An Aptitude for Solitude

The Pacific From Our Upstairs Window

I snuck out for a few moments on my way to Back to School Night Tuesday and saw the horizon out of my open car window. I smelled the ocean and pictured myself for a moment out on that ocean with nothing surrounding me but the sea, watching the sun rise and the sun set for four days in a row. I realized how much my soul needs some version of extended solitude. Some people are made for that kind of thing, some think it torture. For some it cleanses their souls from all the sludge that builds up on land and brings them back more ready to attack life, for some it drives them to madness. I am a member of the former group. I have always had an amazing aptitude for solitude. It is what often has made me forgo going out with a group of friends to finish a project at home. It is what allowed me to survive one very lonely freshman year of college where I would go for days on end without talking to anyone except for the guy who made my sandwiches for lunches.

It is, also, what has driven me to plan this solo adventure, to push the boundaries of what is thought possible for a diabetic, and what has caused me to spend countless hours planning and arranging and seeking out sponsors to get it off the ground.

Many people have asked me why I couldn't bring someone else along with me. A few were concerned for my safety, a few trying to solve the problem of finding a boat to charter from companies that seemed to outlaw solo sailors. I tell them there is an extreme difference between sailing solo and going with someone else.

It's in the freedom to indulge every whim right when it hits. To go out as far from land as I want without having to consider another, to see what I want to see, to stop where I want and to drive on when I want to meet a goal. It is so unlike my life on land where it is always a compromise, when I am pulled in a million directions other than the one I truly want to go. Work pulls. Bills pull. Even having to choose a place to eat involves balancing the needs and wants of everyone else.

Tony needs to eat clean foods and needs to eat in the next fifteen minutes. Shea won't eat meat. Eli will only eat foods that involve begin dipped in ketchup. I need to sit in a place that involves direct sunlight on my face and all of this has to be done for under twenty dollars. But, it is not so when you are solo. It is all me. It is simple to balance the things that I want. One opinion to sway the vote, one need to satisfy, one desire to fulfill.

It's not just about indulging my will, though. It's about testing myself without having any fallback. No one else to confer with or lean on when things go wrong, no one to brainstorm with if something breaks, no one to choose a course or to figure out where we went off course and what point on the chart that huge tower actually is.

It will just be me. When the wind picks up or the boat gets grounded, I alone will have to fix it. If you want to know yourself, to truly know of what you are capable, you have to put yourself in those situations where there is a chance that you are in over your head. It is only then that you can find the outer extents of what you are capable of. If you never get to the end of your rope, how can you ever know how long it is? I hope I am able to find that point so that I can come back knowing that I can handle anything this pedestrian, land-locked life can throw my way. We will have to wait and see...

Has It Really Been Six Months?

My husband, Tony, has been doing triathlons for three years now. He has come from a couch potato to placing very high in his age group. Yesterday he went to pick up his race packet for yet another race, his fifth this year. As he reached the front of the line he gave the lady behind the counter his name and the greatest thing happened. "Spineto? Is your wife that diabetic sailor girl?" she asked.

"Yeah?" he questioned not knowing where she was going.

"That's so cool. I follow her blog. I'm a diabetic, too." she said.

(By the way, if you happen to be this lady, leave me a comment, I'd love to hear form you.)

When he came home and told me this story, my first thought was of how guilty I felt for not writing in six months. well, that's not exactly accurate. I have written, I just haven't written a blog post in that long. Who knows the real reason why I haven't, maybe I am avoiding being so public with all of this, or I was rebelling against having to write on a deadline after doing it for a while.

I would like to think that maybe it was just because I was out living my life, storing up stories to write about at a later time. But which ever reason it was, I thought it was time to break the streak.

I returned from my trip in February and took a week or so to get back in the rhythm of everyday life. In March, I started construction on Come Monday, my twelve foot plywood and epoxy sailboat. Building a boat was one of those things on my "Someday I Will" list, but was never the right time mostly due to lack of space and lack of funds.

Since we moved a year ago, I now had a little space in the garage next to the cardio training room, my writing studio, Tony's painting studio, the surfboard quiver and the laundry room to build a smallish boat.

My requirements were simple. The van could handle a boat up to 12 feet on the rack and I would need at least that much to float the whole family (with a little leeway if my kids ever decide to grow). So it would be a 12 foot boat.

The epoxy could fix all the poor craftsmanship due to twenty year old tools and the fact that my only training was twelve weeks of seventh grade wood shop. Any pathetic cut I made just got filled in with epoxy. After two months and around sixty hours of labor Come Monday took her first voyage, across the Carlsbad Lagoon with Tony, Shea and Eli aboard. And she actually floated.

Me being me, I forgot the oar locks so we paddled her with oars far too long to do it comfortably. I am still working on her sailing rig, cutting down an old sail my friend, Craig, so kindly donated, and working on the mast and spars and rudder and leeboard.

Come Monday showed she was seaworthy just as I was finishing up my thirteenth year teaching, which means I have been a teacher just as long as I have sat in those little desks before high school graduation. I also reached the point where I have spent as many years since high school graduation as it took me to get there.

