Ruach

They call it ambient light.  

When the sun goes down and I’m sitting on the mooring, the water dances with it.  It’s quite a show.  Wouldn’t give it up for the world really.

But  it’s man made light.  Somehow not pure.  Stretching the day, squeezing out the night.  Having a purpose, but…

There are some who have never seen a crystal clear night sky full of stars.  It seems like an eternity since I have. 

Yet I can remember that last time.  It was in New Hampshire.  A cool night.  Inky dark, but for the stars not dark at all, like a night should be.  And there was a pond, still,  like a pond should be.  The Milky Way was strewn across the sky in its entire splendor, stars so close they almost touched.  Yet each one clear and bright.  And when I looked down into the water there they where, all over again.  I in the middle. 

Alone, quiet, in awe. 

It used to be, not all that long ago really, that the majority of folks engaged in boating knew what they were doing.  At least the basics. These days, not so much.

There are a lot of boats out there, and although they all have owners fewer and fewer are owned by boaters.  One of the causes of this is that all it takes to own a boat is money.  There’s no requirement, and even a dwindling expectation, that when you buy that new and very expensive toy you actually have some experience or training.  The reality is just about anyone can buy a boat, get it launched and motor, or sail, away. 

Actually, it’s a little more difficult to sail vs. motor boating, what with all those ropes and poles, and huge pieces of cloth.  And although they look pretty from shore and so do tend to boost the tourism economy, sailboats go so slow it sometimes seems like it takes forever to get someplace (which is, by the way, the point).  Not much appeal there for the gold chains and Budweiser crowd.  But we do get our own, special brand, of idiots.

Most folks new to boating can get the knack of a power boat right off, it’s a lot like a car. The steering wheel is generally on the wrong side, or sometimes in the middle, but that’s just an annoyance.  As a bonus, you can actually (legally) drink a beer as you tool out of the harbor. 

Libation (or just getting plain stinking drunk) is a big part of boating, motor or sail, but I suppose that’s nothing new.  I have a rule;  If you are going to take the helm you cannot have been drinking.  Even one.  Most of that is for saftey.  A small part is just me, as in “why would you want to be drunk and at the helm on a boat, on the water, on a glorious day”? And what day on a boat on the water is not glorious, a gift?

What I really care about is when peoples actions put themselves or their crew, or other vessels, into jeopardy.  Boating is fraught with opportunities to do so.  It used to be you learned about those pitfalls and how to avoid them as you grew up  – on the water. 

Granted, not everyone has or will have the opportunity to have a youth experiencing such a grand, but limited, resource.  And they should not be excluded to the favor of the favored.  So, what are we to do?  Recently there has been a move to require “boater education” for skippers.  That’s a good thing.  Unfortunately it’s still a little basic, and sometimes hokey. 

But it will get better.  It needs to.

Keeping crew and passengers safe needs to be a priority.  Part of that involves my training and skills.  Part of it involves training others on board.  I’m sadly remiss in that later aspect. Tricia, my wife and regular companion on the boat, would probably have a hard time even turning the ship around were I incapacitated or missing. Finding port and getting the boat back in is, I’m afraid, beyond her current ability.  That needs to change.  It has to be a priority.  First thing this Spring.  Maybe we could start with some chart work even sooner.