The coolest thing about CBI (Community Boating, Inc.) is the randomness of the whole thing sometimes. You go down to the boathouse, change into gear, head to the docks and put a call out for a sailing buddy…then a random guy (or girl, but it’s only been guys so far) with an interesting story to tell comes along and you go out on the water for a while. I do want to qualify for solo sailing this summer, but there are benefits to having a buddy…for one thing, it’s good yaking.
It’s interesting who you meet this way. Take today, for example, the guy I was sailing with (Dave), moved away from Cambridge in 1974 and has sailed in Florida and various parts of the US…and on the Thames in the UK (but obviously called it that Tames – a very common mistake amongst Americans in general…I’ve long since given up pointing these things out, since it just makes me seem like an arrogant ass). He wanted to sail with jib and make the most of what little wind we had…and I was happy to oblige, given that this made for more fun as we dealt with the randomly changing wind direction on the Charles. The guy works with homeless people in Boston, which made for a good discussion about Menino, the Federal government, and US politics in general, and we wound up having a drink afterward. I’d rank this amongst the more successful outings I’ve had to far. Hopefully, we’ll sail again. I probably won’t try going out tomorrow as I’ve stuff to get done…and I’d like to go climbing tomorrow anyway. Trying to do both turns out to be painful.
Ben would definitely enjoy it here – quite challenging tacking from one way to another constantly as you deal with the wind passing around the tall buildings of downtown Boston. I suck. Seriously. But I want to work on it over the summer. My sailing shoes definitely were a good purchase and held up well today – I’ve decided I quite like Gill “stuff”. Oh, and, I need to get a cord for my sunglasses, since I don’t much like the idea of throwing $200 overboard the next time I fall in the Charles.
Jon.