Chelsea is graduating Magna Cum Laude in two weeks. David and I are very proud of her. She is quickly becoming more responsible and independent every day preparing for her new life in Aggieland. As with any typical teenager, she is increasingly absent from the house and difficult when she is home. David and I are angry at her more often and she is lashing back. Needless to say, our relationship has been strained. Last night I had a talk with her and as the tears flowed, we both expressed our love. Something has changed though, something is different, something clicked. She is still my daughter and I cherish her, but if feel like I have let go. She is probably wondering what took me so long. This is probably just the first stage. I really didn’t expect that it would hurt so much.
Archive for May, 2008
We had a visit from some friends who knew us in our pre-sailing days, circa 1997-2001. We have all since moved out of the houses that were next to each other, but man, did we have some great times in that neighborhood. I never had to plan what we were going to do during the weekend. We were just going to hang with the neighbors. We started around 6pm on Friday and continued through the weekend. If the garage door was open, it was ok to come over. The kids were of assorted ages, but all got along. It was a very rare time and we are lucky to still have them as friends.
Cheryl, Tommy and Greg (Texas Tech sophomore) came from Midland, TX. Brenda and Marcus came from Kingwood, TX. We took C, T & G to Classic for lunch on Friday, then moved on to the house. B & M got there around 4ish. David and Tommy started the Gin and Tonics after 5 (note pink pitcher on table). Marcus declined participating in the tradition and rightly so. After dinner we went for a night sail. Brenda did the Titanic move at the bow and didn’t fall off the boat (it was a close call). Tommy and Cheryl fell asleep (was it relaxing or did they over imbibe?). We safely docked the boat, not losing any limbs and retired to the house.
Next morning, another sail planned, this time mostly sober, although not for long. We had some time constraints, but decided to go to Redfish Island for a picnic. Marcus got his work out trimming the starboard side jib. Brenda and Cheryl got their ab work out sitting on the low side. I trimmed the port side jib. The wind was up a bit so the anchoring wasn’t so stellar. We ate lunch and carried on down wind back to the club. Then the rest gets a little foggy for me. I will let someone else comment on that if they wish. All in all it was awesome seeing them all again. I will need about a year to recover from it though.
We have had lots of friends ask “can we visit you in the Bahamas?” Of course you can, but we are afraid to make any commitments until we know #1 if we will like it and #2 where we are going. I will try to narrow it down a little. Everyone plan to come to see us in sometime in November-January and maybe February, on one of the islands in the Bahamas. Ok that’s settled, see you there!
We traveled to Redfish Island this weekend with Lizz, Charlie, Dana, Scott (Kaya), Beverly and Walter (Shaken not Stirred). Weather was great (a little windy), food was shared, martinis were very tasty and sleep..not so much. We rafted up to Kaya to eat and relax prior to anchoring our boat. This was a first for Shaken not Stirred (SNS) to anchor, so everyone was happy to give advice. They did a great job. It was very impressive considering that we all had way too many martinis, wine, beer etc.
Sleep, ah to sleep, I wish I could. Our berth is very comfortable, my earplugs fit nicely, but I can only sleep about 1-2 hours at a time. I thought that I had sufficiently imbibed enough vodka to sleep this time, but my darling husband roused me at 0100 asking, “do you hear that?”. I didn’t really, he denies he said go fix it, but that is what I heard, so I got up, went on deck, looked around a little in the dark, went back below, got in bed and tried to go back to the vodka induced coma I was in before. That wasn’t going to happen though. The noise was echoing in my brain now. It sounded like a gong. Did I mention my side of the bed is right next to the mast? I got up again, this time with enough sense to get a flashlight, went on deck, saw the problem (halyard askew and banging on mast in the wind) and fixed it. David came out to watch this time (I guess he worried when I didn’t fix it immediately). Back to bed, back to waking every hour to the anchor alarm, back to fixing my earplugs, tossing and turning. After the anchor alarm went off for the 15th time, David asked what time it was and when I replied 0430, he sighed, “only 3 more hours”, implying only three more hours of this sh!t.
The morning was dry and cool. Walter called and asked, “what’s the plan?” David told him the plan for us was to enjoy the morning, relax, throw paper airplanes at Sam, read a little, do some light boat projects, then pull the anchor up and sail around a bit. In other words, make your own fun. Walter and Beverly decided to head off and do a little sailing. Charlie and co. decided to kayak around the island before they left. That is the beauty of this lifestyle, everyone does what they want.
