Boats - Vessels of Freedom

Why do people adore boats?* Why do people go to great extremes to own a boat?* US country singer/songwriter Kenny Chesney has a song titled Boats on his new CD Lucky Old Sun.* In the song he sings:

Boats. vessels of freedom, harbors of healing...boats, twenty years of a landlocked job was all that Tom could take sitting at his desk all alone and depressed (he) says this just cant be my fate, went home that night and told his wife (that) you can tell all of your friends it's been real but it ain't been fun (so we are) gonna get us one of themboats vessels of freedom, harbors of healing...boats

Ive listened to that song a hundred times and it gets better each time.* He found the words Ive always known were there but never could quite find them.* Good for him!

As a boater myself it sometimes becomes hard to explain to non-boaters what the love affair is all about.* Perhaps its a sickness; at least its a bug.* Some of us use our boats as a home, treating her like a member of the family.* I do have a habit of talking to my boat,the Patricia Ann; she speaks back but in ways only I can hear.* She has become a refuge of sorts, a protected harbor.* Sleeping in a motel room when Im on the road just isnt the same.

I have friends that use their boats for an escape from lifes stormy weather, relying on their boats to unwind from everyday stress.* They take their sailboats, trawlers or motoryachts out to feel the wind on their faces, the sun on their backs.* Their boats bring them peace.* Others friends, have their boats equipped to make a living from the sea, as do the many shrimpers and charter boat Captains that ply the waters of our Florida coast.* Their boats become a life ring, protecting them from the storm that waits at the cabin door.

But as a full-time waterman, I can say its more than what it seems. Yes, it's a state of mind. Leaving the regular 9-5 world behind, knowing you have everything you need to sustain yourself and your crew for days and weeks on end.* If I want to stay, I do; if I want to leave, I can do that too.* Oh boats can be trouble and they take tons of work to maintain but us boaters consider it a labor of love.* You just cant place a price tag on the feeling when you are at the helm, everything works as designed, the air is crisp and the sea is calm.* It takes only one good sunset to make it all worth while.

Mark Twain, an American author eloquently said 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. Discover.

So ask yourself, do you yearn for that feeling .

Spanish philosopher Jose' Ortegay Gasset once said, "Tell me the landscape in which you live, and I'll tell you who you are."

That pretty much sums it up.* Fair winds.

Marinetrader

The following was part of the commencement speech to graduating seniors at Episcopal High School in Baton Rouge in 2005. I'm not much of a church goer and don't go for bible thumping, not religious right or left, and firmly believe that a person should be left to his own religious beliefs.*This prayer spoke to me in*a lot of ways, one being the freedom to leave the dock and go where you want.

* Sir Francis Drake delivered this Prayer for the Ages in 1577 to the ships setting off on voyages around the world, to sailors pushing the unknown.

Disturb us, Lord, when We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.


Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.
We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.
*

This we ask in the name of our Captain,
Jesus Christ.

Old School
Baton Rouge, Louisiana


-- Edited by Gulf Comanche at 11:24, 2009-01-07

You two seem to be on the right course.

Old_Salt