Stuck to the Dock

May 2020

Week One – Living and isolating on the boat from Covid-19.   We were stuck to the dock when normally we have taken off for the wild blue yonder.  Communities in remote destinations were not welcoming visitors, and under Government restrictions, boaters were urged to stay home.  May is our favorite time to leave on our summer trips when the days are getting longer and warmer.  In past years we’d be in the Broughtons or beyond, half way up the central coast, to Prince Rupert and Haida Gwaii, or around Vancouver Island.

Sideways Sally has never been one for patience and dislikes waiting.  She has this “get it done” motto which has served her well over the years.  The boat had already been dug out and sorted from winter projects, which looked after April.  She was in trouble with May and all this waiting.  Not knowing what’s gonna happen next was even worse. Some days she wanted to cry, some days scream, but instead she sewed.  Haha, you thought she was gonna drink, right?  Well, there was a little bit of that, after the sewing of course.

Looking around the boat, SS and the Skipper decided the cockpit cushions could use a sprucing up.  Recovering them gave her some welcome relief from the ruminating inside her head, while hands are busy the mind is calmer.  A quick post on Facebook asking if anyone had a sewing machine they wanted to get rid of, and voila, a day later an answer from a neighbor who had three sitting in her basement.  SS picked up and dusted off her new “old Brother,” oiled it up and coaxed it to life.

WEEEEE.  She couldn’t have been happier, and same for the Brother.  Turns out this is the best Brother she’s ever had (apologies to her real brothers).  Hour after hour, enclosed in the cockpit, sheltered from the elements, accomanied by some country twang, a heater and load of coffee, she sewed the slips for the closed cell foam cushions that were showing 20 years of wear and tear.  Timing was good with the weather being crappy.  There was rain, rain, rain with infrequent spells of showers, wind and then more rain.  SS resigned herself to being ok with being stuck to the dock. Mother Nature wasn’t cooperating anyway.

It’s all an experiment, this new world we’re living in. For the most part, everyone seems to be trying their best to figure it out. Boaters in our home port of Maple Bay and the live aboard community kept social distance and worked away individually together on spring boat projects, preparing for summer sailing even though we didn’t know for sure if and when we’d be out there.

Towards the end of that week our live-aboards were all getting antsy to have some normalcy back, so for the first time since our 8 weeks of Covid-19 restrictions we gathered for a special celebration, on land, social distancing.  We had a very important person’s birthday to celebrate.  Boaters are unique people, and Vic is somebody who is selfless, caring and connected to all of us.  He is always there to help, or listen, or walk a dog.  So off to land we went, with chairs spread six feet apart, to sing and honor his 75th Birthday.  It brought tears to Sideways Sally’s eyes to be a part of the afternoon, sitting with our community, slowly getting back to something normal.  (B-day video in previous post)