Summer came with the promise of finishing all of those projects I put off during the school year, but as soon as the days got long and hot and the kids were off playing for hours on end in the cul-de-sac, all I wanted to do was laze around by the pool and thumb my nose at my to-do list. I even dared to watch a T.V. show in the middle of the day, a true indulgence.

My thyroid has cooperated with the meds and is getting back in line, no longer doing whatever the hell it wanted. It is listening to the rules of my body more and more which is great for my overall well being.

I have recovered enough to get back the desire to compete in triathlons again. So in June I chose one in October and began training. I had no idea though not only how badly out of shape I had become after being sick for 3 years, but of how slowly my recovery would be. My body just doesn't bounce back like it used to. Maybe its still recovering from the thyroid or maybe I'm just getting old, or maybe a little of both.

Lucky for me I am good at dragging my feet at paying entrance fees, October is far too soon for a race. Instead I will shoot for the Carlsbad Half-marathon in January. Insulindependence has a team that does the race and they do it right with a whole weekend of events and parties and a great support tent out on the course. Even if I have to walk it, which I'm pretty sure my pride won't let me, (I finished the last one with a stress fracture in my foot from the obstinate thyroid) I want to be a part of it.

And since there are so many great people doing the race, that same pride will drag my lazy butt out to the treadmill day after day to train so I won't have to walk it. And my good buddy Michelle has been dragging my ass out to meet her to bike every week which has been doing wonders for my recovery. (Thanks, Michelle!)

Although I haven't been writing for the blog, I have spent a good chunk of the last six months working on the book and it's really starting to take shape. I figure I'm about two-thirds of the way finished with the first draft. and just as I am about to celebrate, I realize I haven't accounted for the time needed to complete my second draft and my third.

I have lined up an editor, which, I am sure, is obvious I desperately need. I forgot to pay attention to these things in high school, instead choosing to spend most of the hours of my class asleep on my desk. Some days I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Other days I see that light receding into the abyss.

I have had my fill of crappy diabetic days. Those days when a 300 that you cursed over at noon becomes your best blood sugar of the day. When the thought of spending some time praying to the porcelain god flits through your head and the only thing that takes away that thought is curling up in bed with your softest blanket and watching hours of a new TV show on Netflix. I have brought down my A1c's from an unacceptable range due to the thyroid and lack of exercise to a less shitty level. Still not what I want it to be or what I would be proud of, thus, why I have not mentioned any numbers.

I did manage to hook up with Nick again (my Dexcom, not a sordid affair, I promise) after learning how to work my insurance plan. I have yet to get new A1C's done to prove his worth, but, I know it everyday he tells me I've exceeded my limit for sugar or when he gently nudges me in the middle of the night, telling me to storm the kitchen for some chocolate sludge.

As for the future I have my plans, and on top of that list is to finish the first draft of the book, the second and third and get it into the hands of an agent or publisher any way I can, which of course means learning a whole new business and doing that work that goes against my own nature, self-promotion. But it will be well worth it to hear just one person say they found some thought they could use in life.

Come Monday still needs her rig. I will celebrate my 35th birthday in a month and my 13th wedding anniversary in a few weeks to a man I am still completely in love with. I am determined to learn to run again.

And I have started the thought processes on my next big adventure. One involves the Keys, a journey, a group of friends, kayaks, some running and swimming. One involves the family, a boat and the Intercoastal Waterway. Maybe a group of girls and a multi-part running journey bringing only the clothes on our backs, lots of sugars, and a credit card for a place to stay. Then there's the Grand Canyon Part II, this time with running shoes and both walls of the canyon.

Or maybe flying a sixty foot hovercraft? Then there's enjoying some football, hanging out with friends and doing a better job keeping up with this blog. All in all it was a spring and summer well spent.

Best Morning Yet

I think by far this has been the best morning yet. With a small craft advisory on for today, it has made the decision to end my trip a little early a no brainer. There is no way I'm going against NOAA.

And technically I made it to Key West, its just the east end instead of the west end, but it's Key West all the same. I got to sleep in until 7 and am enjoying my breakfast on the patio of a closed dockside bar. The sounds of the fishing charter boat captains and their clients for the day blend nicely against the background of all sorts of tropical birds chirping and the brown pelicans slapping their jaws.

I have nothing in front of me except a leisurely day riding around Key West on a rented cruiser. After charging up my phone and laptop from the two 6-volt batteries on board (thanks Michelle for the cigarette lighter converter, it was priceless and I didn't even know I needed it), I am off to arrange for the boat to be picked up and to take some pics of Key West. First stops Tennesse Williams old house and the Key West graveyard. The graveyard has been around since the 1800's (if you don't count when all the "contents" were flooded out and had to be dug up and re-buried above ground in crypt like things.

For some reason it reminds me of Tom Sawyer. Maybe because it's so old it doesn't seem as

creepy, like all the "people" there are just fictional characters who never really existed anyways. But, then again, maybe it will seem a whole lot creepier when I get there.

After that I think I will just play tourist and see what I can see. All I know is, after a day like yesterday, I deserve to sit on nice stable land with no chance of dying (unless you count being run over by a scooter driven by some wild tourist), eat a good meal and just sit for a while. I've had enough movement to last a long time.