Boats, a sentimental attachment?

[BandB]

Wifey B: I think comments that they mean more to you if you do the work yourself is crap. I didn't build my house, but I sure love it. However, they are about the memories and if the memories you value are working on the boat then that's fine. I value the memories of our time on the boat just as much as you value your time spent working on it. However, selling the boat doesn't take those memories away.

My first was the 25' Cobalt hubby owned when we got married. It was the first boat I ever got out on the lake and enjoyed time in, first boat I ever made love in. But none of those memories were lost when we traded for a 30' Cobalt. Then it was the first we ever bought together. When we moved to FL and sold it, the memories were all our years on Lake Norman, the wonderful times on the water. There was a loss, that we wouldn't be doing that anymore and we have rented and gotten out on the lake a couple of times since. But it was on to new things. I do have the same thoughts as you who work on them wondering if the next owners are enjoying them and treating them right, but every memory can be carried with me.

I know we'll trade the ones we have now. Some have the memories of larger numbers of people and then the Baby Riva, as I call it, of just the two of us going places on romantic overnights or short trips. I joke about we can trade anything but just not my baby, but then I know one day I'll see some small hot boat that interests me.

Hubby commented on the bad one being the last one. I see it that way a little but not too much. When we can't get out on the water with friends then we can still have them over on land. They are the memories. We can still talk about everything we did together. I am sure we'll mourn a bit the loss of the ability to get out on the water, but that more than a specific boat. I'm guessing there will be that time of facing the reality we've lost so much physically and have less time remaining to live. I don't know how that will feel. I really dreaded aging. I know I'm young compared to most here but I'm old compared to what I once was and now we have a generation around us younger than me. I have a bazillion memories though. The older you get, the more memories you have. That's what is so awful about Alzheimer's as it robs you of the best part of life, the memories.

I decided, we decided, along the way, never to complain or mourn what we don't have. We've had far more than enough. I refuse to ever get angry over not being as young as I was, having to give up any material possession, even health, even the health of my hubby. I've already had a life I never dreamed of. Love i never dreamed of. I hope to never complain or mourn that I no longer have. I just feel like that would be wrong of me.

Keep your boat logs forever, make copies. We've kept a journal, diary or whatever you want to call it of every day of our lives together. We decided when we married and even went back and documented each day to that point. Sounds like a lot of work I know, but so marvelous to be able to look back and remember. If either of us ever gets Alzheimer's we'll have it and value it. I'd encourage any of you to do something similar while you can. Maybe not to the degree of ours, but save your memories for the times you may not be able to remember. If what you are going to feel a loss of is all the work you did on the boat, journal it in some way so you never have to lose it. Write about the time you drilled right through to your finger and cursed a blue streak cause it hurt like all heck but you got that new gauge installed and it worked perfectly. For us, it's the things with each other and family/friends. We even went back and recorded how we individually felt throughout the weekend we first met. See, it's not the hotel that's important, it's our feelings. I think I remember everything so vividly, but then I look back and think, omg, I forgot about that. I made the whole family record all the feelings on the day our niece, Aurora was born. She'll have that. How we each felt the first time we held her. I whispered to her telling her I was going to spoil her beyond anyone's imagination.

So, if you don't want to lose when you sell the boat, save all the memories and written is better. For those who blog, that's what they're doing. Don't write for others, do it for yourselves. We've shared some with those closest to us and I'm sure it's surprising to no one that some of the things we've done get a reaction like "Omg, you what? You really did that?" And my answer is "Yes."

So put the wonderful times on the boats in writing or photos, the tough jobs, and then write down the feelings you have on the last day you see it. You can preserve the memories and they will make you want to a little but mostly

Now, we're out in the Baby Riva with just us and Tabitha today. Recording today because we know as she finishes grad school, starts to work, meets someone, starts a family of her own, oh the things we can remember. Like with Aurora, we do have preserved the night we first met her mom, our sister, Tiffany and then meeting our parents (they weren't yet but soon were) the next day and the daring thing we talked them into doing later that week.

Every day is a new page in our lives. It's as good as we make it.

 

[Hawgwash]

...the boat becomes part of my personality.

When I was a kid, I had a horse. Well, me grandad did.
He was a big old Clyde (the horse not grandad) used mainly for chores, but I rode him like a pony.

