Sailing

A few months ago, I was stand­ing in a line in Best Buy, with a new lap­top in my hands, unsure about my selec­tion.  Behind me, a petite dark haired woman talked on a cell-phone. From what I gath­ered, she relied on advice from her friend who seemed to be knowl­edge­able about com­put­ers. I was in a sim­i­lar sit­u­a­tion. I wanted to sur­prise my hus­band with a new lap­top (the old one devel­oped a sus­pi­cious burn­ing smell). We offered each other (com­puter) advice and started talk­ing. A friend­ship was formed.

We met a cou­ple of times, talked about our back­grounds, expe­ri­ences, our mar­riages… We clicked.

A few weeks later, Anna called me, invit­ing my hus­band and I for an after­noon on a sail­boat she and her hus­band Art recently pur­chased. We met in front of Bahia Cruiser, in a small har­bour filled with sail boats. The sun was high up in the sky; it was a gor­geous sunny day. Soon, we were all aboard, with James and Art care­fully manoeu­vring Art’s small sail boat out of the har­bor, into the open sea.  The weather was per­fect, with indigo blue sky and just the right amount of wind caught in our sails, accord­ing to Art’s meter, we were trav­el­ing about 7mph.

A lit­tle while later, sur­rounded only by the blue, calm water and an occa­sional sail­boat pass­ing by, we dropped the anchor, did some fish­ing, (no suc­cess), ate some sand­wiches, home-made salsa with chips, grapes and had some white zin­fan­del (not Art!).

A pel­i­can came by float­ing on the water, look­ing at us sus­pi­ciously and non­cha­lantly at the same time. He (or she) com­pletely ignored the chips we threw in the water, but did not hes­i­tate for a sec­ond to reach for and swal­low the frozen sar­dine we sac­ri­ficed (since that was the end to our fish­ing adven­ture any­way). We enjoyed the com­pany and the con­ver­sa­tion, the food, the sun­shine and the refresh­ing breeze infused with the scent of the ocean.

When the sun started set­ting, we turned around and headed back, adding speed to our lit­tle sail­boat by the motor as the wind had qui­eted down. It got a

bit chilly, so we were grate­ful for our wind breaker
s. What a great way to spend a Sat­ur­day after­noon. Ahoy!

Who knows maybe some­day we will live like this cou­ple!

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Tags: sailing san diego bay