Our vessel Brigadoon has been sold to a fellow from Ohio. Jack is a farmer, has a barn to work in, and a 40-foot flatbed trailer with truck. He is also a sailor who has been missing his former C&C sailboat. We wish him luck with this project and will be glad when we hear that our boat is sailing once again. It goes without saying that we miss Brigadoon terribly.
We are in Texas, but hope to be back on the road soon and back in the Puget Sound area by September. It has been very difficult to return to life ashore. We both still have a hard time sleeping without the motion and sound of the water and find it very uncomfortable to wear shoes. The so-called “normal life” seems anything but and we find it hard to believe that people can actually live and work that way. Obtaining and preparing our vehicle has been a real drag and it is still in the shop at this time. Everything seems so expensive, often unnecessary, and usually ridiculous. I have had to stop watching TV news ... it is too depressing.
I have learned a few things from our ordeal, at least: First, do not buy a newer car. As we have painfully found out, everything, including shifting of the transmission, is operated by computer modules. They are expensive and difficult to find for a vehicle 10 years old!
Second, (and surely a controversial subject,) pay rapt attention to your feelings. After having languished for almost two weeks in Carrabelle awaiting the right weather and wind, we set forth for Alligator Harbor and hence to Crystal River, Ft. Myers, and the Keys. This good weather and wind window began on Friday. With some trepidation and against my feelings, we sailed on that Friday, not wanting to waste any of this brief opportune window. You can’t know how much we both regret that step.
I should say here that I have never been overly superstitious, but from experience I learned that sometimes we ought to think about those things we don’t understand, and especially when we have strong feelings about things. As a former computer programmer, I am a pretty rational person (most of the time) but I have also become to believe that there are things going on in our universe that we just cannot fathom.
Most of us who are sailors have probably heard of seaman’s superstitions and laughed. My friend and former boss, Captain Rick Miles, is a former Gloucester fisherman of much experience, and I have sailed with him on his two most-recent vessels, including one trip across the Atlantic Ocean. I have seen Capt. Miles tell paying passengers to stop whistling on his ship (unlucky and likely to “whistle up a storm.”) I well remember one trip back in 2001 working aboard the schooner Timberwind, out of Maine. We had two ministers on that trip, something that the old-time sailors believed unlucky. I never gave that one much credence, but the day the pastors boarded our ship, the weather turned foggy and rainy and stayed that way all the time they were on board (four days.) As soon as they departed Timberwind in Rockport, the sun came out and we again enjoyed the beautiful Maine summer! It impressed me.
I have normally tried never to leave port on a Friday. something abhorrent to the old “tars.” Why tempt Fate, you know? But, in our haste to get underway, I shoved my feelings aside and we left Carrabelle that Friday. You already know the rest of the story.
So, I would strongly suggest, my Friends, stay in port on Friday. Read a book, work on rigging, do something besides sail off into possible tragedy.
Below are some quotes from Legends and superstitions of the sea and of sailors in all lands and at all times. - Fletcher S. Bassett, Lieutenant, U. S. Navy. (This book is available in full to read on Google Books.)
Fair Winds and Following Seas,
Skip
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“But Friday is of all days the one proverbially unlucky for sailors. Its bad character on shore is well known, and we should not wonder that it also obtained such at sea.”
‘Cooper says of a certain hero: "As for sailing on Friday, that was out of the question. No one did that in 1798, who could help it." Brand tells that a London merchant said, in 1790, that no one would begin any business or voyage on Friday. Thatcher writes, in 1821: " Seldom would a seaman then sail on Friday." And Cheever, in 1827: " He (the sailor) will never go to sea on Friday, if he can help it."‘
“Finn and Breton sailors deem it an unlucky day to sail. Gloucester fishermen still believe it an unlucky thing to sail on Friday. “
Many instances are told of disasters on Friday, strengthening the sailor in his belief. The English ship ''Captain " sailed on Friday, and was lost with her great crew. It is said the admiralty did not venture to send the next ship sailing after her loss, the Agincourt, to sea on that fatal day.’
The Amazon, a West India packet, the troop-ship Birkenhead, and the packet Golden Gate, sailed on this unlucky day, and were lost, with great sacrifice of life.
The United States ship Idaho left New York, on a cruise to China, on Friday, much to the disgust of the old sailors. Three weeks afterward, a fire broke out in the after magazine, and this was accredited to her sailing on Friday, and her subsequent encounter with a terrific typhoon, and the loss of her sails and spars, were cited as confirmatory facts.
The ill-fated Huron sailed on Friday, and this list could be extended at will."
(Legends and superstitions of the sea and of sailors in all lands and at all times. …. - Fletcher S. Bassett, Lieutenant, U. S. Navy.)
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