The Excellent Adventure

Moving aboard a boat is far more complicated than anyone told me it would be.

I mean, I knew about getting rid of stuff, I knew about consolidating, I knew about simplifying. I’m good there.

What I had no clue about was how to make my boat home.

I am a deeply devout homebody. Curling up on the couch with my family is one of my favorite things in the entire world. I am intrigued by discussions of how to create that sense of home, that sense of belonging, that feeling that you are in the best and safest spot in the world. I have studied feng shui, interior decorating, and I’ve even gone so far as to pick up a homemaking magazine or two, once or twice, at some point. Part of the overall allure of the whole liveaboard cruising thing was the idea that you can go wherever you want in the world (provided it isn’t landlocked) and still have your home right there.

Boats are different. Very very different.

We’ve been here for almost six months, and finally, on Sunday, I decided that I was going to get one room, just one room, looking like I really lived there. So I focused on my and Jason’s berth.

Almost eight solid hours of scouring, scrubbing, stowing, and sorting later, it looks like a room. Art is hung on the walls. The bed/berth/bunk whatever is made. The bookshelf is organized, and the titles please me. My desk is neat, my files are filed, the stacks of clothing in the two lockers are tidy. There are a few candles, and the room smells more of incense than it does of diesel.

I feel like I just won the biggest game of Tetris I’ve ever played.

Shoes were fun. I designated one storage space beneath the berth as “where shoes live”. Then ended up with one pair of shoes more than would fit in the space. So then the priorities question… do I a) get rid of the extra pair of shoes? If so… which pair is the goner, and how do I decide? b) pick a different locker? If so… which one, and how much more of a pain will that one be to keep clean, mildew-free, and organized, while still being reasonably accessible?

Nothing is simple, when every single item you own has to be triaged like this. And it’s our berth, so that required doing that for all of both our belongings. And all our files, since that’s where the “office” is as well. And did I mention that I had to come up with a visually-pleasing, yet practical, way to overcome the fact that that’s the room closest to the phone line from the dock, so the DSL modem and VoiP box have to go there, yet the power plug is in the galley, so the wires have to go around and through the door?

I think that counted as the third major purge; first one when we decided to move to a boat in the first place, second one when we actually moved aboard, and now this, the final adjustment to getting everything actually stowed properly, in a way that makes us happy. I still have the rest of the boat to work through this way, but just having one space I can go to when the visual fatigue gets to be too much is worth every single overdecided-and-analyzed moment. And when the goal is “soothing space to exist in”, suddenly the ties you thought you had to material goods just evaporate. I think I got rid of more stuff on Sunday, for just one room, than in any other one-day purge event since the garage sale.

But just last night, I caught Jason eyeing the deck, which isn’t level. Because you see, the boat isn’t balanced correctly, and the weight needs to be distributed for ideal sailing performance.

Looks like another purge coming in my near future…I can picture myself heaving stuff out of the hatches, while Jason watches the GPS, adjusting us for that last crucial tenth of a knot of speed.

Tags: Moving Aboard

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