He liked that role and thanked me for the fun by playing me. Stand on my foot, look at me and grin when I was trying to harness him. Go at a good trot for the lowest branch he could find. Say “screw you, I’m done” and yard logs right into the barn.

We were pals. Loved to play together and knew how to tease; each the other. We constantly tested one another and each felt we had won. I guess I was 15 and cried when he was shipped off to LePage’s

I had a number of bikes and boats, but only one of each that gave me the oneness I had with the old horse. Lots of memories with the others but these two were an extension of me. They had personalities. Could take more than I could give them and knew in advance what I was about to expect from them. Never, ever let me down.

Though built by others, they were both "mine," like art that turned heads by show and performance. The boat was so good at what it did, it made me look better than I was.

The sentimentality of both came, not so much from what we did, but from us being joined at the grip.

Other rides and other boats came and went, as a matter of course mostly, but these were different. The bike went to someone who wanted it; badly. I was happy in that moment, knowing it would continue the life we had. The boat needed to go and I lost track of it until the second owner after me; a clod who destroyed it and that hurt more than saying good bye.

 

[Art]

Great story! Even GREATER photo!!




You still wearing them big assss glasses - I AM!!

 

[Blissboat]

Two thoughts occur. First, a boat is not just an object, it's an experience. Put differently, it represents the places it goes with you, and the people who are part of the journey. The more time you spend with a boat, the richer and more valuable that overall "experience" becomes. You might look at it as a whole bunch of smaller experiences, which it is, but the one constant running through them is this object that shapes and defines where you can go and what you can do. I have never had a boat that failed to affect me that way.

The other thought is that a boat is a relationship. When trying to explain (especially to a non-boater) my relationship with any of the boats that I have owned, I've used the term "boat-husband." Every boat needs a husband, meaning some one certain person whose duty it is to care about that boat, worry about it, think of it's safety and well-being, plan ahead for its needs and muster the resources to meet those needs, and to feel pride and satisfaction in all of it. When all is well with your boat, you feel peaceful and at ease. When something isn't the way you know it should be, you cannot be completely happy. So it's an intimate relationship of mutual dependency - more like a romantic partnership than any other kind. I suppose the term "boat-spouse" would work, too, as being a boat husband isn't limited by gender.

Every time I have sold a boat, it's only been when I was psychically ready to move on. My boat and I had done all we could for each other, and I'd been stealing more and more frequent, covetous glances at other boats. (Hey, a guy's gotta look, doesn't he)? But still, the final parting caused a pang.

Every once in a while I think about various boats from my past that carried me and others safely for so many miles and through so many moments of adventure, joy, boredom, frustration (or sometimes sorrow or worry). Glancing at a photo of one of those boats can unpack a whole flood of memories. I wonder where those boats are now, and hope they have faithful husbands.

 

[Art]

Two thoughts occur. First, a boat is not just an object, it's an experience. Put differently, it represents the places it goes with you, and the people who are part of the journey. The more time you spend with a boat, the richer and more valuable that overall "experience" becomes. You might look at it as a whole bunch of smaller experiences, which it is, but the one constant running through them is this object that shapes and defines where you can go and what you can do. I have never had a boat that failed to affect me that way.

The other thought is that a boat is a relationship. When trying to explain (especially to a non-boater) my relationship with any of the boats that I have owned, I've used the term "boat-husband." Every boat needs a husband, meaning some one certain person whose duty it is to care about that boat, worry about it, think of it's safety and well-being, plan ahead for its needs and muster the resources to meet those needs, and to feel pride and satisfaction in all of it. When all is well with your boat, you feel peaceful and at ease. When something isn't the way you know it should be, you cannot be completely happy. So it's an intimate relationship of mutual dependency - more like a romantic partnership than any other kind. I suppose the term "boat-spouse" would work, too, as being a boat husband isn't limited by gender.

Every time I have sold a boat, it's only been when I was psychically ready to move on. My boat and I had done all we could for each other, and I'd been stealing more and more frequent, covetous glances at other boats. (Hey, a guy's gotta look, doesn't he)? But still, the final parting caused a pang.

Every once in a while I think about various boats from my past that carried me and others safely for so many miles and through so many moments of adventure, joy, boredom, frustration (or sometimes sorrow or worry). Glancing at a photo of one of those boats can unpack a whole flood of memories. I wonder where those boats are now, and hope they have faithful husbands.

Great description!