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A Boathouse Summer

As the weather changes to frigid and life slows down a bit, I have a little more time to write again. While I was able to share our hiking, camping, and raspberry picking along the Superior Hiking Trail, we also had plenty of good weather (and bad weather) moments from our home base- the boathouse.

As a refresher- Michael, Hutch, and I live off grid in the boathouse we rebuilt over two years ago. We live on the Mississippi River on an island in Winona, MN among 100 other boathouses but only a handful or two year-rounders like us.

We have “tea” with our neighbors on Thursdays when the weather is right. Tea might include tea. It might include Tullamore Dew whisky. On special occasions, Tea will be an entire bloody mary bar. Whatever beverage Tea is serving, it always includes good company, interesting conversation, and a couple of neighborhood dogs (not ours) and one neighborhood toddler (ours).

Living off the grid means no bills but arguably more chores. In the winter, these chores are tedious. In the summer, they are fun. The boathouse chores include but are not limited to: refilling propane tanks, refilling drinking water, refilling our 55 gallon drums of water used for showering and sinks, and the occasional emptying of our compost toilet. In the summer, we are fully powered by solar energy. In the off seasons, we may need occasional help from a friend- the Honda generator.

In the summer, chores are done by jon boat. We get our water from the local marina which is a quick jaunt upstream. We can also transfer our propane tanks by boat to vehicle to gas station and back again with much less effort than the sled pull technique that winter provides.

The only downfall of summer chores is when the fruit flies make their way into our toilet and proliferate like… like flies I guess. That cleanup is a dreadful job, and one that Michael has taken on 100% of the time. For the record, I did take care of the maggot situation we once had in our cloth diaper bin. This was a lesson not to leave dirty cloth diapers outdoors, and to potty train immediately- which is going quite well.

Some summer highlights on the boathouse include the following: the sunsets, watching our neighbor Gerty cruise by via boat no less than 3-4 times per day- almost always with his dog Banksy in tow (Hutch loves the doggies, he loves Gerty too but Banksy more), watching the Steamboat Days fireworks on the deck, using the boat as our primary transport (to the grocery store across the river, to “daycare” aka Grandma and Grandpa’s cabin on the river, or just to the parking lot which is a solid five minute walk otherwise), jumping off the deck into the river (diving board coming next year, already purchased via Craiglist ad), and e-bike rides to town or to the adjacent wildlife refuge… so many e-bike rides, 2,200 miles to be exact.

This year also brought us some roommates for a couple months.

Our friends Sam and Patty took up residence in our houseboat Neighbor Girl, the little steel hulled houseboat we lived in for four years before moving in to our current river residence.

You may remember Neighbor Sam from being a neighbor of ours when we lived in this boat in Saint Paul, MN. Sam had an adorable tugboat that he acquired from Lake Michigan. He also lived on his boat for four years.

Together, our boats and our selves navigated four wildly different seasons in an elusive wooded marina smack dab in the middle of the cities.

Now, having Sam & Patty here allowed us to revive Neighbor Girl as she had slowly become a glorified tool shed over the last two years.

Their presence also brought a lot of fun, a welcomed sense of community with shared meals and game nights, and new memories together like co-parenting an abandoned duckling, mastering “patty boarding”- pulling a kite surfing board behind the boat (named after Patty as we accomplished this on her birthday), and assisting in the capture of a fugitive.

Okay, I will share the fugitive story… It started on a blissful sunny afternoon when Patty, Michael, Hutch, and I boated to the boat landing to pick up Sam so he did not have to walk that treacherous five minutes across the island. Sam was briefly chatting with a stranger drenched in river water when we arrived. The stranger was frantic upon our arrival and requested a ride “down river”. I asked multiple questions like “are you okay?”, “what’s the matter?”, and “where do you need to go?” The stranger eluded my questions and became increasingly demanding that we give him a ride.

Meanwhile, Michael spotted a police officer pulling up to the landing and asked the stranger if this had anything to do with the cop over there. Michael got the cop’s attention, and the cop hurriedly made his way to the landing. The stranger became frantic as Michael started to pull the boat away from the dock. The stranger jumped onto the front of our boat. He slipped around with his wet feet as Michael gunned it in reverse. The stranger fell in the water. We were caught between the police officer coaxing the stranger to “just make it easy on yourself and come on in” and the stranger saying “I’m trying but I can’t, the current!” while the current was indeed aiding him in the officer’s direction.

We hung around as either a rescue or a capture boat but luckily, neither was needed. The stranger swam in and was arrested as a fugitive with a history of sexual assault. When I told my coworker this story, she asked “What is up with you running into criminals this year?” She was referring to my vehicle being stolen on Superbowl Sunday and being found outside the scene of a homocide… Well, let us hope 2022 brings less crime and more patty-boarding.

While one of our 2021 summer goals was to hike the Superior Hiking Trail, our other family goal was to take a few days to navigate our jon boat downstream and simply take in the Mississippi River in all of it’s raw and unassuming glory.

This would include tent camping on whatever sandbar we landed at, cooling off with a swim, and the occasional mingling with small river towns when we stopped to refill gas or groceries.

One of our greatest inclusions was to bring our e-bike along. All three of us can ride, and it was an easy way to see a town from top to bottom and side to side.

I try to keep a sort of travel journal whenever I go somewhere new. This started when we took our trip around the world and continues with trips within our own region or state. I highly recommend this practice as even the most magnificently tangible details dilute with time. Instead of trying to recollect the details of this river trip, I’ll include tidbits of the unrevised journal entries below.

Day #1

Michael has outfitted the boat nicely with a new spotlight and navigation lights, made a console hatch that locks, made a cover for the engine compartment, added our cedar chest to the front for our items, got a new prop, and strapped on our e-bike as well as our two gas cans and a water jug. We’re taking our jon boat with a bimini and the pack and play for Hutch.

We get to Lock #7 where a barge is headed upstream. I call the lock and find out it is a 1.5 hour wait. We find a sandbar nearby and hang out. Hutch runs around. We eat and drink and get in the water a bit. We find a baby turtle that Hutch is very afraid of.

I find camp just downstream across from Brownsville on Ryan’s Point. Hutch is asleep by 8pm. Michael and I join him in the tent at 9:30. I read a bit, fall asleep quickly, and wake to high winds and light rain at midnight. The tent is shaking and I’m amazed Hutch doesn’t wake. Rain starts again around 5am and sticks around until 8:30am. We play in the tent until it clears. We debate going home already as the weather forecast shows scattered storms all day and into the night. We take a gamble and keep going.

Day #2

We are glad we gambled. It is a perfect day.

We strip Hutch naked and let him play in the sand and water for at least two hours. He loves to have a cup and scoop and dump water over and over again. After two hours, I ask Michael, “How long do you think he would do this for?” Michael says, “at least a year.”

The blue herons are very active here and louder than I’ve ever heard them. I usually see them alone but here it seemed like they were playing some sort of game- calling eachother and dodging around. I love to watch them. They are my favorite birds.

We do family river baths tonight, giving Hutch a rinse with our clean water. The forecast states a 90% chance of rain tonight so we prepare for that. We are all together in the tent by 9pm.

Day #3

We never got rain last night. It is the driest year yet this year and the first time I’ve heard the word “drought” used for the state of MN, so I celebrate rain whenever it chooses to come.

