Saturday, June 21, 2008

Saying Goodbye

The past several weeks have been consumed with checking off work items needed to throw off the shackles of land life and get ready for life at sea. But interspersed with that work have been retirement parties, a goodbye luncheon (or three) with work friends or neighbors, dinners and family gatherings for the sole purpose of simply wishing us well. There is the guy up the street who may see my leaving as a chance to get a good deal on a lawn tractor, but most folks wishes are really heartfelt and warm our hearts. We will really miss certain people like our neighbors of 20 years whose daughter babysat our little girl and is now successfully in college. We have watched each others homes and pets on numerous occasions and they and many like them will be missed.

I draw strength from the hope that we will meet a whole new community of boating folks and create similar bonds along our way. I have read that relationships tend to form more quickly since we have limited time between the time we pull into a harbor and the time we must leave to make the next landfall. And we may be pulled together in facing a 40 knot squall that comes through during the night and threatens to make our anchors drag. We do know that our outgoing 7 year old will no-doubt be the icebreaker for many friendships …. and we can’t wait.

But alas, I need to get back to packing up more stuff for storage. I’m only up to box number 159…