4/14/25 - Dreams of My Dresser

Friends….no pictures today. Just lots of thoughts. No energy for photos.

Last night was rough, but at least I slept more than the hour (?) I got the night before.  I adjusted my pillow and rolled onto my other side.  It took several minutes for all of the liquid grossness to shift from one side to the other.  The shift started in my sinuses, then moved from one nostril to another, and then the drainage eventually hit my throat and I cleared it with a cough or two.

As colds go, this is not too bad of a cold.  While I don’t have a voice, the grossness is contained in my head (oh, the symbolism), as opposed to the colds that come with a super runny nose and almost constant coughing.  This is not that.  This is a quiet and mild cold. 

And yet, it’s still a cold and I feel absolutely disgusting on every level.  My mouth feels thick and still has a tinge of the Halls honey cough drops I needed in the middle of the night.  My stomach is feeling off because of all the drainage.  All I want to do is stay in bed. 

Today is Monday, April 14th, the day before Steve’s birthday.  We’re sharing a bed for the first time in almost a month and I’m fearful I’m going to give him this cold.  And I really, reeeeally don’t want to do that for so many reasons.  He can’t get sick.  He needs to be healthy, if only to get us through the next two weeks.

We are in Charleston, SC staying at a friend’s house while her family is out of town.  It is a gorgeous house and we are forever grateful to them for lending it to us.  They have given us an oasis.  But we’re still not on our boat.  Still. 

After my dad turned the car around on the highway when we found out we needed to order a new oven, we went back to my parent’s house.  We moped around all day, feeling sad and disoriented as our plans had, once again, done a 180.  But later that day we called the boatyard and were told that the oven should take a week to arrive and an hour to install.  Okay.  Not ideal, but we can do it.  At least we had a timeline.  We can plan.  We would be conservative and give the oven an extra day to arrive and we will leave on Wednesday.  Yet again, we geared up our weary emotions for the goodbye, started gathering our things...

Friends, **sigh** you can already guess what happened.  The oven hadn’t arrived yet.  The tracking information now said it was going to arrive on Friday instead of Tuesday.

We don’t even get mad anymore.  We have no energy for that.  We go straight to sadness.  And then we redo the plan. And the logistics.  Over and over and over. 

If the oven was going to arrive on Friday, what time?  In the afternoon or the morning?  If it arrived in the morning, would the mechanics have time to install it on Friday and the boat would be ready for us on Saturday?  Or if it arrived late on Friday afternoon, would they get to it first thing on Monday since they are closed for the weekend?   More limbo.  For our sanity’s sake, we assumed that they would get to it on Monday.  Let’s assume Monday.  That means yet another unexpected week in St. Louis. 

We needed a change of scenery, a change of pace.  We needed to move.  We were all so……damn……tired..…of waiting.  Because when you’re waiting, you’re not able to make plans.  You’re constantly thinking that your departure is imminent and you make decisions based on your anticipated departure.  Ex: “Oh, let’s not buy another loaf of bread.  We’re leaving tomorrow. We’ll just make do.”  We have been living in that “make do” space for two months. Two whole months since our engine died off the coast of Cape Fear.  Two whole months of constantly thinking “we’ll leave for the Bahamas shortly.”

I texted my AmeriCorps friend Laura who lives in Charleston and had offered her place to us months before.  After a few back-and-forth texts and a wonderful catch up on the phone, we had a place to stay.  We finally left my parent’s house on Friday, and arrived here on Saturday.  And now here we are (Thank you so much, Laura! I’ll wash all of the sheets and wipe the whole place down before we leave—promise!).

*sigh* Friends, I’m down.  A few weeks ago, I took one of those stupid online quizzes to see if I was depressed and it said I’m mildly depressed.  While I don’t think I should take a psychological diagnosis from a random online website as gospel, I think I just needed it to confirm what I already suspected.  And it did. 

Please prepare yourself for a grown-up tantrum.  Here’s where I am: (oh, here come the tears….I need these tears…I need a release…)

We spent four years preparing for this adventure.  Four YEARS!  We sacrificed so much to get where we are to do what we’re doing.  And we did it RIGHT!  We didn’t cut any corners!  I went back to work full-time to save money.  We dedicated most of our vacation time and evenings and weekends to boat-related projects.  We took classes—sailing classes, medical classes, engine classes, scuba diving classes.  We researched and got all of our immunizations.  We created a super-detailed, four-page 11 x 14 portrait orientation spreadsheet that listed HUNDREDS of to do list items.  And we crossed them ALL off!  And man (!) did that take time! It was SO MUCH WORK to get here!  For the opportunity to live in screen-saver-esque, postcard islands and make wonderful memories as a family.

It was not supposed to be like this.  We went out to dinner with my parents the other night and Addie asked if we knew everything we know now, would we still have bought the boat and gone on this adventure?  *long pause* I don’t honestly know.

So what’s the plan at this point?  Ughhhh….my stomach hurts just thinking about it. 

Today is Monday, 4/14.  In a little while I’m going to call the boatyard and hope against hope that the oven has been delivered.  Assuming it has, then we will also assume it will be installed today or first thing tomorrow.  Tomorrow, we will drive our rental car four hours to the boatyard just outside of Southport, NC to get to our boat.  We will unload our stuff and then hit the grocery store before returning the car.  I am also hoping that the boatyard will once again loan us their truck so the rental car drop off will be easier. 