Hutch woke twice in the night but very briefly. One time just to say, “mama, yup. dada, yup,” then back to sleep.

We biked around Prairie Du Chien for a good while on the e-bike. The weather was perfect in the morning but we knew rain was on the horizon. When we hopped back in the boat, a barge was ahead of us. I cruised to get ahead and get to Lock #9 first. It was 5 miles away but we did it.

The rain was headed our way from the north so we made a plan to drive just south of Lansing, park under a bridge, and visit the Driftless Area Museum while the rain poured down. We parked perfectly so the boat was spared of the 1.5 hour torrential downpour, and we enjoyed the museum.

Day #4

We wake early, of course, because Hutch always wakes early- 6am. It is already a perfectly calm day. We got on the water quickly and cut through the glass-like river. We see pelicans, a cormorant, and two eagles chasing each other in flight- a full grown and a juvenile, the juvenile chasing the full grown out of a tree.

We reach Stoddard. At the landing, there are many pickup trucks, and also a horse tied to a tree with an Amish cart nearby. We take the e-bike to explore and restock our ice.

It’s a beautiful day, a beautiful ride home. I drive us toward the sunset and play some music. We hit the last two locks perfectly- no wait time and we’re home by 6pm. I could live on this river forever with these guys… I just might.

I write about much of this as way to hold memories. Anyone who knows me knows that my memory for things, people, and events does not hold up well. Perhaps, this is why I was given a joy in writing- it is my way to to memorialize moments.

I want to remember Hutch’s unadulterated joy in watching the ducks swim by. I want to feel the swift euphoria as I jump to the river from the edge of our spiral staircase. I want to dwell in the admiration of watching our 86 year old neighbor diligently care for his boathouse, for the ducks, and for the island for over 40 years of purposeful boathouse-dwelling  existence.

I want to close my eyes and see the summer sunset as it casts it’s pinks and it’s oranges across the quietude of a still river, always interrupted by the noise of a landing duck or a family splashing at the beach across the water.

I know that our boathouse winters will hold and have held memories that would be equally painful to lose. I will transcribe those again too. In the meantime, I could not let this year pass without reflecting on the spontaneous, untroubled (except for the very sweaty, unair-conditioned days), and very colorful existence that a boathouse summer provides. Thanks for partaking in my untimely contemplation of a summer passed.

Oh, and happy holidays! May your cup of cocoa have perfectly melted little marshmallows, and may someone make you frosted cut-out cookies with multicolored icing so that you don’t have too. Cheers!

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Remembering The Nightcrawlers

I love bad weather. I love that it knocks us off our routine, makes us uncomfortable, and bring us Minnesotans/Wisconsinites together in a collective “What the hell is up with this?” kind of way. I have to include Wisconsin in my posse now that we’re living out on the river somewhere in no man’s land between the two dairy-loving, football-crazed, lake-loving, hardy-living states. Also, I love the cheeseheads.

Two days ago, on October 20, it snowed multiple inches all over the place. (That is exactly the sentence I would say if I was hired to be a weatherwoman.)

Today, I woke up to a gray yellow sky which is a color that makes no sense. It felt otherworldly.

My neighbor texted me to watch out for an alien invasion. Allegedly, there have been multiple encounters with former residents on this island, and today looked like the set for exactly that. My mind wandered and made up stories as the eery energy eminating from the sky and off the oddly calm waters infiltrated my system. I then heard a clunk clunk against the boathouse and jumped with the flashing thought of a landing spaceship. It was just a log brushing against the barrels, and it is a noise that happens here every 3.5 hours. My imagination got the best of me.

Shortly after my stint of imaginating aliens, Michael called me. He is rained out from work. Reason #5 that I can appreciate a little bad weather: we will now have the rare day off together.

I think I like bad weather in the same way I like the dark. It heightens my senses and allows me to feel fully present. You can bet that I am paying attention to every broken branch, every print, every sound, and every motion as I walk through the woods late at night. For those five minutes on my walk home, I don’t think about what my patients are going through, about Covid and about missing many of my favorite humans, about politics, about anything outside of my present experience in these woods. It’s enlivening and so necessary. Also, when I’m most alert, the neighorhood beaver slaps it’s tail at me and makes me pee my pants, so there’s that.


If you think back on the last year, I guarantee that some of your most vivid memories include inclement weather. They do for me.

I remember bringing Hutch home from the hospital during a winter flood. The icy water was up to our knees and I yelled to Michael, “as long as it doesn’t reach my stitches!”… uffda. We stayed at our neighbor’s house that night after discovering that our heat went out.

I remember the hip deep snow at the cabin- Hutch’s first time there. It was such a challenge just to move through, and it provoked plenty of fall-related laughter.

There were the hot days that I submerged Hutch in his bathtub while I lived in just my underwear.

There was the mid-summer tornado that skirted around us. It was mighty and dark as we tracked it’s path just south of us. I remember the warm air, the whipping wind that switched directions ten times a minute, and the maternal worry that pulsed through my body as I asked Michael, “Should I put Hutch in a life jacket?”

I remember the wet and humid days walking through the island. I felt transported to a rainforest- a wild place so green and isolated.


As I walked home in the dark on Monday, I thought, “Why do I love this so much? Why do I love this dark walk that also feels both cold and wet?” I dug into that wonder until I remembered gathering nightcrawlers with my dad as a very young kid. It felt just like this night. I might have done this thirty times or maybe just once, but my body remembered the thrill.

I would have never dug up this memory had I not tried. Our minds are cluttered with so much.

The brain begins to carry only what we exercise; this is science. I see it in practice as my stroke patients must repeat actions to strengthen a neural pathway that they lost. If they repeat a thought over and over or an action over and over, that pathway will regenerate and grow stronger and more accessible with repeated input.


If we exercise gratitude over worry, our minds will land there first. If we perseverate on the flaws of a person, our minds will execute that negative thinking the next time we consider them; the same goes for positive thinking. If we start to stereotype, those connections will only grow stronger with each practiced thought until every person we meet or every experience we have gets put into it’s prescribed box.

But, if we relive the nights with the nightcrawlers, if we remember the thrill of being wet and in the dark way past bedtime and this is learned to be fun and not scary or uncomfortable, we will start to carry those kinds of feelings in the forefront of our cluttered minds. If we take time to enjoy bad weather or humorously entertain stories of aliens or perseverate on what is so good in each person we meet, the neural pathways in our minds will grow stronger toward these inclinations. We will feel enlivened.

So today, when I catalog the gray yellow sky in my memory, I will remember Hutch crawling on me at 7am and the neighbor’s dog visiting and licking both of our faces into a smile. I will remember a day off with my family with nothing planned. I will think about aliens, ya know, just for fun.

 

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Moving Port

It is 6:45am on Saturday, August 24, 2019: Day #2 of driving Neighbor Girl down the river to her new port of Latsch Island, Winona, MN. We beached our sturdy steel houseboat on a sandbar last night near Mile Marker 810. One lock and dam down, four to go.

The river treated us kindly yesterday. Perhaps she feared that I would flood her with my tears. We left our home yesterday. More specifically, we drove our houseboat out of her home port. We left Watergate Marina in Saint Paul, Minnesota- our home base for the last four years.

