ALMOST SETTLED... and happy too (Part 62g)

Before the group broke up there was word being passed around that the reason that I hadn’t gotten the cannon when I crossed the finish line was that I wasn’t the winner. My first thought was ”how could this be?“ It was almost at that very moment that we all heard a loud ”boom“ from the race committee boat. Looking out on the water we could see one sailboat in the vicinity. With the officials still out there I couldn’t get to ask what rule I’d broken this time. As much as I liked racing a sailboat I certainly had no love of the officials that ruled the sport.

Long story short... I had gone around the course the wrong way... and so had everybody else but that one boat. That boat had been involved in the collision prior to the start but had managed to make repairs and had gone the right way. It would take too long to explain what had happened. In truth, I was partly to blame. The race officials were technically correct but were also culpable. The reason I say that is that there were 14 boats with about 10 of them that had more than 5 years of racing experience who had followed me unaware of the course change that the officials had made. In any case it was another disappointment and garnered me the nickname ”wrong way Corrigan“.

The trip home with Paul was long. I definitely felt cheated because we had beaten all the boats who had started together. We found out the other boat had received specific direction from the race officials telling him that we all were sailing the wrong course as he crossed the starting line. But how do you fight ”City Hall“. It wasn’t just me who had been disqualified as all of us had been with the exception of that one boat. The way the scoring worked was that you received the same number of points as your finishing position. If you start a race and drop out you get one more point than the last boat to finish. But, if you are disqualified you get one more point than the number of boats that are registered. With 16 boats registered we (and all who had followed me) got 17 points making it virtually impossible to be in contention for a trophy. Paul recognized this and asked if he could back out of his commitment to crew for me the next day. It was his last day to be home before returning to his base so I told him it was OK. I really wasn’t into it either. The only thing was that he didn’t ask until we were back to the trailer. My boat was still at the racing venue which meant I’d have to go back on Sunday to get it. That part didn’t make me very happy.

Sunday races weren’t scheduled to start until noon to allow those who wanted to go to church to do so. I slept in and when I did get up asked Elle if she wanted to go for a ride to go get the boat. It was another beautiful day and even though she was still burdened by her period she said yes and suggested that we make it a picnic. She made up sandwiches and I packed up some toys for the kids to play with. It was a little over an hour to get there and when I parked the car I could see that the boats on the beach were just starting to be launched. I unloaded the car and took the stuff down by the boat. I recognized the familiar face leaning against it as Penny, Pam’s sister. She was wearing a sun dress and had her shoes in her hand. She wanted to say how sorry she was that I got disqualified the day before. I asked how bad the damage on her boat was and she said it really was bad and that if they thought it could be sailed she’d be out there. By not racing in the afternoon race she and her sister had, as far as point go, finished second and because of their finish in the first race were actually in first place overall. I remember shaking my head in disbelief. Something was wrong with this scene.

Penny then asked why I wasn’t preparing to race and I told her I didn’t have a crew. Her face lit up like a roman candle and I can still hear her yell out ”I’ll crew!“ as she ran around to the side of the boat where I was standing. Elle heard her and as I looked her way she kind of shrugged her shoulders as if to say it was OK with her if I wanted to. I did and I didn’t. In the back of my mind was what my father had preached; ”finish what you start“ but, on the other hand I'd asked Elle to go on a picnic. I remember sort of hesitating pointing out that she wasn’t exactly dressed for crewing. She started running towards the parking lot yelling for me to get the boat lunched. There were still two guys who hadn’t started off for the starting line who I was able to coerce into helping me. I had started to hank on the sails when I saw Penny running across the sand. She’d changed into a pair of red shorts and a white blouse that she was buttoning as she ran. She jumped on board and I pushed us off without getting the sails fully on and without the rudder. The wind was behind us and was blowing us towards the starting line and I felt it would take longer to do it while still by the shore. At least we were headed in the right direction. We were further away than I’d hoped we’d be when I heard the starting sequence start. We almost made it but were the last boat to start.

On our way out Penny pleaded with me to tell her some of my sailing ”tricks“. She explained that by sailing with her sister they were always trying to figure out why I did so well. I’d known since I first started sailing against them that they had looked up to me. I’d never really thought about teaching racing tactics before she asked. I quickly decided that I’d tell her why I was doing what I was doing and encouraged her to ask questions.

Because we were last I decided to take a ”flyer“ like I had the previous day. The wind was what I called ”perfection”; about 8 to 10 miles per hour. It was enough to make the boat go fast without having to really work hard. I really had nothing to lose since I was already last. I explained what I was doing and pointed out what, as a local sailor, should’ve been obvious to her and that was the out going tide was working against the majority of the other competitors. We went the other way and by the first mark we were fifth. She was really impressed and couldn’t believe that no one had ever told her (or her sister) about how to use tidal action. We ended up finishing third. She was really excited that we’d come from so far behind.

To be continued...