Someday-I-Will

I see a white sail,

Skipping cross a blue bay,

And I say Someday I Will.

Don't need to know who,

May help you make it come true,

Just say Someday I Will.

Don't have to work it all out,

Don't have to tear it all apart,

All you need's a place to start.

--"Someday I Will" Jimmy Buffett

Some people have a bucket list. I have a Someday-I-Will list, my list of future projects that I am not currently in the process of making happen. And one by one I hope to take them off this list and put them on the Current Goal List, just like I have recently done with the Swim Around Key West and previously with the Long Distance Solo Sail.

I have been reading The Power of Less, which suggests that you become very public with your goals. So I am going to do just that and post my Someday-I-Will list. I may add to it and change it from time to time, but I hope to complete it all, someday.

1. TRANSPAC- a sailing race from Long Beach, CA to Honolulu, HI.

2. Run or bike the coast of an entire state (Probably a small one)

3. Take my family on a one or more month-long cruise on a sailboat

4. Take a long-distance, multi-day SUP/camping trip on the Intercoastal Waterway

5. Write a full-length screenplay

6. Make a short movie

7. Travel- Eastern seaboard of US, Ireland, New Zealand, US Virgin Islands, Southern Pacific Islands, Costa Rica

8. See Jimmy Buffett in a spontaneous show in a small bar, Flogging molly in an Irish Pub ….9. Finish converting Come Monday, my 12’ wooden boat built from scratch, into a sailboat.

So what is on your Someday-I-Will list? Maybe I can steal some ideas to add to my list.

Happy Cocktail

I was recently sharing with a friend my recipe for dealing with the depression that diabetes and life in general brings. The big 5 ingredients in my Happy Cocktail are exercise, music, sunshine, people (good people you actually like), and future plans. You force those upon yourself and it will drag you out of the blues into Happyville. As we round the corner out of winter and into spring (although it is not much of a winter here in San Diego and I know spring seems a long way off for many in the US and worldwide) I am working hard to throw off my yearly winter blues. I've been surrounding myself with happy music, through a new free Sirius Satellite subscription continuously tuned to Radio Margaritaville. I have been reading outside int he sunshine during my lunch break. And I have been going out of my way to build the relationships around me. But I needed to find a place for the last two ingredients in my Happy Cocktail; exercise and future plans. And for me that usually means it's time to find a new adventure to train for. So it was time to dig out my Someday-I-Will list. It's too soon to conquer the WESTPAC, a 8-19 day sailing race from Long Beach, CA to Honolulu, HI. I can't be away form my kiddos for that long, yet. A multi-day Stand Up Paddle exploration of the Virgin Islands may be a bit beyond my experience level at this point (I've only Sup'ed a handful of times). Which only leaves the Swim Around Key West.

The 37th Annual Swim Around Key West is a 12.5 mile swim around the island of Key West in Florida on June 28, 2014. twelve and a half miles is too much for me to take on this June, but they do have a three person relay division. I can definitely do a 4.2 mile swim with six months of training. I've done solo adventures before, I want to do something with a team this time. Three swimmers, a boat captain, maybe even a photographer/media captain to share our journey along the way. This race will give me a Future Plan and a purpose to Exercise. For the next six months I can look forward to a trip to the tropics and a five day vacation with some amazing people. And it provides me with the accountability to get to the pool and the weight room and on the road for a quick run to the beach. Now the question is, will this adventure be those same ingredients for you? I am looking for people to join the team. Maybe even put two teams together. If this could be the two ingredients you need in your Happy Cocktail, you can find out more here. You can also fill out the INTEREST FORM to let me know you're interested.

Swimming the Keys

There are those runs every so often, when you feel like you can run forever without even a hint of fatigue. Where your mind drifts off into that happy place and your body just relaxes. I’ve gone to that place a few times while running but never when swimming.

It's kind of hard to get into a groove when every eighteen strokes a huge wall looms and forces you to break stride to turn yourself upside down in some elementary school style pool trick just to put in another eighteen strokes and hit the other wall.

I've been in the pool for fifteen years, taking it twenty-five yards at a time, and never found that happy place. That is until last week when I took my Christmas gift to the deck. I had my eye on it for over a year when my parents found out and gave me a waterproof case for my iPod, an H2O Audio case for my third generation Nano and the Laird Hamilton earphones to match.

I figured if I was going to meet my goal at Wildflower this year, I needed to put in some major yardage at the YMCA pool. So I situated my Nano inside the case, locked it down, slipped the neoprene belt around my waist and fiddled with the earphones for a bit. The first few laps were less than enjoyable trying to get the volume adjusted, the earbuds set just right and the pressure fixed in my ears from the watertight fit. But once I got set up, I was immediately in another world.

The experience of counting my strokes in my head, "1,2,3- 2,2,3- 3,2,3- 4,2,3- flip" was instantly replaced by the feel of the tepid water gliding across my skin. With a little Jimmy playing in my ears, I could see the sun streaming in from the open roof as if it were shining down from a tropical sky.

The water suddenly was the clearest ocean water I had ever seen. I was swimming around some tidal island in the Keys just a few feet from shore. No more stroke counting and flips, just a constant revolution around the island.

When I pop my head out of the water for a moment to breathe, I catch a glimpse of a Key deer nibbling some grass just below a patch of palm trees moving ever so slightly with the Prevailing Westerlies.

My 22’ Catalina sailboat anchored offshore is still visible to my left where I left her to have the coolness of the sea wake me up and to get in some exercise before lounging the rest of the day away in my topside hammock, writing and enjoying being in one of the coolest places that God has made.

If only I could make this feeling last...

I'd love to hear a story of how you slipped into the zone while running, or hiking or doing some other amazing activity. Leave me a comment below.