We bought our houseboat there five years ago, left the country to travel to 13 others assured that in six months, we would have this 142 square feet of living space to exist on for the summer. One summer of living aboard turned into a fall, a winter, a spring, and three more years just like that. Michael and I joyfully resided on this tiny floating home together tucked away in a quiet park marina along the floodplains of Saint Paul where even the locals don’t know we exist. (Trust me, getting an Uber pickup had about a 45% success rate.) We continued to exist there purposefully and peacefully with eight other boats year-round and countless more during the seasonable and vibrant summers.

During these last four years of life, I worked at Hennepin County Medical Center at a job that I loved for challenging every part of me and showing me the hardest and most beautiful parts of humanity. Michael and I spent weekends building our cabin up north. We got married. We made a baby. We made a whole family in this marina and some very best friends; I’m looking at you tugboat and sailors. So, as we leave port with Ken and Roger tossing our lines, it’s no wonder that the Mighty Mississippi fears I may flood her waters with these unsupressable tears that well up from the pit of my gut and burn my heart on their way up to my pathetic sniffling face.

Watergate Marina is beautiful on this day- a sky as blue as I’ve ever known it and a sun that casts down an easy 70 degrees.

Video: Leaving Port

As we slowly leave the marina, I hand the wheel to Michael and spend a minute on the stern (slightly embarrassed by the puddle I’ve become) as our home harbor disappears from sight. Michael joins me, and I tell him, “I’m not sad, I’m just so so grateful.” He hugs me and says, “me too.” We agree that there is nothing more we could have wanted out of these last four years. For us, they were perfect. When I finally clear my eyes to look up at Michael, he has two big tears living on his cheeks- a rare sight on his typically cheerful and mischievious face.

Now, on this Saturday morning, we revel in our first day of river boat journey success and last night’s very primal joy of sitting along the river’s shores with our feet in the sand and a warm campfire glow across our faces. Today, we are fresh-faced and confident going in to the biggest test that trusty Neighbor Girl has had to face in her last four years with us and likely in her 49 years of existence: the Lake Pepin crossing.

Lake Pepin is where the Mississippi River becomes it’s widest and deepest for a stretch of 22 miles. Lake Pepin widens to a distance of two miles and has an average depth of 21 feet and a maximum depth of 60 feet.

For those of you who have not done much river travel, I will enlighten you on the treachery of wing dams. The Mississippi River is lined with them. Wing dams are human constructs that were built during the 1930s and ’40s with the purpose of crafting a deeper and more reliable navigation channel. These wing dams were built prior to the present day lock and dam system as a means to control the flow of the river. Wing dams extend partway across a river channel and often go undetected depending on the depth of the water at that time. If the water is low enough, you will see a line across the water that delineates a smooth water surface upstream and a choppy water texture downstream of that wing dam. It takes a practiced eye to identify these.

Now, on to the treacherous part. Wing dams are unmarked. Boats and boat engines are frequently wrecked by these shallow lurking structures. The good news? Wing dams do not exist within the main channel which is marked by red and green steel buoys. “Red, Right, Return” means that the red marker will be on your right as you return north. Since we are traveling downstream, the green is on our right and the red is on our left, or so we expected…

At the head of Lake Pepin where the water widens considerably, the reassuring red and green channel markers suddenly become non-existent. Things had been going very well so far. With a high level of confidence, I thought, “no big deal, the whole width of the river must be open for business.” We didn’t bother to check the river charts that Michael had downloaded on his phone. Within 15 minutes of cruising cockily along the Minnesota shore, I blazed our little houseboat right into a submerged sandbar. The engines grumbled as they tried to process the run-in with sand and thick weeds. My relaxed mood shifted to “shit, shit, shit.” This was not the spot to lose an engine.. or two. Thank God we have two. I inched out of this disaster and let the engines relax. They sounded gruff for ten minutes before regaining their deep calming purr. We lucked out. Michael checked his river charts and sure enough, the elusive submerged bar was marked on there. “What the f***. If that’s been known long enough to include on a chart, why isn’t there a frickin’ marker by it?!” I exclaimed this in defense of my sweet old boat and dented captain’s pride. Michael laughed, and we chugged on.

We had 22 miles of Lake Pepin ahead of us; three hours of white crested waves beating our steel hull from all sides. We were fortunate that the day’s wind came from ahead as Neighbor Girl does not fair well in a side wind. A side wind of today’s speeds would have forced us to sit this day out, but with a head wind, we pressed on. We quickly learned that both of our bilge pumps were in working order… whew. Water was leaking in from somewhere, or everywhere as the decks were fully rinsed with each wave. Thankfully, our pumps had no trouble keeping up and expelling this intake. Neighbor Girl was doing great.

What I did not expect from our Lake Pepin crossing, besides that disruptive submerged sandbar at the start, was that the main channel crosses through the middle rather than along the shoreline; this caused us to be nearly a mile from shore for most of the venture. With the wild wind splashing from ahead, mysterious dark waters for a mile on all sides, and migrating birds overhead, we felt like true river nomads now! We cranked the music, danced at the helm, and celebrated feeling free and dry in our little moving home.

Later that night, following a celebratory dinner at Slippery’s Bar in Wabasha, we ran our boat aground once again in an attempt to beach up for the night. Neighbor Girl made it out of grounding incident #2 unscathed, and we found another, more perfect spot to make dinner and watch the sun set behind the distant bluffs.

Video: Beach Camping

As night fell, a beaver played near our boat. We did our best to keep quiet and observe his antics, but he caught a glimpse of us, slapped his tail, and dove smoothly away.

It is now Day #3 of this river boat adventure. We wake just south of Alma, WI to find that we have no maple syrup for the pancakes I have been dreaming of all night. These are the things that matter at sea- a good warm meal in the morning and a cold hard drink at night.

Since my little growing fetus disallows me from the cold hard night drink, I am living for these warm morning meals. My husband must love me or something, because we backtrack a mile to Alma’s city dock with the mission of maple syrup acquisition and a propane tank refill. We get distracted by good conversation and fresh pretzels at The Alma Bakery where we are introduced to a 50% off closing sale at The Junk Market down the street. Two hours later, we reboard our boat with propane, fresh pretzels, four wooden folding chairs, a canvas painting of a ship, some sort of antique cutting tool, and with the baker himself for more conversations on scheming and dreaming. The baker didn’t end up departing with us. I suppose he had more pretzels to make after we cleaned him out. The syrup never made it on board either. We are far too distractable to ever become pirates, at least productive ones.

We left Alma at 11:15am, made it through Lock and Dam 5 at 1:12pm, and through the final lock, Lock and Dam 5a, at 2:35pm. We were greeted on the other side of the lock by two boats- one with my parents and the other with the Brandon family. It was a lovely welcoming. We made a small parade to my parent’s cabin where my sister and more family boarded for the final stretch to Latsch Island.

