SURVIVING MARRIAGE AT SEA
Many of my captain friends that have cruised with their wives have told me that “if your marriage can survive the first six months of cruising, then you are in the clear,” I am finding this theory to hold true. While I knew that this adventure was not going to be an easy task, I did not expect the level of unorganized stress to be this high. One would hope that life at sea would be like the movies; husband and wife with a cocktail in hand, watching the sun go down with soft music playing in the background. The mornings would be the same except your hand would be holding a cup of coffee. Dreams.
The reality of the situation is that yes, there are times that those dreamy movie like moments happen, but most of the time you are down in the trenches fixing mechanical issues, cooking, cleaning or provisioning. Long story short; it is very hard work. Most of my close friends cannot even fathom the idea of being confined on a floating object in the middle of the wide open sea. A surprisingly large amount of them say it seems very claustrophobic, but to me it offers a complete sense of freedom. Braden and I seem to find our groove out on the water amongst the episodes of sea sickness, mechanical issues and screaming children. We must be suckers for self inflicted punishment?
Life becomes very simple out on the water. The daily stress that existed on land for us is eliminated from our relationship. Our focus on one another has become immediate. There is no pushing it aside because we are a team. Our life depends on peaceful cohabitation. Literally. We are not only confined in a small space together, but our stresses are now linear and straightforward, instead of scattered and unorganized. We must make decisions on charting, repairs, meal plans, homeschool, exercise and entertainment instead of accommodating many other social calendars, traffic, work meetings ect. For us, it just works better.
Our biggest hurdle right now is figuring out what our overall purpose for this journey is? Why are we doing this to our family? What are we hoping to accomplish? And the biggest stressor of all is will we financially be able to maintain this lifestyle? I hope these answers will start to unfold as we continue on this path together. While it appears that we have all of the answers, I can assure you that we do not. We jumped blindly, some say irresponsibly in this lifestyle, with great ambition that it will eventually all come together. We are unsure of our purpose, but is anyone? Are we not all on the same inevitable path? In the end we are all preparing for our expiration date; deciding what mark we want to make on this planet? We have the great ability to leave behind both posterity as well as poignant and valuable information that lead our human race towards a more advanced species. Purpose goes so far beyond a single marital relationship, and yet the success of that single martial relationship is very crucial in the historical outcome for future populations. So when friends, family and passing strangers ask us both how our marriage survives and what our purpose in choosing this alternative lifestyle is; you may now see why delivering a sensible answer is extremely challenging.