Saturday, September 28, 2013

Sailing Into the Storm

When I was 16, right after finishing high school, I attended a course at Hurricane Island Outward Bound School. I don't necessarily trust all my memories from that time, as I've retold things in my head enough, and I've changed enough, that I'm sure some things in my head have altered from historical fact. But I am confident it was a powerful experience for me.

In particular, I remember an incident that occurred on the final expedition. For those unaware, the Outward Bound schools provide a variety of wilderness experiences to their participants. The Hurricane Island school, off the coast of Maine, was focused on sailing experiences in 30 foot ketches. Our time was organized into increasingly longer sailing trips, culminating in a five-day final expedition.

As luck would have it, a hurricane was moving up the coast right about the time we were to leave on the expedition.We had bunked on the island and prepared to sail, but were not even sure the expedition would not be cancelled (or delayed) because of the weather. As decision time came closer, the hurricane lost structure and was downgraded to a tropical depression. The expedition was on.

We sailed out of the harbor. It was blustery and raining. We were all decked out in our yellow foul-weather gear. Each of the twelve people in the boat was assigned a task, and with the fog and rain, we were quickly out of sight of land. I remember feeling very cold.

Even though we were in the Atlantic, it was still coastal, and there were rocks and shoals we had to be careful of. The rocks off the coast of Maine are not friendly, soft rocks, but could put a hole in the hull and would be very dangerous to strike. One of the most important jobs in the boat was bow lookout, to watch for those rocks. I was given that job.

I wear eyeglasses.  I've worn eyeglasses since just before third grade. If you are not familiar with eyeglasses, let me assure you that they do not work well in wind-driven rain and fog. The lenses quickly become speckled with water and mist, and you essentially cannot see through them. The cold wind was blowing, the rain was coming down, I was supposed to keep us away from the rocks, and I couldn't see.

I was unhappy, because I was aware I could not do the job I was supposed to be doing. I told our watch leader (was his name Geoff? don't recall anymore.) so he assigned another person to help as bow lookout. He assigned Miles.

Miles and I were the only two people in the watch who wore eyeglasses.

The two of us were in the bow of the boat looking for rocks. I asked him (I think I had to shout, because the wind was so loud) "Can you see anything?" "No." he said. "You?" "No, I can't either."

This is something that may not have actually happened, but I remember right about them feeling the wind calm just a bit, and turned warm. It was somehow just comforting. Miles and I looked at each other, laughed, and just did the best we could, taking turns wiping our glasses.

I'm writing this story now, 41 years later, so obviously things did not end in disaster. But I remember this story sometimes when I'm harried, and it continues to calm me.

You may wonder why this is on my math teacher blog. I'm attending a workshop on building virtual learning communities, and this is my response to an assignment prompt to write about a peak learning experience.

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