Solace

Here’s the skinny.  On Christmas Eve we bade farewell to our beautiful ‘Sweet Caroline’.  I can’t believe it!  I know the expression ‘everything is for sale’ – but I never applied it to Sweet Caroline.  She was supposed to be a keeper.  She was our savior.  When times were uncertain, she provided us with solace.

Sweet Caroline

He slept in her v-berth the first day back on the dock.  A fallout of his strokes and unsure of his balance and footing, he made his way over the floating docks to Sweet Caroline.  She beckoned to him and like the call of a siren, it worked.  She became an integral part of his rehab in the coming weeks.

But this past summer our aging knees had another story to tell.  Buckling to his knees one morning, an old knee injury reared its ugly head and the ladder to the flybridge was becoming an assessability hazard.  Who knew?  So on Christmas Eve with the purchase and sale offer in our hands, we exchanged knowing looks and became very, very aware of our immortality.  Out of the blue a couple wanting a Mainship trawler approached us – they had heard of ‘Sweet Caroline’ and wanted to buy.  Even with the language barrier, the language of boaters and the sea took over.  They fell in love.  Not much wonder.  Anyone spending any amount of time on board Sweet Caroline would say the same.  She was beautiful.

So with love, we said farewell and for a few short weeks we were ‘boatless’.  But I have been here before.  And as anyone who really knows us…it was just a matter of time.  We are once again boat owners.  After a few offers passed back and forth doing the purchase and offer dance, we now own a beautiful craft.  

I am happy to introduce “Solace”. She will be our escape. All the expressions like ‘you can’t take it with you’ and 'I’m spending our kids inheritance' come to mind. Only this is indeed a family boat – room for all.  Our grandson in wide-eyed wonder looked at a picture and in two words said it all; “nice boat”!  

 

SOLACE

We’re already planning the official launch; the maiden voyage to our home port with our son assuming the role of first mate; a designation I will gladly relinquish for the day.  It is our thing- this boating thing.  And without it, we are like fish out of water much like the man from Atlantis.  It is our destiny.  It is our “Solace”.