And then the clock starts ticking.  Addie needs to be back in St. Louis—yes, back in St. Louis—for her Space Camp departure with her class on Sunday, May 4th.  Months and months ago, I made important dentist and orthodontist appointments for her on Thursday, May 1st.  In a perfect world, our family will sail/motor from Southport, NC to Ft. Pierce, FL and get there by April 28th. Addie and I would fly to St. Louis on April 29th (I can’t remember what airport is closest to Ft. Pierce, but Steve and I worked out all of the details a few weeks ago when we thought we would have four weeks to make this trip.)  During that time, Addie will be with her classmates making lifetime memories.  Steve and Sid will stay with the boat, hopefully in the Ft. Pierce marina where there are things to do and see.  I will stay, once again, with my parents.  After that, on/around May 11th or 12th, Addie and I will somehow get back to the boat and, together, we will sail/motor down the rest of the FL coast to the Bahamas.

Friends, this is the plan.  For this plan to work, everything—everything—needs to go right from this point forward.  No boat issues.  No weather delays.  No sickness.  No flight delays.  There will be one or two overnight passages to get there.  I’m still very new to helming the boat and we haven’t had the practice time we anticipated.  Additionally, I’m not feeling great and it seems that Sid is starting to catch whatever I have.  It hit me last night that I should take a covid test.  If Addie gets covid, she will not be allowed (understandably) at Space Camp.  I can’t even think about that possibility right now.  The amount of time and money and energy (and luck!) it will take to get that girl to Space Camp is Herculean.  But….we promised her a long time ago that we will make it happen and we do not want to break that promise.  She’s really looking forward to it.  In all sincerity, I would appreciate your prayers for our first-world hope of Addie to go to Space Camp and have a great time. We need a win.

****

That’s the short-term and medium-term.  The long-term….?  Oh, that makes me sick to my stomach, too.  A few months ago, when we first got stuck and were feeling down on boat life, our family had brainstormed all sorts of possibilities.  We could keep sailing (Ha.  ”Keep” implies that we are currently sailing), we could sell the boat and road trip around the US, we could travel around Europe, etc.  We were still filled with excitement and anticipation.  And energy. What amazing memories could we make with the time and space we created???

At this point, at this exact moment, I just want to go home.  I want the feelings of rest and comfort and routines that come with “home.”  I want my own bed.  I want my own dresser so I can stop living out of a bag.  I want to take Addie to volleyball practice and pick Sid up from Chess.  I want to unload my own dishwasher.  I want the shampoo and conditioner in my shower to be right where I left them and right where I expect them to be.  I want to go to work and be with my team and feel like I’m making a difference for people with disabilities.  I want to sit on my own couch with a blanket and light a candle and watch Netflix.  I want my closet full of clothes.  I want to go to “my” grocery store instead of feeling like I’m in a strange new land every time I go into a new grocery store where it takes me twice as long to shop.

I want normalcy.  My routines.  A feeling of purpose.  So strange the things you want and miss.  When I worked on cruise ships, my job was to run games and game shows for the passengers.  At night, I would mingle and have drinks with passengers in my formal gowns until midnight almost every night.  It sounds like so much fun.  And it was a blast….until it wasn’t.  At one point, I vividly remember saying to Steve “someday, I want to have a 9-5 job and sit on the couch in sweatpants and watch TV with you in the evening.”  Many times over the years, we have pointed out to each other that we are “living the dream.” 

Travelling, in theory, sounds like a lot of fun.  And it is and it can be.  But there are also downsides.  It can be lonely.  It can be unhealthy—the amount of fast food we have eaten while on the road in the last few weeks going from Point A to Point B is disgusting.  Our rental car reeks of smoke from whoever had the car before us.  Hotel sleeping arrangements are less than ideal. 

I guess the thought of travelling around right now doesn’t seem fun.  In this moment and for the last week or so, I just want to be home—real home.  But the “home” I want, my old house and my old life, doesn’t exist right now.  We can’t go back.  It’s not an option.  Another family is renting our house and while I’m sure there’s an “out” clause, it wouldn’t be right to kick them out.  And….somehow….there’s still a small sliver of me that is still encouraging.  “Keep going,” it says.  Going “home” wouldn’t be the right move either.  We’re in this very strange “inbetween land” and it’s incredibly uncomfortable.       

I read a recent blog post from a boat friend of mine who we were supposed to buddy boat with all of those months ago.  They made it to the Bahamas and it sounds like they have had a blast.  I’m so happy for them and yet so envious at the same time.  In her post, she said there are “feral kids running around everywhere.”  That’s what we thought we were signing up for.  We wanted Sid and Addie to experience a world with crystal blue water, smooth, soft sand and new lifelong friends from all walks of life.  And that world exists.  And it will be possible for us to experience that world……come November.  But November seems very far away and I don’t know if we can make it that long.

Time will tell.  In the meantime, please enjoy your dresser and your “normal life” routines for me.   

I am using this blog post as a way to get out all of this negativity and all of these feelings.  Thanks for indulging me. I’m going to join my family in the other room.  I can hear the kids playing Animal Crossing and I assume Steve is out there somewhere.  I still have them.  I have my family.  I have such a great family! We are together.  I just don’t want to be depressed mom. I want to be fun mom. I think she’s in there somewhere….God, I hope I find her soon.

Time to get some breakfast and go to the beach.  The beach is a definite upside.  We signed up for that.

**While Steve has been proofreading this, in this exact moment, the kids are both laughing and singing “Die with a Smile” that was the centerpiece of last week’s church service in St. Louis. Apparently, it made a big impression on them.

They are singing. SINGING! That means they are okay! And that—their okay-ness—THAT’S all that really matters to me (and your okay-ness, too, Steve). Thank God. We’re okay.

*****

Two hours later: I am now feeling slightly embarassed by this post. While very real and raw, it is also very self-centered and seemingly ignorant of the real struggles others are going through. I just wanted to put this additional thought out there.