Riding over the San Mateo bridge....
26 years back I would be at sailing practice. Etchells in the spring and early summer on Manhasset Bay after a long (cold) winter of Penguin class racing. I remember the 45min bus ride home from Cathedral and thinking of the water, wishing for wind and hoping I wouldn't make the same mistakes.
Dropped home...blazer hung (demerits and lint involved), jumper jumped out of, peter pan collar tossed, penny loafers replaced with docksiders. And off to the water. 15 minute drive/lecture all about focus, strength, discipline..."learn to see through the sun", "there is no separation", "point", "quick--quick--quick", "did you work on your hand exercises?" (I would never get stronger or much faster. This would continue to haunt me in summer camp, 50' Catalina Morgan,...,ask me to swim from Tortola to Jost Van Dyke--no problem. Be on winch? err....) If practice went well and sun/conditions permitted, 505s. I would never master the skills required. Something didn't click--the sync-up...or just being too light, too weak, too something on the side of absence rather than presence. But I loved it. Intensely serious kid who relished/fought/tried conquering (?) the facts of reality. It just was. And somehow through all of the recognition of how poorly I executed there was a path somewhere into the future that was bright and filled with...some day. Some day would be many days of learning--persistence--silent emotionless frustration (yes, that's valid. perfect wasp behavior)...eventually, some day resolved itself and the fun of it all won out.
Fun...a common language.
Fun enough that I would take my mother sailing in Captiva, Hilton Head, etc. on winter breaks. She would comment, "This suits you." I don't know exactly what it is she meant, only I can't say I was puzzled either. "You could sail about the world, yes?" And for a moment...however brief, I remember my thinking, "But you do understand." (Mother=brilliant, beautiful, charming, extreme presence, extrovert. Child=serious, pensive, polite introvert.) Perhaps ocean everywhere changes the dynamics, essentializes the expectation and requirements, allows each to be as they are? Regardless, we had fun. Afterward, she made lots of new friends as usual. I watched quietly at attention...as usual.
Later heaps of fun and laughter with friends in Nantucket, Hamptons, Pelham, Newport, Provincetown. Lazy or torrid or perfect...fun.
Ten thousand waterless days later, after moving west, my 36th birthday. A serenely solitary sail on which I would experience sea sickness for the first time. It took me 11 months to admit it. I would never have admitted it but was concerned that it would be the same birthday present. Finally fessed up that I should never like to go through the same 7hrs again. Steve just stared at me...dumbfounded. And then we laughed and laughed until we cried because it was so ridiculous and silly. Every now again he'll look at me, shake his head, "You're ridiculous. I can't believe you suffered through 7hrs of hell. I thought you were finally relaxing."