We arrived at The Wheel House, our future floating home under construction, at 4:45pm. We docked with a bang… literally. Michael drove flawlessly up until this climatic point when he made a small but very audible dent in the side of our new boathouse. The excitement got the best of him. I’m taken back to over four years ago when we took Neighbor Girl out for her first trip. With a fresh coat of paint, newly placed engines, and not a bit of knowledge on how to drive this big box of steel with twin engines and no keel, we enthusiastically headed for open water. As brave as ever, we felt like two free birds exploring a world of new possibilities; it was a very familiar feeling that resided in us throughout these last three days. Eventually, on this day four years ago, Neighbor Girl’s maiden voyage came to an end; it was time to dock her back in the slip. Michael took the wheel, used both the wheel and the two throttles to steer (We later learned that this was the beginner’s mistake. You must only use the throttles and no wheel if you hope to park without incident.), and not-so-gently rammed in to the bowsprit of our neighbor’s much nicer boat. Luckily, only ours came out with a scar- a four foot gash through the cabin’s port side. Neighbor Girl’s beauty scar still remains today.

The Wheel House now has an upstream scar to match. These two little river homes now live side by side, each with an imperfection to remind us of the joy in our wildest ideas and new beginnings. May we never be ashamed of these scars or scared to make new ones; they each tell a great story. May we continue to live our lives being too novice, unintimidated, a little stupid maybe, and much too eager in all the new and unusual waters that come our way. May we sometimes forget the syrup and come home with pretzels and a new friend instead.

Video: Celebratory Champagne

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When You Have To Boat To Your Boat

“Whatchya writing about?”, says my husband as he shaves his face over the sink while sitting next to me on our bed. There are no distinguished spaces here. It is one room containing all the aspects of a home… except for no laundry machine or any sort of closet. I tell him, “the flooding”. He says, “whoa, that’s a biggins.” “I know; where do I start?”, I say, “at ten feet, twelve feet, eighteen feet?” Michael says, “Start at the bottom of the river.”

I still didn’t know where to start so here we are. I began by giving you the visual of Michael inches away from me at 1:12 am while I sit cozy in bed tip-tapping away on the keyboard. We have three candles lit because our power is out. It’s been out for 22 days now. We’re borrowing Neighbor Mike’s generator because ours fell in the river last night at 4am. I know it was 4am because I wake every time the generator turns off. I’ve turned in to one of those people that has to sleep to the sound of a fan, except in my case: a generator. The whole dock hums of them at night. I met a neighbor for dinner on the dock yesterday and we yelled across the table to hear each other over the loud drone- it was lovely. Anyway, here we are. We’re off grid. Our generator is in pieces to “dry out” on our boat’s floor. There is six inches of snow on our dock. We have to kayak to and from our boat to traverse the flood waters. And Michael shaves his face at 1am while I try to process these last few weeks of Minnesota madness.

Spring isn’t always like this. We usually don’t get flooded out of our parking lot. Our power has never been turned off. We’ve never received an email from the city to evacuate our floating homes due to major flood levels… how strange that none of us checked our email that month.

One month ago, the marina started buzzing with the information that this would be a year of historic flood levels. Would it be something like 2014- a river crest of 20.13 feet? Many neighbors were familiar with this year and smiled as they shared stories from it. It was one year before Michael and I made the marina our home. Could it be something akin to 1965, the highest waters here in recorded history? The river crested at 26.01 feet then.

I’ll quickly brief you on the river levels. The river depth here in Saint Paul, MN is about 9 feet deep. There’s a ton of history on how the 9 foot navigable channel was established. The Upper Mississippi River was not always navigable, not even close, but humans have knack for manipulating nature to suit our wants. I read a book recently that brilliantly goes through the history of our local river: the good, the bad, and the ugly. I highly recommend it: “The River We Have Wrought” by John O. Anfinson. Anyway, back to river levels. The action stage is 10 feet, the flood stage is 14 feet, the moderate flood stage is 15 feet, and the major flood stage is 17 feet.

In the week leading up to the river’s rise, the harbor’s waters remained frozen, and the summer’s boats lined the parking lot just waiting for the spring thaw and eventual release to their dock slips. This year, this transition from dry dock to water would not happen naturally or smoothly. It would require a 65 foot barge pushed by a tug to break up the frozen ice. It would require volunteers to chip away at snow and ice surrounding the stands that held the seasonal boats on land. It would require hundreds of different maneuvers to get the seaworthy boats (boats that can float) in water and the not so seaworthy ones on high ground. The parking lot was going to flood, maybe six feet high. This meant that all the boats safely stored on the lot for winter would not be so safe anymore; they would be floating away… and fast.

This year’s flooding was already different from that of 2014. In 2014, the flooding happened in June- a rather pleasant time of the year to hassle with extra water. Now, it’s March; it’s cold and everything’s frozen. We are understanding these things: we’ll soon be off grid as the power will be turned off before the water reaches the breaker box, we’ll be kayaking to and from our boat as the parking lot is sure to flood significantly, and if all the boats on shore can’t get in the now frozen harbor, they will float away, sink, or surely be damaged. I’m not sure we’ll be telling stories of this flood with a smile on our faces.

Letters were written to the city officials, and the marina acted quickly and with minimal rest. They got that barge to come in and break up the marina’s main channel. Volunteers came forward in impressive numbers to break up the ice within the dock slips and where the barge could not reach. The marina employees worked tirelessly to slip in 48 boats in a span of three days. The boats would be safe.

The water rose quickly, and when we arrived from a weekend away, the liveaboards were in full flood mode. A dinghy dock was established, Neighbor Sam purchased a new motor for his dinghy while Neighbor Mike purchased a new generator, Neighbor Roger lended me his neighbor kayak for the flood season, Neighbor Sam gifted us gimbaled oil lamps for the weeks of power outage to come, and Mystery Neighbor delivered my rain boots directly to Neighbor Girl’s door. As evidenced over and over again, lots of looking out for each other seems to happen here when conditions aren’t fabulous.

Weeks have come and gone now- more than three of them. We are still off grid. Roger’s still letting me use his kayak. We’re getting our day time warmth from the sun (if it’s out that day) and our night-time warmth primarily from candles or our solo propane heater that kicks off frequently for no good reason. We gave up trying to power our fridge, so we’re consuming a hardy amount of dry goods and making more frequent trips to Mickey’s Diner.

We are caught up to the present now. Just when we got settled in to this off-grid flood life, the 5th biggest April snowfall on record blasted us with nearly 10 inches. As temperatures dropped in to the twenties and the wind picked up to 20 knots sustained and 51 gusting, our generator landed in the river at 4am. Michael retrieved it, but it hasn’t been able to be revived. We woke up to one cold boat being tossed back and forth by the unrelenting winds. With my winter coat on, I packed a bag with three days worth of clothes. I impulsively determined that I would find somewhere to stay until this wintery spell seceded. I stormed off the boat in my knee high rain boots in to the snow and across the flood waters. In that moment, I thought I’d be gone until summer.

My rage did not last long. That night, I was back on the boat with my three days of belongings put away and a borrowed generator for heat. It is now 1:12 am. I’m cozy in bed, loving this boat again in all her resilience and charm. “Whatchya writing about?”, he says… I write without really knowing I guess. I start with one small thing, event, person, and I wring it free of all the sensations it has to offer. I write to understand this life all over again; to feel it fully. It goes too fast otherwise. I write to share the beauty in life and the funny in it. I write to honor the very essence of living stripped from all the extras. “The flooding,” I say. I’ll start there. Of course, I start the story talking about him. I can’t help it; it’s just where I feel the most.

