We posted this quote back in May, and Sue was reminded of it recently after a series of minor
anxieties. Or were they successes? Or perhaps opportunities for
growth?
Curtis was installing a small solar
lantern on a stern railing when he suddenly let out an expletive. Sue
asked what was wrong, and he responded that he'd dropped a rubber
bushing for the rail mount...overboard. He sounded ticked off: at
himself, at the water, at the lantern. Sue suggested that they might
be able to make a replacement bushing out of some rubber or neoprene
scraps at hand. “This is probably the first of many things we'll
lose off the deck,” she added, thinking of the stories they'd heard
about barbecue parts (or entire barbecues), winch handles, and tools committed to the deep.
Curtis later admitted that watching the bushing disappear was a bit
shocking, as it was his first time to watch something sink beneath the surface. Many other items had fallen into the bilge, or the engine
compartment, or into other deep recesses, but at least they were
potentially retrievable, with effort. Optimist: Sue. Pessimist:
Curtis.
We've had a persistent slow water leak
under the galley sink since we moved aboard. A small puddle forms
near a through-hull seacock, and when we taste it, it's salty. Mikey
at Bittersweet suggested it might be one of the pieces of Pex hose we used to plumb saltwater to the galley footpump, so Curtis
changed out the Pex with a length of white hose designed for
below-water installations. He mopped up and waited. The puddle
reformed. “The through-hull must be bad,” groaned Curtis. “We'll
have to have the boat hauled out to replace it.” Sue traded places
with him and scrunched down between the cabinet and the companionway
stairs to take a look. Every bronze fitting and hose clamp was sweaty
with condensation, so it was hard to see what might be
leaking. She ran her hand behind a nearby flexible water line where
it junctioned with another Pex line. Her fingers came away dripping.
She dried off the spot and felt it a second time. Dripping. “I
think it's this line,” she suggested. Curtis tightened up the
connection, and the puddle stopped forming. Optimist: Sue. Pessimist:
Curtis.
Our first solar shower experience was a
decidedly mixed bag (!). It had been a warm, sunny day,
so the five-gallon Stearns shower bladder heated up nicely on the
foredeck. In the late afternoon, at a mooring fairly removed from
other boats, we decided it was shower time. Five gallons is heavy, so
we debated where to hang it. Sue wanted to hang it on the foredeck
and run the hose down into the head through the open portlight, but
Curtis thought the hose was too short to clear the sink and
countertop area. Curtis wanted to hang the bag from the boom over the
cockpit, but Sue thought it wouldn't be high enough to even wet her
hair, let alone rinse shampoo out of it. Boom-hung it was. Sue ended
up sitting under the steering
wheel in the cockpit to wash her hair, and she was Queen Grump about
it. Curtis took the second shower, and he reveled in the warm water,
the lovely evening, and the view of ospreys and bald eagles
overhead.It was very nice to feel clean and warm, Sue admitted later, over a plastic cup of wine. Choose your attitude. Or your remedy. Or both, adds Curtis.
