THE LONG ROAD BACK

From the moment we threw our dock lines over the cleats in Waikiki - it was back to the grind.

Having jumped into our cruising lives with no financial parachute to cushion the flat spin back into "Real Life"...

I'll admit, it's been a rather rough landing. 

Kind of an ankle breaker, actually...

In our absurd reality, what we do for a living has about as much security as sitting at the Roulette table in Vegas - only with slightly worse odds.

Re-entry has come with the rather ice-cold reality check that getting back in the game... 

is gonna take some serious freakin' hustle.

As our other cruising buddies make their way back home to 401K's safely tucked away or return to reliable professions like nursing or plumbing...

It's gradually becoming apparent why the ocean is not teeming with out-of-work actors and screenwriters toodling around on mid-life sabbaticals.

I'm not knocking what we've gotten ourselves into...

Well, not yet, anyway.

The incredible experiences and adventures we've shared  this past few years together are worth every moment of heart- stopping anxiety that we are now experiencing.

Right?

At least, thats what we tell ourselves when we gaze at those switched-on, bright eyed kids of ours that sparked us to take this whole mad adventure in the first place.

Kai and Hunter don't seem the least bit ruffled by the instability.

Living on a boat gives you that.

We can handle a little turbulence.

It's what you learn from being your own real-life, day-dream believer.

"The Wisdom of Insecurity" is our motto.

( intentional or not)

I'm a card carrying member of whatever club it is that

"... BELIEVES TYING LIFE INTO NEAT LITTLE METAPHORICAL BUNDLES WILL PHILISOPHICALLY SAVE ME FROM FROM BEING DECLARED A RECKLESS IDIOT..."

I venture this comparison:

Having a slightly broken boat, 

that Jon must wizard a way to fix - with no money,

and facing a rather daunting 2200 mile voyage back to the Mainland in the next few weeks,

all while creeping towards utter insolvency...

Is nothing we can't handle.

It's really just like any other adventure.

Sometimes  you can't believe what a lucky scoundrel you are, 

to be out there digging the whole cosmic luau...

AND then there's those times,

when the Great Blue is kicking the snot out of your puny butt,

and it feels like you're sliding headlong to certain doom and everyone you ever knew will certainly be shaking their heads at your epitaph, and muttering;

" Yup. They were always crazy."

So what.

Am I going to sit around a chew my nails and wonder if being forty-six and having no car, no house, no savings,

was the wisest choice one could make?

Sure. 

Some days.

But then there's this;

We went back to Mainland for a few weeks and did the LA rounds, re-connected with our business, saw some family and friends, we also went home to our Island in Canada as a surprise for Kai's 12th birthday...

And everywhere we went...

No one said, 

"what the hell, you guys?"

"What on Earth were you thinking?"

We were met with love.

Everyone told us over and over how inspiring this thing we did was.

They welcomed us with open arms,

Told us not to worry, made us feel like we would make it.

They offered to help us find jobs,

Let us sleep on their couches,

borrow a car while we ran around trying to sort our

lives out and figure out how to ready for our last push home...

We felt like rock stars.

(broke rock stars, who still have to sail a really, really long way to get back home...)

But when we laid in bed at night,

( maybe it was in a tent in my mother-in-laws backyard)

 or woke up in the morning and looked at each other...

(  while staying in my mom's guest room)

We felt pretty good about the whole shifty, 

unstable, chaos of our lives.

And seeing Kai and Hunter back home with their friends, grown and changed but still fitting in and being welcomed by their buddies and all excited about starting school again next year...

Made it seem like, maybe...

it wasn't such a crazy thing to do with our lives.

Sure, it's gonna take some hard work to redefine ourselves and start again...

Basically, from scratch,

but that's part of the deal.

When you set out on that Road less Traveled,

there's not really a shortcut back.

Fingers crossed we get lucky on that roulette wheel...

But the real trick,

is to make coming home as much of an adventure,

as sailing away in the first place :)

The amazing TENT - we spent about six weeks here while trying to hustle work in Hollywood.