If you’re wondering how we (Saint Paul, MN in the year of 2019) ended up in the historical flood contest. The river peaked at 20.19 feet. Yes, 20.19 feet in 2019; I bet you won’t forget that now. It’s the seventh highest in recorded history. The river was higher (and colder!) than 2014, but not as high as in 1965. What a year to have two floating homes on this mighty Mississippi.. uffda. We’re not out of the woods yet, but so far, both are surviving. I wouldn’t say thriving but definitely surviving; I’ll take it.

Since I started this story with Michael, I’ll end with him too. I like to bring things full circle. Since Michael and I work evenings and not always the same evenings, the commute home during flood season has involved a kayak trip from dinghy dock to boat between the hours of midnight and 2am, either alone or together. At first, I though I would dread this after a tiring shift at the hospital. It morphed in to one of the favorite parts of my day (except when that April blizzard hit; screw kayaking in that mess). The water was the most calm at night. It looked like glass, and the moon shine would light our path home. On my nights alone, Michael would always text me things like, “wear your life jacket” or “paddle over the parking lot; it’s more shallow there”. We also debated nightly on which was the best exit point at the dock. I liked to venture straight to our dock finger where a ladder dipped in the water to meet me. Michael preferred to go up the walkway at the dock’s end; it was a gradual slope up and one he insisted was less risky. The water is still icy cold, so any fall in could be dangerous.

One morning, I woke up to Michael blasting through the boat’s door in only his underwear. I didn’t have my contacts in or glasses on, so this was just a strange, blurry vision at first. He had fallen in the water, swam to the dock, got assistance from our neighbors to fish the kayak out, and then stripped his wet clothes off and hung them outside to dry. (The clothes were later found to be frozen stiff.) I couldn’t help but to laugh at him as this blurry image shared his story. “And you always tell me to be careful,” I said, “how ironic.” So, for the official record of Mississippi River fall-ins over four years of life aboard: you can tally Michael’s at a whopping three, while I sit cockily here at zero.

April 2019 Stats To Remember:

  • The 7th highest river crest with a height of 20.19 feet.
  • The 5th largest April snowfall in history.
  • An astounding jump in the river fall-in count with Chelsi securing a 0-3 lead. Booyah.
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Not Too Little, Not Too Much

Lagom. It’s a Swedish word meaning “not too little, not too much, “in moderation”, or “enough”.

My birthday is on New Year’s Eve. There are certainly perks to this. For example, I pretend the whole world is partying in my honor- the ball drop, the dressing up, the good food, the midnight kissing, the whole thing- my elaborate birthday party. Because NYE is a holiday and I’m a nurse, I’m destined to every other birthday with my patients; this year was one of those years. I still pretend that the world is partying for me; I just don’t attend the party, and you know what- it’s awesome. I get to wear scrubs, I don’t eat or drink too much, I laugh a lot, there are no expectations, and most importantly, I get to celebrate life in the rawest form.

As a nurse, you know a patient’s whole story. You know what they like to eat, their bedtime routine, who their favorite family member is (and their least favorite), what gets them through the hardest of days, and what their shit (figuratively and literally) looks like. I know… TMI. Welcome to nurse life. In every patient, I see a bit of myself, my family, or a friend- in the homeless guy who got hit by a bus, the woman my age who is now a paraplegic, the grandpa who had a debilitating stroke, and the mechanic who suffered extensive burn injuries, these people are my people. My patients remind me that life is incredibly precious; quite simply- today is all you get; so, on my birthday, I am ecstatic to be with these dynamic individuals who have faced tragedy prematurely and face this day, my day of birth, with such grace, strength, and inevitably true joy because for all of us, today is a blessing.

To be honest, I got distracted back there. I was going to talk about lagom which made me think of the book that Michael bought me on my birthday, which made me think of my birthday, and then made me realize, “damn, that was a good birthday”. Okay, back to lagom.

The book I read is titled “Lagom: The Swedish Art of Living a Balanced, Happy Life” by Niki Brantmark. The book touches on de-cluttering, the art of listening, eco-friendly living, the morgondopp (morning dip), work-life balance, fika (a break with coffee and a treat), sauna, and even foraging. As I often do with books I love, I read it aloud to Michael during our morning fika. We come to realize that lagom is really life as we know it. It is perfectly enough… except we need a sauna.

You guessed it. He built a sauna. Alright, you probably didn’t guess it, but it’s true. In the days leading up to a big project like this, Michael is a much quieter presence in our little boat. His mind is working on the logistics, notes are being scribbled, Youtube videos are being watched, and Craigslist is being scoured through for discounted materials. Michael is truly a student of the process. I adore him for this. Michael is thinking of measurements, materials and timelines while I’m like “can’t we just get a day pass at the YMCA sauna?”… not the same.

It’s two days of obtaining materials, two trips to Hutchinson where Michael has his dad as a mentor and his shed as tool heaven, six hours of constructing the perfect jig for dovetail joints, twenty minutes per cedar board dedicated for dovetail carpentry, and multiple nights of staying up until midnight with the coolest and kindest welder at work who helps complete the homemade wood stove. With only wood, stainless steel, a small amount of stone, and lots of gained knowledge, a sauna is made.

What is next on our lagom to do list… the morgondopp (a morning dip in the local swimming hole)? I step outside the boat and shiver at the thought of falling off the dock in to the thick dark mass of nearly frozen river water. While a good chunk of my winter neighbors have experienced this fateful event and come out looking like scared, wet cats, I’ve walked carefully along the dock to avoid such disaster. My heartbeat quickens, I tighten my scarf and decide that on the scale of “not too little to not too much”, the morgondopp is simply too much. I’ll just fika instead.

So, how to live a life of lagom? Live a life of “enough”. It’s living for what matters and not indulging in what doesn’t. I possess eight pairs of pants and twelve shirts but enough books to sink our through hulls. I love work but spend more time not at work. The process is what makes you; a sauna does not build itself; the food you eat does not grow itself; a maple tree will not tap itself; the process matters more than the outcome so enjoy every moment of every process you can be a part of.

Be a contributor, a listener, and a lifelong learner. Dedicate time to activities that enrich you, not distract you. Be outside; remember that you are a part of this world and this world is a part of you. You are not superior to the trees that give you air.

Spend your birthday doing small things with great intent; in fact, spend every day that way. Give, give, and give. Please, stop taking so much. You will be happier with just enough. Finally, be yourself wherever you are; understand that you are not too little and you are not too much; you, just as you are, are exactly enough.

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Like Berries On Ice Cream

I am finding that life is far more fascinating than I ever imagined. It is not the dramatics that amuse me but the simplicities. It is one good conversation with a stranger. It is the cool breeze rolling off the river and slipping right through my open window as I fall asleep. It is a good meal with a neighbor.

Meet Bob.

Bob and his husband Yader joined our quirky community when they docked their 1976 Carver Mariner across from ours one year ago. In this quick but full year, I hold memories of Yader and I dipping our feet in the waves with Bob at the helm; this quickly turned in to us getting soaked and laughing heartily at our fortunate misfortune. Warning: waves may be larger than they appear. I fondly recall salsa dancing with Bob on the dock on Cinco de Mayo and Yader later leading an impromptu Zumba class; looking back, dance class on the dock seems like a hilarious accident waiting to happen.

