Be Our Guest - Sherry Galey

by Dotti

About the time I was thinking about whom to invite to be our February guest, I read on Sherry Galey’s blog, Still and All, that she and her husband were getting ready to leave their home in Canada for points south in Florida to spend the winter on their boat. I don’t know about you, but this is a dream that captivates my imagination and I wanted to hear more about it so I asked Sherry  to be our guest today. Sherry is a longtime member of our FOL family and I think you’ll enjoy her story and getting to know her a little better. Please join me in welcoming Sherry to our pages today. {In addition to her blog which I’ve linked above, you can see more of Sherry’s beautiful photography on her Flickr photostream.}

Lessons from a life afloat...

She must find a boat and sail in it. No guarantee of shore. Only a conviction that what she wanted could exist, if she dared to find it.

                                                                                                                                  Jeanette Winterson

Lesson 1: Find a way to do what makes you come alive

For the past three winters, I’ve been living a dream on a 36-foot sailboat called Windsong II – and sharing it with Bob and Charles, our Westie. We’re not fans of cold weather so we’ve chosen to spend our time away from the snow, ice, freezing temperatures of our Canadian winters. Lately, this has meant going to Florida but we hope to explore the Bahamas, too.

Our dream didn’t materialize overnight, and it didn’t come easily. We took risks, We made sacrifices. We climbed steep learning curves. But without a doubt, it has all been worth it.

Everything started with a wake up call some 11 years ago. 

One hot summer day, Bob, the love of my life, suffered a sudden heart attack while painting. Happily, he recovered well, but the scare made us both take stock. We resolved to stop taking our life and health for granted. Neither of us wanted to reach the end of the line only to realize that we had failed to honour the deepest longings of our hearts. 

Soon afterward, Bob retired and started pursuing his boyhood dream of learning to sail. I joined him in that and also began to seriously explore my lifelong fascination with photography. These were passions we had both put on hold until "later." We launched an ongoing conversation about how we could spend more time together doing more of what each of us loved best. 

Luckily, sailing and photography are a match made in heaven. But I was still on the treadmill of a demanding communications job, and it wasn't immediately obvious how I could get off and we could make our dreams come true. I knew deep inside, though, that if we were 100% committed, with a bit daring, creativity and hard work, we could find a way. 

So we kept brainstorming, researching and crunching numbers until a plan was hatched. It involved trading a house in the city for a house in a small town and a sailboat.  

Fast forward to January 2012. I had retired -- which, after 30 years in the workforce, felt a bit like jumping off a cliff without a parachute -- and after an intensive search, we found the right boat for us in southeast Florida. 

Adventure beckoned in our new floating home -- and I was ready with my camera to capture it.

Lesson 2: Your real home is where you feel most in touch with who you are

Martha Beck says that "Heading towards your inner home will take you places—both inside yourself and in the external world—which your heart will recognize as its native environment, even though you have never been there before."

I'd never lived on a boat before. And it's not for everyone, that's for sure. Some people just aren't cut out for fitting a whole life into less square footage than a two-car garage, with only a fraction of the clothes, furniture, appliances, books, gizmos, gadgets, decorations and keepsakes that ordinarily surround us. And I get that.

But living a simpler life with fewer possessions gives me energy and makes me feel free. And what makes me feel free is what makes me feel most at home. This is my heart's native environment.

On a sailboat I'm also closer to nature. I can't help being more attuned to the environment. I practically live outside. My days are longer and slower so I am more present to my experiences. I delight in more sunrises and more sunsets than ever before. When it rains I feel the drops trickle down my face. I stand in awe of the power of the sea. I notice the phases of the moon and the tides. I gaze up in wonder at the stars and feel humbled. I feel the water supporting me as the boat rocks me to sleep. 

And I'm always acutely aware of the strength and direction of the the wind. Or I should be.

That leads me to Lesson 3: Pay attention to the details

Weather is everything on a boat. A few years ago we forgot that.

After a couple of beautiful days at anchor on the way to the Florida Keys we became complacent and failed to check the the weather forecast. The east wind was clocking to the south and increasing to gale force. I huddled in terror in the aft cabin, afraid that our anchor would let go and we would be blown God knows where in the pitch blackness, while Bob watched the GPS like a hawk to see if we were moving. Neither of us got a wink of sleep. I made peace with death that night. We stayed put, thank heavens, but needless to say we didn't make that mistake again.

Paying greater attention to details has helped my photography too. I used to think that it was enough to vaguely aim my camera at an interesting subject and just click. I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't even notice where the shadows were falling or what was going on in the background. I didn't look closely enough. I didn't see clearly enough. My senses weren't sharp enough.

That has changed some after much study, practice and experience. I'm definitely more aware of how details affect an image -- like the time of day, the direction of the light, the temperature of the light, the angle of a face, the tilt of a head, the softness of the background, the juxtaposition of the tones, the precise point of focus…

I understand better now that the overall feeling, mood, message, and story of an image are really the sum total of all the little details that make it up. And that my open, loving awareness can encompass it all.

These are only a few of the many lessons I've learned from my life afloat. I've also discovered the joys of self-sufficiency and community and letting go, but those are stories for another day...