Joy From the Journey

Hello world!  We’ve been a bit busy lately – pretty sure I write that every week – but it’s true!  We’ve not been out on the water much with Steve working, trying to get the propane locker done, and just everyday life popping up in the midst of it all.  

To be honest, writing the blog every week is really what makes me slow down.  It helps me appreciate things we’ve accomplished, even if they’re small and somewhat unnoteworthy.  Simply acknowledging that I’m so lucky to spend my days with my person and our pup on a boat feels so good.  Although it’s not always sunshine and rainbows, but we do our best to make it feel that way more often than not.

Steve and I are a great team.  We work together, have the other’s best interests in mind, and do our absolute best to achieve things for ourselves (individually and in the relationship) and for the boat every day.  We’re always 100% there for each other, especially when things feel heavy.  However, we do process and figure things out in a much different sense.  The way his mind works when completing a project is not even close to mine, so there’s a lot of “What do you mean by that?”  “You want this to go where?”  “Can you just draw it out for me?”

Clearly, we’ve been through this enough to know how to better communicate our questions (for the most part).  It’s super relevant because we’ve been figuring out how to make the propane locker and thus working on it all weekend.  The thing is, once we figure out who is better at what tasks, we divide and conquer. That, my friends, is the beauty of a good team.  

Now, it’s not always as smooth as I just wrote it out for you. There is quite a bit of confusion and frustration mixed in, but the best part is getting to do it together, whether it goes smoothly or not.  Because once we fix that locker, once it is done and in our back lazarette with the oven hooked up to it ready to be used, it will be something to celebrate.  

When I asked what people would like us to talk about every week on our Instagram (@mentallysailing), a lot of people wanted to know how it worked living with your significant other, why you wanted to, and how living in a small space worked.  Well, Steve is my best friend, so of course I want to live with him.  We actually do really well with the small space, and it’s enough room that if we do want to work in separate spaces we can.

Working with anyone is hard.  You have to get to know their work ethic, how they like to do things and how fast they want them done, etc.  It’s pretty much the same with your partner, you just also love each other enough to figure it out before someone drives the other crazy. (For the record, we never drive each other crazy. No way 😉

Main point:  It’s so wonderful to live a dream with someone you care so much about, and I’m not just talking about Buoy.  So, make it work, put in the time, communicate, and it’ll figure itself out.  The dream isn’t so far out of reach, and honestly, it’s the journey that matters.  You have to first enjoy where you’ve started, what you’re doing throughout the experience, and where you end up.  Truth is, I don’t know exactly what our end goal is or where we’ll “end up”.  This “dream” I keep talking about?  It’s really more of the journey, which is what I’m currently living.  Whether we live on the boat for the next ten years or sell it after a couple of seasons and move somewhere else (ya know, maybe with ground under our feet instead of water), we’ll be doing it together.  That is the adventure.  That is what makes it exciting and fun and full of joy.  

Maybe you love adventuring with someone or by yourself, as long as you feel joy from the journey you’ll be living out your dream.

THIS WEEK:

Woohoo!  Hello and goodbye to the first week in August!  We have been busy cooking pizza on the grill, finding jellyfish in our AC (again), saying “she’s so cute” every time we look at Buoy sunning on the deck, taking long walks, hiding out from the rain, and working on our propane locker.  Talk about a full week!

Hope you enjoyed my splurge, see you next week.

Skye