Ok so you might think I’m crazy. But let me tell you, my hands have never been so completely and thoroughly twitchy and nervously on guard for the inevitable grab.

Living on a boat PROS:

• new adventures

• diverse learning opportunities

• family togetherness

Living on a boat CONS:

• there are a million things you have to do for the first time

• you always have to learn new things

• feeling like 3 sweaty bodies are constantly trying to climb back into my uterus

New adventures / the million things you have to do for the first time.

One of the people who knows me best is Liz Lusk, business partner, best bud and a very good judge of character (she did choose me after all hahaha) …once, for a laugh as we struggled to re-write the dreaded personal bios for our website, we answered 10 questions about the other person and then shared our responses (yes we are geeks and this was super fun for us). In Liz’s responses about me she pointed out that while I’m fairly skilled at getting people to change their practice or learn something new, I absolutely HATE change myself and will do anything to avoid doing something for the first time.

Well sh*t. You can’t have new adventures (which I want… I am grateful for the life we had in Milton, however, walking the same sidewalks everyday in our subdivision was mind-numbing at times) without an ongoing barrage of first-time anxiety. I’m pretty good at talking myself out of having to onboard the new printer software, or changing to the new pizza place but I can’t really talk myself out of taking the boat out of the slip for the first time or we’d get stuck here all winter! But man, did I ever try. There were 735 reasons not to go. But I know myself well and I know when I’ll fast-talking nonsense so we got Matriarch out the other day - Thank F*&%. Now, taking the boat out isn’t new, it’s newish. Newish is a much more comfortable place for me to exist. Newish means I have done it once and therefore can do it again. Newish means that soon it won’t even be that…in case you are wondering the last phase is “Old Hat”.

Diverse learning opportunities / you always have to learn new things

Ugh. There is a reason I have chosen people in my life who are pretty different from me in some key ways. Greg, and Liz for that matter, research the HELL out of stuff. They both like to be well-versed in as many things as possible and will read read read read read until they find the dusty corners of the internet. It is very useful to have people in your life who do this. I love learning and can be veracious about it; however, if it’s a topic that I HAVE to learn about rather than a topic I WANT to learn about I am much more of a whiner.

On a boat there is a limit to how much I can avoid this. Greg can’t / shouldn’t do all the research himself and yet there are so many things to learn, become well-versed on and then be capable of applying when sh*t gets real offshore. The upside is that we are relatively young in this world sailing and there are many many wise, grey and salty sailors who LOVE giving us youngsters advice. I’m hoping I can have 80 years of experience, research and general know-how jammed into my brain in the next few months by way of all the helpful people we meet and then I inevitably talk to for hours. Talking with people who know stuff is my absolutely favourite way to research :)

Family togetherness / feeling like 3 sweaty bodies are constantly trying to climb back into my uterus

This is for real. FOR REAL. Look we’ve always been a close family. Lots of kisses, hugs, snuggles, heads tucked up into armpits and hand holding. The kids are super affectionate and I love it.

Mostly love it.

Other times it makes me want to shake them off in a crazy Elaine-from-Seinfeld dance and if they land in the water oh well. Bad mom alert! The kids have gone from lovingly affectionate to borderline co-dependant / compulsive touching. Like they seriously have to have a hand on us AT. ALL. TIMES.

Hair stroking, neck kisses, petting…I do not like these. Hanging on my arm because I am carrying stuff in my hands…I do not like this. Holding onto my shirt because the stuff I’m carrying required my arms this time…I do not like this. Having one kid on each hand so that we make a crazy wide hoard of people taking up the entire dock, not to mention running the risk of someone falling off the edge and taking the other two with them…I do not like this.

I’m not kidding. I’ve shooed off neck massages while pooping. WTF.

So (big shocker) now I find myself shaking the kids off and asking them to give me a bit of space. This works for a short while, depending on the kid. No joke, in a span of 2 minutes I asked Aden 6 times to give me some space and that my hands just want to be left alone right now because a few seconds would go by and she would grab my hand again. Completely innocently and absentmindedly. But it still drove me nuts. It happened so many times in a row that it got to be crazy and funny and then Greg took pity on her so she hanged off of him for a while while I twirled around the parking lot in a moment of freedom (jk jk…or am I?).

As we hit the 5 week (or so) mark of living aboard I am trying to tell myself that they are adjusting too. Maybe they are a bit insecure and being physically close to us is comforting and they don’t realize it.

Or maybe we’ve created a bunch of touch monsters that don’t understand personal space and make my hands hyperventilate in anticipation of being suffocated every time we step off the boat onto the dock.