Making History

Bob Bitchin

Make the Dream Happen Out at sea, hundreds of miles from the nearest land, there is a boat. It is there right now. The people on board are either awake, sleeping, eating, fishing, setting sails or just relaxing. But the point is, they are out there, doing what you may someday be doing, and they are out there at this very minute. The problem with dreams is, they are just that - dreams. They are for later. They are not real.

But that boat, sailing right now for the South Pacific, or for the Mediterranean, or headed for South Africa, that is real. They are there right now living their dream. The difference between the people on that boat and you is, they made up their mind awhile ago to do it. Then they took the steps to turn their dream into a reality. I am not in any way suggesting that you just take off and forget your responsibilities. I

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Starboard Attitude am suggesting that you stop thinking of cruising as a dream. Make it real. It is easier than you think.

Here’s what I mean. Instead of saying, “someday we are going to sail off into the sunset,” sit down and work out when you might be able to do it in the real world. Take a look at where you are financially, with the family, and in your career, and set a reasonable date to get out there. Sure, there are always the kids, or not enough money, or any variable of a hundred different problems that can hold you back. But if you look at it as a goal, a future plan to work towards, it then ceases to be a dream and it becomes a reality in your mind. I remember a little over 20 years ago, when I had just returned from a voyage to Hawaii. I was tied up at the fuel dock, and a friend of mine came aboard to welcome me home. He just kept shaking his head and saying what a lucky SOB I was, being able to take off like that. I told him that if he wanted to go, he was in better shape than I was to do it. At the time I had a fledgling little motorcycle magazine, and was scraping together whatever I could to get by. He, on the other hand, owned a couple of car lots, had a home he owned, and was still single. (That has long since changed!) The truth was, he didn’t really want to be out there then (although he does now). It

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Bob Bitchin was just a dream for him. In a few minutes we figured he had enough money at that time, if he sold his home and his business, to take off for years... probably the rest of his life. He could have turned his dream into a reality. But his reality at that time was, he really didn’t want to. He liked the dream, but didn’t want to live the reality. And that is the case with most people who dream about one day casting off to sail the world. They want to experience the dream without turning it into a reality. Reality sucks! In a dream, you drift across a brilliant blue sea, munching on sushi your mate has just brought up, and enjoying a good book while your boat does eight knots on a downwind run. Reality is, the majority of time the winds are on your nose, or, if they are from behind you, they are right behind you and you have to continually steer so you don’t jibe and lose your rig. Your significant other is suggesting, in no uncertain terms, that you should get your lazy butt down below and repair the head which has been broken for two days. The winds are starting to blow at a force nine, and the port you are heading for is still five days ahead of you. But take heart! The feeling you had about your dream will return soon. When the head is fixed, the winds have dropped to 15 knots at 120° and you see the waving palm trees on your bow, your heart will swell with a feeling that

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Starboard Attitude you never could have achieved in your dreams. No, not by a long shot. Dreams are all well and good, but the day you are sitting out there, looking back on when you used to dream about sailing off into the sunset, then you will realize the truth. What is the truth? Well, I think it was best described by one who knew how to turn life into a dream, and a dream into reality. That would be an old sailor named Samuel L. Clemens, better known as Mark Twain. “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. “ By the way, my friend who decided it was really just a dream? He recently returned from a cruise through Mexico on his 56’ ketch, Namahana. He made his dream come true, but he waited until he could share it with his wife and five children. Congratulations Curt!

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Bob Bitchin

Put Some Life in Those Years

There are times when I think I must be out of my mind. Oh, I know there are a bunch of people who have believed that for years, but thinking back, I can see a basis in reality for their concerns. Here’s what I mean. I can clearly recall sitting on the bow of my boat as we were sailing south about 20 miles off the coast of Guatemala, smiling like a Cheshire cat as I worked on a broken head. Seriously! What kind of nut is happy working on a head? I had to be a few fries short of a happy meal! Today, as I was trying to come up with some kind of life’s lesson for my editorial I was thumbing through “Letters From The Lost Soul,” the book I wrote while cruising the world. I was looking for something that might inspire me. I came to a paragraph that discussed how I had to fix a broken head while underway, and

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Starboard Attitude all of a sudden I found myself kicked back, feet on my desk, daydreaming about that day 15 years earlier. The weather was about as perfect as it could be: clear sky with some white puffy clouds spotted around, crisp blue water, and on the horizon the green jungle of Central America. Earlier I had removed the head from the forward bathroom to rebuild it. I remember that I was not the happiest of campers! A half hour later, I found myself in the process of putting the pieces back together when I discovered I had lost a nut. The nut was special for this particular job. It took awhile, but I finally had to manufacture a piece to make it work. Cutting a piece of metal I had below, then forming it with a file, then drilling and tapping it to make it work... all of this was not making me a happy camper. Ahh... but when I got back up on deck with the newly created nut and it dropped right into place, all of the grumpiness left me. I found myself sitting on the bow, with the head clamped firmly between my legs, smiling. All of a sudden life was good. No, not good, great! The feeling of accomplishing something made an otherwise tedious job turn into a sense of pride.

I don’t know if this was the first time I noticed it, but I recall thinking the secret to happiness is not in doing what one likes to do,

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