Bob loves his boat as obsessively as the rest of us, and I’ve observed many nights of Bob diligently working on one boat project or another. Bob’s favorite form of exercise has become kayaking at dusk- a favorite and often shared activity among the whole dock; this is almost always followed by the nightly ritual of beaver, deer, and bald eagle or blue heron stories as observed whilst at paddle. Sometimes our dock is fortunate enough to hear Bob playing the fiddle as the sun slowly falls behind the trees. As evidenced by these previous paragraphs of goodness, Bob and Yader fit perfectly in to our strange little floating society.

I get this question often- how do you cook on your boat? Our mainstay is the cast iron skillet. We specialize in stir fries, curries, and egg scrambles. We do not have an oven although some boats do; and for the record, no boat actually uses them. We do have a grill but rarely use it; other boat neighbors use the grill religiously. One guy uses his pizza oven for everything. Our friends on a sailboat actually have an outdoor solar oven since they anchor out at all times. My husband makes weird green smoothies comprised of kale, garlic, and beets; it tastes like someone smothered your face in the dirt. Our neighbor Sam makes a similar looking smoothie that I once mistook for the water he rinses his paintbrushes in.

Back to Bob.

Bob is the kind of guy that warms the soul of each person he meets. He tells good stories, plays good music, and listens with an honest intent to learn about another. Bob loves people. He loves his boat, and he loves food. It’s no wonder he would want to combine all his loves in one place- a cookbook for boat people.

I go to Bob’s boat this morning as he prepares “a basic breakfast hash with cowboy caviar”. This is not the first time Bob has cooked for me. He often grabs a neighbor to share a meal with. I love this about him. He has Appalachian music playing lightly as I come aboard.

Bob is coming to his boat a few times a week now to cook a meal in preparation for his upcoming cookbook. Bob has a vision. He wants to appeal to those who want to cook on a boat or in small spaces and do so creating good food with a fresh flavor. Bob plans to complete his vision by next summer, and his neighbors’ bellies are all benefitting in the meantime.

So what about Bob?

Bob works as the Regional Marketing Director for Bon Appetit Management Company; he has worked there for some time now, but he wasn’t always in the food business. Bob first received a degree in Social Work; he did this for seven years but found himself unfulfilled on this path. Bob described going on home visits at a reservation in New Mexico where he would find himself cooking with the kids in the kitchen. He realized his passion lived here- with good people congregated around good food.

As a child, Bob looked up to his mother who cooked from scratch and has fond memories of cooking with Patty, a family friend who threw “amazing dinner parties”. Patty remains an important influence to Bob; she even sang at his and Yader’s wedding. At the age of 30, Bob went back to school- to culinary school in St. Louis. He worked closely with a great chef during this time and soon found himself writing a food column called “Dinner and a Movie”. He later managed a restaurant and helped this restaurant grow to seven restaurants; this evolution pushed him toward marketing. Now, here we are. Bob is preparing the best breakfast hash of my life while I sip espresso on the stern of his boat soaking up the morning sun. Thank you Patty!

Bob’s cookbook will include a pantry list of supplies for the reader to always keep on hand. Each meal will combine what the reader already has with a few additional fresh and local ingredients to make the meal flavorful and unique. He will also have a basic bar section because what is boating without the occasional cocktail?

In finding his calling to food, Bob remembers his first “ah-ha” moment. In this moment, Bob is a child at his grandparents’ house. Little boy Bob has a handful of freshly picked, warm raspberries; he brings them in the house and puts them on ice cream- the raspberries melt the cool ice cream surrounding them. Bob tells me that this taste is “that moment that you’re always chasing”.

“That moment you’re always chasing”… I like this. I reflect on “ah-ha” moments- the simplicities that make life fascinating… the good conversation with a stranger, the cool breeze as you fall asleep, or the warm raspberries on your ice cream. Perhaps we should all chase our “ah-ha” moments. If we live a life or work a career full of “ah-has”, I think we’re on the right path. I think about my career “ah-has”- seeing my patient walk again after many weeks of therapy, being asked by a family to pray with them before their mother goes to surgery, a burn patient singing to Mariah Carey as we do his full body wound cares, and discussing life goals with a woman exactly my age who has just become paralyzed. These “ah-has” are not always wonderful but they show me life; they have confirmed that I am walking the path I was meant for. Of course, I have personal “ah-has” as well. As a child- dancing in the milk barn or swimming in the cold creek with my cousins. More recently- anchoring our boat out for the first time or sleeping on the plywood floor next to candlelight in our half built cabin.

“Ah-has” are simple moments with big impact; we must recognize them as such and use them as a compass. Like warm raspberries on ice cream, it is the simplicities of this life that are utterly fascinating, delicious, and small signs toward a life well lived. Cheers!

 

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Getting Along Well Enough

Last week was one year of marriage for Michael and me. We celebrate it doing one of our favorite things- an unplanned road trip. We aim west and soon find ourselves in Colorado.

As we hike The Colorado Trail, I think about being married, a critiqued choice these days (and rightfully so given the failure rate). As I sweat my buns off and see that cutie hiking ahead of me, I realize that hiking is something like marriage. You start strong- excited, optimistic, with big ideas. You start together. You prepare for this. Some prepare more than others but in the end, I wonder if preparation matters more than innovation and intent… I lean towards the latter. Some hikes face challenges early, some later. Some hikes turn out harder than expected. You might think you’re totally ready for this hike but then find yourself surprised by the altitude or the incline or your own physical and mental capacity to handle this. Sometimes, one cannot keep up to the other; one might need to slow things down for a minute so you can stick together.

At some point, you come to a fork in the trail. Michael wants to go one way, but I want to go the other. I think my way is better and try to convince Michael of this but he’s stubborn too; he thinks his way is better. We could go separately on our chosen paths, but we don’t. We picked each other for this journey; we go together.

Our packs start to get heavy. Michael’s is heavier though; he always chooses to carry the heavy one. I recognize this and offer to switch for a bit; I want to share the load. I don’t want this marriage, I mean this hike, to be one-sided. We find that this hike is challenging- lots of ups and downs; the best hikes often are. It’s so rewarding to get through that together, to share the valleys and the views, to high five at the summit.

Sometimes, when people do a long hike, they think they’re better off going alone, and some people are. I think about doing this hike alone… I know I’d be weaker without him. I’d have less fun too. I think about the campfire; I like it best when it reflects off Michael’s blue eyes. I like to talk about the stars together and theorize on what exists beyond us. I’d appear crazy if I talked to myself about this. Also, who would I laugh at? I’m not that funny on my own.

I may not have as much for myself when I hike with Michael. We’re almost out of water, and we overestimated the size of this blanket. I wake up 20 times during the night to fight for my half of this inadequate covering. We laugh at this in the morning until we realize we’re out of coffee; now that’s no joke. Maybe preparation does trump innovation; at least when it comes to coffee.

Michael points out things on the trail that I wouldn’t have noticed alone- a big black slug, a tree we couldn’t identify, and a beautiful prairie on top of a distant ridgeline. I find that we frequently ask how the other is doing- if the other needs a rest or a drink of water. Thunder rolls in the distance as we enter camp.

We made it back just in time. I look at Michael and love him more now than at the start of this hike, more than yesterday, more than one year ago. You guys, I think I said something wrong at the start of this. I described hiking as being strongest at the start; I went on to compare hiking to marriage.

My dad, a man of few words, wrote this in our anniversary card: “Just keep lovin life and each other and it will be a Good Life”.

