.  I had given it all up for her.  She lifted me from the plane of the mundane and placed me on the unsteady and threatening surface of a sea of challenge.  I was awakened as from a dream, to an experience of awareness and endeavour that could only be the early stages of a slow bonding love, not just for her, but for the new adventure of life.

            It was a magic time whose bag of tricks is yet to be emptied.  The events of today and most likely tomorrow are viewed as impossible by the minds eye I left behind.  With her, I am forced to revel in the circumstance of each passing moment, and she opens my heart to the fullness of what we have shared.  Our intimacy is such that others note us as one. Indeed it is a true observation.  She controls me while allowing me the vain pretension that I am the master.  We battle for survival together.

            We have shared many great gifts.  Purpose, pride, passion.  Fear, stamina, courage.  Our experience is a poem of joy and struggle and peace.  Our bond is thick to the touch.  It oozes from her timbers and glows in my eyes.  Those who meet us notice. They leave with a new awareness into the many facets of the bonds so loosely labelled love.  A man and a ship, a love like no other.

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Thanks again to all of you who are making this happen. These next few weeks are to be very exciting as some major hurdles are overcome!

YEAH FOR US !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!