My dad got a sailboat while I was in high school. It wasn't much of a boat, just big enough for him and me and a lunchbox. We used to take it out on the reservoir near my house, sail it up one way and down the other.
Or, sort of sail. My dad is 5'11'' and big, even now, and he weighed close to 300 pounds at the time. He would sit at the back of the boat and run the mainsail, and I'd sit at the front and run the jib- if we tried it the other way around, the nose of the boat stuck in the water. He'd holler directions at me, I'd get confused, he'd helpfully yell detailed mathematical explainations, I'd get angry, and then we'd run aground somewhere for lunch.
We never actually crashed the boat- I left that job for Kim, when she and Dad were out sailing after I left for college. Once, though, on a particularly windy day, we nearly tipped it.
Ok, I'm sorry, that was boring. Let me try that again, with more salacious detail:
The cold northern wind blew across the resevoir, tossing our small bark upon the waves. Sky gray like sheet metal stretched overhead, scuffed by wrathful, speeding clouds. My father and I wrestled with the wet ropes, shouting over the furiosity of the storm...
That's not at all accurate, although it's more exciting. It was a sunny day, just with a strong wind... and really, the wind wasn't even that strong. I just held on too long.
I mentioned that Dad controlled the mainsail while I controlled the jib. The means of control was a rope threaded through a grommet on the sail, with which I could control the tension of the sail and the direction in which it pointed. Ours was a small boat, though, so when the wind blew particularly hard we would let go the ropes and wait out the gust- too much wind would capsize us.
So, we're 'speeding' down the resevoir, probably not at a particularly fast rate but more quickly and smoothly than we had gone before, when a blast hit us from behind. Dad let go of his rope and told me to let go of mine, but I didn't hear him. The boat pitched foward, then sideways, as my little sail took the brunt of the gust.
"Let go! Let go of the rope!"
I heard Dad, that time, but I couldn't process what he was saying. The boat was at enough of an angle that the mainsail was brushing the water, and my dad was sitting up on the top edge to try to balance it- I had my body braced against the boat, pulling for all I was worth to hold the sail against the wind.
"Let go! You have to let go!"
I could feel my arms (and legs) tiring, and the rope started sliding between my hands. The sail was still taut, and the wind was still driving us foward, but the the rope was slipping, slipping, slipping... and then it was gone. My jib floppped free in the wind, the boat sat suddenly upright in the water, and I fell backward in the boat. My dad, not quite so lucky, fell backward out of the boat.
"Why didn't you let go?"
Dad was annoyedly dogpaddling in the resevoir, as the wind died down, trying to figure how he would get back in the boat. He was annoyed to be unexpectedly on a swim trip, but more so annoyed with me for having ignored clear and sensible instruction. He tossed the lunchbox back into the boat and repeated himself:
"Why didn't you let go?"
For the same reason that I still hold things, I guess. I was too busy playing tug-of-war with the wind to hear or realize that holding on was the problem, not the solution. The blisters on my hands were not only hard won, but useless.
So, an odd story, and I don't doubt it makes more sense when I tell it than when I write it. But there it is.
4 comments:
It's like when I was learning to waterski. Mom was in the water with me, and when I was "ready," I signaled to Dad to hit the gas. My skis were quickly removed from my feet, and I plunged back into the water. Only I didn't let go. I was plowing through the water with my head down, and finally lifted my left hand from the ski rope, waving it in the air as if to say, "stop the boat! stop the boat!"
Just thought I'd do the female thing and share a story. :) I know what you mean, about not letting go.
The rope was still attached to the boat, though, right? It's harder to let go of things that might slip out of your grasp, fall into the water never to be retrieved... particularly when you realize it's something unexpected and precious. Your story makes sense to me, even though it's taken me a while to figure out how to comment. (And I reserve the right to comment further)
Well, yes, the rope was still attached to the boat. At the risk of being melodramatic, though: if I hadn't let go, the boat might have capsized. The rope was important to me, important enough that I didn't want it to sink to the bottom of the reservoir while Dad and I swam to shore.
In other words, valuing the rope meant valuing the whole boat.
And of course you have the right to comment further, so far as such rights can be granted by me.
I guess I'm trying to draw out a slightly different image: you can let go of the rope, even if it's difficult, for the greater good, since the rope really is part of the thing you're trying to save.
What if were holding a cup with two handles and an elephant on the side instead of the rope, but you still had to let go? It's more difficult when you're forced to make a choice that you don't want to make, because now you need to declare which is of greater value. Boat or cup? In some respects, either can be replaced; but I can also imagine a situation where the cup is less replaceable than the boat. Even if it means that people get dumped out and have to swim to shore.
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