Embarking on a new phase of sailing

    You may not know this if you somehow have only followed our journey via the blog because we are somewhat lazy at keeping it current (I’ve made a vow to do better which should last at least a few months), but three of the four previous years we have gone south to the Bahamas for the winter season and returned around July.  In the past, we have always just got someone to stay at our house and watch the cats for us.  This year we are returning to the boat about the same time as ever and making the same initial journey, but everything feels different.  Everything is different.

   This year, we don’t plan to return home when the winter sailing season is over and hurricanes start to roll into the picture.  Making that decision created a cascade of difficult changes that included selling virtually all of our possessions barring those that fit onto the boat and a small handful of things that have sentimental value which we are stuffing in a storage unit.  We spent several months going through and trashing items that we didn’t really want everyone who came to the sale looking over or things that seemed like no one in their right mind should purchase second-hand.  The estate sale agent was shockingly willing to try to sell many of the things that fell into that category, but we set an overflowing trash can to the curb every week and hired a dumpster which we also filled.  I will admit that we got less selective as the process went along.

    The entire process was stressful and emotional.  Lisa and I stood together in the wreckage of the house looking over the various things we were leaving behind and feeling an odd mix of excitement and sadness.  There was a round of visits with friends and family that were all bittersweet — we know that we aren’t leaving forever, but it may be quite some time before we are home or at the least we won’t just be able to pop to my sister’s house for drinks one random night or play games with our friends.  I felt sad about the last visits I didn’t have with so many people and even sadder with the awkward goodbyes with some of the visits we did have.  There have been quite a few tears shed, some of them not even our own.  Starting a new chapter of our lives has involved a bit of pain at closing the old one, for certain.

   In the end, though, we have pulled the trigger.  The estate sale contract is signed and they are rapidly cataloging our possessions and putting price tags on everything.  The property management company is hired and ready to rent out the house for us.  The immigration attorney is hired to permit us to live in Italy for the next few years.  The cats have been moved onto Dragonfly and are starting to get used to the idea that this weird floating box is their new home.  They don’t see why anything needed to change, but they seem to be handling it alright.

Natasha feeling safer next to Lisa

   We made our first short trip with the cats aboard last Thursday from our home port in Deltaville to Waterside in Norfolk, VA.  It was an eight hour hop, so it allowed us a rare daylight only passage.  The first few hours had strong winds and choppy seas and the cats were entirely unimpressed and hid in their secure undisclosed locations at the foot of our bed peeking out occasionally to see if it was over.  The nice thing about being in Tidewater is that we both grew up here, so we are getting to do lots of visits with friends and family.  We got to hang out with a lovely couple I knew from my work days the night we landed and the next day was a homemade pizza party with my Mom and some old family friends.  Saturday was a frustrating day filled with boat repairs that didn’t go very well and a live country band playing at ear splitting volume approximately 30 yards away all day long.  This didn’t improve my problem solving skills.  After giving up and taking Lisa for cocktails and “girl dinner” I was able to start fresh and fix the problem in just a few minutes, so hopefully things are looking up now.

Boris finds it calming to lay on Mike