Boats versus Fire & Wheels

My daughter and I are going to spend seven days on a sailboat cruising the fjords of Norway at the end of the summer. The boat will be a 45 or 50 footer, with three crew members and nine guests. This will be a working boat ride -- the guests will be expected to help with meal prep and sail the boat. 

Claire-Adele insisted I take at least one sailing lesson before the big trip. I was nervous about it, so I waited until the last possible moment to take a class at Sail Sandpoint. I scheduled the class for last night, less than a week before I leave for Norway.

It was fun. Lots of fun. It was a beautiful, warm night and we rode small catamarans. We never got going fast enough to get up on one side, but still it was a blast, even if I was on a boat with a 20-something mansplainer* who was otherwise very nice.

As the boat was floating on the water, I was amazed. As a civilization, we think that fire and the wheel were the top inventions of ancient worlds.

I think the boat should be up there with fire and wheels. Seriously. Who thought of the way to get across large expanses of water on a vehicle? Why would anyone want to do that? Did it start out as something practical, or did someone try it out for fun? Did our distance ancestors know how to play? Puppies and kittens and lion and bear cubs know how to play. Why not humans from thousands of years ago?

I digress. I can't believe I've lived in Seattle--a city surrounded by water--for decades, and I never learned to sail. Since I can't go back to my thirty year old self and take those lessons, I am taking them now.

*Note to mansplaining men: Sometimes when a woman says "I don't know what to do" or asks for help, it means she is processing or perhaps lacks 100% confidence in the task at hand. It does not mean she is a helpless, clueless idiot who would be lost without your guidance. She is simply looking for an opinion, which she may or may not take. Since biblical times (see: The Red Tent by Anita Diamant, which NGL I never finished), women needed collaboration skills to survive motherhood. I believe asking for support is wired into our DNA as a survival mechanism so the results of the pains of childbirth could survive into adulthood. It was a matter of life and death: Should I feed my baby a raw egg, or should I cook it? Honey? My baby is barfing uncontrollably. What should I do? I know you don't mean to mansplain, but that was probably how you were socialized. Likewise, many women today were socialized to doubt themselves.