My mom and dad had their 30th wedding anniversary this year. He has loved my mom and life every day that I have watched him live. I cannot recall an instance in which he complained about either of those; I only know my dad as happy. Ever since I can remember, my dad would say “life is good” and his daily actions never led me to believe otherwise. My parents have shown me that if treated right, marriage gets stronger and better with time.

And how to treat it right? This is what I’ve learned: love each other shamelessly. Don’t let sadness, pride, hardship, or anything else take that away. The world challenges your love, and for some reason, people might to.

Michael, when talking about living on a small boat, someone recently asked me if we actually like that lifestyle and if we “get along well enough”. “Get along well enough”… what a strange phrase. Does this mean we are supposed to say excuse me when we move around each other? Should we politely take turns filling the water tank? Should I come home from work quietly and leave the lights off so as not to wake you? Do we divide our tiny, tiny fridge so you have half the space and I have the other half? What about our “closet” which happens to be a five foot long space below our bed, should that be 50/50 too?

Do we “get along well enough”? While not totally understanding this innocent but bizarre question, I shrugged in response and said “well, yeah”. That probably didn’t sound convincing. Michael, I talked about you fondly the other day. It must have been too fondly because the recipient of my conversation followed up by saying “well you’re still in the honeymoon phase”. I laughed and said “I suppose”. Michael, sometimes I wish I wasn’t cursed with this Minnesota Nice thing; maybe then I would have told her that “the honeymoon phase” is a stupid catch phrase someone invented to make up for their diminishing behavior toward the one they promised forever to. Hmm… that sounds a bit intense. I’ll stick with my first response- “I suppose”.

So Michael, do we “get along well enough”? Is spanking your butt when I’m trying to move around you polite enough? Should I fill the water tank the next five times to even out the score? Do I need to ditch my books so they don’t overflow in to our 50/50 “closet” space? My Love, I only turn on the lights and kiss your face when I get home because… well, I don’t know… I missed you.

Michael, it is certainly a small space aboard. I tell people that all the time. I say “for one person, it’d be perfect but for two it gets a little tight”. Why do I say that? The truth is this- the boat feels too big without you, too empty, too quiet. Today on this hike or when I’m home on the boat while you’re away, I am reminded of this- my life was not made to live without you. You are not just the person I found to “get along well enough” with. Michael, we certainly argue, disagree, or get frustrated with the other. Our world is not perfect, but you are my soul; my bold, hard-headed, stinky-farting, perfect soulmate. So Mr. Get Along Well Enough and Ms. Honeymoon Phase, I politely ask you to shove it, for this love is my favorite part of me.

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Dreamers At Work

I got home from work at 2:30am last night. Working as a nurse in downtown Minneapolis is anything but monotonous; it can be a little chaotic and a lot of crazy; it is challenging and fast moving. I love it, but by the time my shift is over, this is where I want to be. At this time of night, the docks are quiet, the water surrounding them is still, and my neighbors are tucked away in their floating homes. As I enter the wooded marina, I breathe easier and move slower. While the sound of call lights continues to ring in my head, my lone footsteps on the dock finally quiet them.

At 2:30am, I am surprised to see another soul awake. It is John. He works late on his trimaran preparing it for June 8 at 5am when he and four others plan to race this not-yet-ready boat in the R2AK. It is a 750 mile race from Port Townsend, WA to Ketchikan, AK. You must sail with no motor and no support boats. With the race nearly one week away and the boat currently afloat 1,760 miles from the starting line, I’m a little nervous for them. I spend a few moments with John, and as he shows me his project successes from the night with a smile that not many people can hold up so well at 2:30am, I believe in him.

Today, May 31st, we have a perfect afternoon. It’s sunny and still. It’s a project day in the marina. With the holiday weekend and spotty storms behind us for a couple of days, every captain in this place has big eyes and working hands.

Bob across the dock is refurnishing his wood trim. Rick, one dock over, is trying to fix leaks around his windows; he says this is a problem every Chris Craft of that era has; we yell across the water as we talk about this. On our boat, we added plywood to our top deck floor to stabilize and level it. It was two day project finished today with fiberglass, paint, and parquet flooring that Michael bought on Craigslist.

As the evening moves on, I visit the trimaran and find Juan. No, I’m not just calling John “John” in Spanish… that’d be confusing. Juan is John’s friend and a fellow sailor ready to take on the R2AK. Tonight, while John is at an open house for the Lake Calhoun Sailing Club (he’s an Associate Director there), it is Juan’s turn to get this trimaran race-ready.

John and Juan are roommates. They met in college when they both went to the University of Minnesota. They met on the water of course. Like all boat people, they got to talking about how to fix one or the other’s boat problem, and before they can do anything about it, they’re buddies forever. They are both Wisconsin boys; John from Milwaukee and Juan from Wisconsin Rapids. I lived in Wisconsin once and still had to ask where this was; Juan tells me its right in the middle of the state. Juan was born in Mexico; his family moved here when he was one year old. As Juan tells me more about who he is, I feel akin to him. His outlook is familiar.

Juan sailed for the first time when he was 10 years old. Then, like me and so many others, the teenage years brought distraction. He was in to sports, hunting, and girls. In college, Juan got a degree in chemistry. When I ask what he originally went to school for, Juan says “for knowledge mostly”. I don’t know why but the choice to get a degree in chemistry surprised me a bit… maybe because we just spent the last ten minutes talking about travelling and for some reason, being in a lab and being out in the world seem like two different animals. Juan told me about taking a few semesters off to backpack in national parks, play music, and spend time WWOOFing on a vegan permaculture farm in California. I related to him on these experiences, except on the music thing; in this, I lamented to him about my ongoing failed harmonica attempts. Juan plays harmonica, drums, guitar, and some ukulele. I’m jealous.

Juan told me that at one point he wanted to be a farmer. This, I understood. Michael and I talk of this often- having our own small farm. I watch my dad and my grandparents find ultimate peace and joy in this work. I ask Juan why he got a degree in chemistry. He tells me that his initial idea was to get educated in environmental water chemistry. Aahhhh… this makes sense to me now. Juan is smart and ambitious. I’m sure you’ve gathered this by now. He spends time with our waters and doesn’t want to just use the resource, he wants to preserve it too. I understand this. In this small revelation, I am proud. During a time when much of the world would rather look away from the environmental problems at hand, I find others my age that care. Juan is one of them. I see this same inspiration in my marina neighbors who gather garbage from the waters when they go out kayaking. I see it in my parents who love their land, my dad out “cleaning the woods” to make it the best habitat for what lives and grows there. I see it in my husband who adores the small details of what we have in our waters and woods; who lights up when he sees a new plant, tree, or animal.

Juan tells me that studying environmental water chemistry was “actually kind of depressing”. I don’t even ask why; I know the answer. I think back to yesterday when I walked in to work behind a lady who threw a half cigarette to the ground right before she entered the building. I wasn’t sure why this set me off. I see cigarettes on the ground all the time and of course, there are bigger problems than one cigarette on the ground, but observing her total disregard for her surroundings must have done it for me. There was a garbage can right next to where she threw it; she didn’t even look at it. I picked up the cigarette, put it out, and threw it away. I continued to feel pissed off for the next hour. As I sat in work reviewing my patients’ charts, I wondered “why is this still bugging me… let it go Chels”. Now, in talking to Juan, I am reminded that it matters. To have an environmentally conscious chemist out there, I am thankful. To be an environmentally conscious nurse, this matters. To maybe someday be environmentally conscious farmers, this is huge.

