A long day and a quiet night...

Various weather sources suggested that yesterday would be a really good day to make the 47 mile, 8.5 hour trip from the Solomons to St. Michaels. With Grandson Eldest at the helm, we pulled the anchor out of the mud and putted down to Solomons Yachting Center where he did a picture perfect job of getting us on the fuel dock, his first docking of this boat. When they showed up for work, we were already tied up starboard side to looking for the full monty: fuel + water + pump out + trash + ice. Filled up or emptied out as appropriate, our young Captain drove us off the dock and out into the bay. There we found that the various weather sources were on it today. Only the occasional and somewhat feeble whitecap thumped against the bow and by early afternoon even those had faded completely away. It was, as they say, “Smooth Sailing” only without the sails.

We had planned to anchor in a cozy little spot just a short dink ride from the town and well protected from all quadrents. But there was already a boat in there and one is all that will fit. After a bit of motoring around we ended up with a few other boats out in the broad Chester River. The anchor bit hard but where we sit has some pretty long fetch from NNW to ESE. So we are hoping that the weather sources are correct again with their forecasts of storms coming from the WSW. We also hope to be at Kent Island for the weekend, which we might make Friday afternoon depending on those very same storms.

Regardless, it feels pretty good to have this last long leg behind us. Two more short hops should see First Light in Oak Harbor waiting to be pulled for the winter. That is far from the original plan of having the boat in a slip near St. Louis for the winter. But (as the Taoist sages teach) life unfolds as it will. Accept what happens with a bit of humility and do one's best to stay on the path. It may take a while to come to terms with all that has happened this summer. Brushes with dying and shattered bones? On the one hand neither are new or unique experiences for Deb and I, though this is the first time that she has gone under the knife for broken bones. (Me? Lost count a long time ago.) Word has it the Doctor told her that the fatality rate for my kind of heart problem is somewhere around 97%. Slightly higher than the 95% number that was bandied around after a particularly nasty car wreck many a moon ago, but perhaps a bit lower than the near miss with a bout of meningitis also many a moon ago. That time I was saved by a 100 to 1 chance of an intern questioning a test an ER doctor had scheduled. A specialist was consulted instead, one who immediately had me tossed into and ambulance and hauled over to his facility. There we were informed that the test would have certainly proven fatal. Yikes. 

Throw in a motorcycle crash or two plus more close calls in airplanes than I can likely remember, and one might think shrugging this one off would come as second nature. It is a practice the Stoics refer to as “Memento moi”. But I'm not there yet. At some point, of course—tonight, tomorrow, or years from now—that number will be 100% and this particular sojourn will end. But sitting here in this quiet anchorage, having managed to get this far in spite of it all, it is hard not to marvel at just how lucky we have been. Still, I haven't quite shaken the need to take metaphorical looks over my shoulder.