At this point, I ask Juan how old he is. He’s my age- 28 years old. I only met Juan today; brought together by the water. It is how I’ve met so many people that inspire me; people that care about our world, how we treat it, and how we treat each other. My neighbors on this water are creative, smart, bold, and unafraid. They live in the environment because they care about it.

I once had a friend throw a piece of garbage out of her car. I said something and picked it up. She responded “oh yeah, I suppose you live in the environment”. This was over a year ago now and it has stuck with me. We all live in the environment. What is going on that not everyone feels this way? How do people not see the impact our habits have? How do we fix actions that are so commonplace, so dismissed; like throwing your cigarette to the ground with a bunch of people watching? I still don’t know the answers to all of these questions but I think about them every day. I hope this is the first step to something.

I help Juan hold the electrical panel as he cuts around it to fit the wall. We drink beer as we talk. Todd throws us two more Hamms from the dock. Juan works at Rahr Malting where he is a QC Project Manager, Micro-Maltster, and Assistant Brewer. He’s a bit of an expert in beer so I’m surprised in his gratitude for the Hamms. I invite Juan over for dinner. Michael made steak and asparagus. Juan says he ate already today and when I ask him if he’s on a one meal per day diet, Juan says that lately he is. With the time crunch of getting this boat ready while still working full time, Juan has been getting five hours of sleep and one meal per day. I am thankful that Juan finally agrees to eat after we put the food in his hands.

 

It’s Wednesday; the trimaran gets hauled out on Friday; I know he has a lot to do so I appreciate how present Juan is when we talk. His looming projects include getting the electrical situation squared away, mounting the solar panels, setting up the rigging, and attaching steering platforms. Juan tells me that at this point, the boat is not seaworthy and the five of them have yet to sail together as a team. Whether or not they are ready and able to do the race eight days from now, they will still sail to Alaska, get to know the terrain, and be more than ready for the race next year. I ask Juan about his future. Water will always be a part of his life; he loves sailing. He’ll probably stay around here for a while. He’s ready to set some roots. I realize I feel akin to him because of where he’s at in his life. He has stretched his legs out, carried a backpack around the country, and ponders on what he can do to be good for the world. In all of his exploration, he has found that making a difference where he stands makes the most difference.

As the sun sets, the dock gathers together to unwind from the project day. We finish dinner, drink beer, and talk about what was accomplished. Somehow, conversation turns to plumb bobs and we discuss these for what feels like an hour. It’s surprising how many jokes sprout from this conversation on plumb bobs. I am educated on the variety of plumb bobs that exist. It’s soon 10:30pm, and I retreat to the boat with plumb bobs on the mind. Alright, I’ll let you go before I babble on. It’s time for me to go to bed and time for you to google what a plumb bob is. Also, Michael wants you to google “plumb barbara”; do so at your own risk. Goodnight now.

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The Spring Feels

With the spring season, I am overwhelmed with nostalgia. I’m not sure why. Spring is not my favorite season, not by a long shot. Sorry spring, don’t take it personally. I reminisce on this nostalgic feeling, looking for a cause. I’m not sure I found it, but I will ramble here anyway. After all, it’s stormy outside and I’m aboard and alone without my distractingly handsome mate.

This is the beauty of Minnesota. Just when you get to know yourself in a certain space at a certain time, your environment flips the switch. You are reminded that time is not a statue. It is not something concrete that you can go back to and touch or relive. Time is fleeting.

Spring reminds me of tilled fields, running in the rain, and of more recent nostalgia, coming home. Three years ago in April, Michael and I came home from nearly six months of travel. We loved every moment of these months, but we missed something tangible. We missed the seasons. We completely skipped winter and all that comes with winter – reading extra books, snowstorms, bundling up to go outside, movie nights in, the holidays with our families, etc. We had Christmas at a McDonalds for gosh sakes. They had free Wifi. You take what you can get. We didn’t notice until we returned how valuable these seasons are. They balance your innards (like your soul and stuff).

The change of season is a faithful reminder that you better get to living now because now is all you’ve got.

So back to the spring feels. It seems crazy to say that this is our third year of living aboard. It seems like just yesterday we were spending full days grinding down our boat, repainting it, and living in our van all the while. Time flies.

Thanks spring for the in your face reminder that you are here; for startling us with thunder and showering us with oversized hail this week; you play dirty. I write this as tornado watches and warnings beep all over the state. Spring is beauty and pain at its finest.

We bought the boat prior to our travels, not knowing how the world would change us and if we would even like each other when we got back. Spoiler alert: We came back not in dislike or like, we came back nearly obsessed with one another and filled with a love for genuine souls and joy in any strange experience that would come our way. You could say that this marina fit into our lives perfectly for the strange and genuine souls we would meet in those weeks are like our family now. Roger knows our schedules down to the hour and is a constant on the dock, looking out for us all and always there when we need a hand. You know summer is well underway when John has his flags out and his music is heard from down the dock. Diane is the one you go to for a good conversation; she listens intently and has the best insight. Wally starts the bonfires and tries to share his blue mixed drink with you. I won’t dare share his secret cocktail recipe but I’ll let you know it contains three different kinds of alcohol and nothing else; I’ve had it once and never again. I won’t go on and on about these people although I could. I hope that someday, these people I love will let me share them through story but that’s for another time. Anyway, this is all a part of the nostalgia thing.

I have a feeling that spring will always remind me of those May days three years ago. From sun up to sun down, we were working on that boat. Michael had a grinder for a hand while I, who finds painting to be very therapeutic, had had enough therapy to cure the craziest of minds and then make them crazy all over again. We were in a constant state of sweat and van life certainly didn’t help our hygiene. Our future neighbors would stop by to meet us and bear wisdom or ideas for this or that adding to our to-do list and allowing us to quickly fall in love with this quirky place.

Wow spring, you are actually raining so hard right now that I can no longer hear myself think. What are you trying to say, that you’re not all flowers and Mother’s Day!? I get it. Okay guys, Mother Earth wants me to tell you that spring brings the feels, but they’re not always good. You might meet a spring that makes you miss someone or like I’ve noticed, a spring that reminds you that time is not a statue; you can’t go back to it. Spring might make you feel old or like you’ve left something behind.

Spring brings storms. They’re scary sometimes… especially now when Michael is at the cabin and here I am stuffing towels into crevices to remedy unexpected leaks and refreshing my weather app to see if there’s a tornado in my midst. Hmm… I hope our bilge pump works…

Okay, she chilled out now. That was intense. I’ll check the boat for hail damage later. It’s the funniest thing to watch the river’s response to hail; jumping all around, a perfect representation of my nerves at the time. It’s crazy how your mood syncs with the weather. Spring, you are a powerhouse…you make us feel oh so alive. You shower us (quite literally today) with all sorts of sensations. You remind us that time is fleeting while surprising us with new life. You startle us with thunder and then bring a rainbow. Spring, you’re a bit bipolar but I like you. Ya know, after writing this, I just might call you my favorite season… don’t tell summer I said that.

 

 

 

 

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