Hey to my approximately two readers out there!
Like most of us, I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to be doing during this pandemic.
Probably a push up challenge? But I’m not about to do that (full disclosure: I secretly tried for 3 days and gave up). Maybe re-learn how to play my guitar? But even I don’t want to listen to something that bad.
So during these strange and uncertain times, when I don’t really know what to do (and I’ve always been shit at trying to better myself no matter how hard I try), I’m going to attempt to write down more of my memories and try and forget I’m alone in my apartment and laugh at myself so I don’t have to cry.
Instead of thinking about being trapped here alone, today I’m going to remember the time I was trapped on a boat with 22 people.
SO HERE I GO:
I like to think of myself as a relatively smart person. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to be the next Einstein, but in general, I get by. However, there is nothing that can shake a person’s confidence more than being required to do a “simple” task that “ANYONE can do” and realizing you flat out suck at it. You know, almost getting fired from that job where the only qualification was knowing how to count to 20 or having a panic attack when you need to make simple change for the cashier at Taco Bell? That kind of thing.
I find myself feeling that way a lot. Most of the time I can laugh it off, blame it on being tired or just moving on to the next thing, but occasionally it can really get to me. One thing that has given me some comfort over the years is that I’ve realized it’s not just me that sucks at a lot of very simple “easy tasks.” There are a lot of us who are all stupid. Which leads me to the time I went houseboating with 22 rugby friends. Going houseboating only requires you to be above the age of 18 (check) and to have a driver’s license (check). We were told by NUMEROUS people it was SUPER easy and that ANYONE could drive a houseboat.
All 22 of us had never been houseboating before, but how hard could it be? That being said, we did start to get a little nervous when we realized there was a $10,000 damage deposit, but it’s not like we were going to crash the boat, right?
Two of our friends were designated as the captains who would drive the boat and were given a 20 minute orientation for our 2 storey boat that was equipped with bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a kitchen, living room, and most importantly, a hot tub. The brief orientation went through everything from turning on the boat to changing its oil.
Meanwhile the other 20 of us were running around the boat like crazed hyenas, loading on ridiculous amounts of alcohol and snacks for the weekend (it is truly amazing the boat didn’t sink from the alcohol and salt and vinegar Miss Vickies chips). When I looked at our captains during their orientation, the “what the fuck are you explaining to me” was visible on at least one of their faces. Despite that, miraculously we were able to dock for the first night without too many issues and were ready to start the weekend!
We had been planning this trip for over a year so we were ready to party HARD all weekend long!!! So naturally we spent the first night watching She’s the Man and falling asleep before midnight. #hereforyouAmandaBynes
Due to our early bedtime and the fact that we had all squished so tightly into the boat, we were up at the crack of dawn. We started by taking the stakes holding the boat in place out of the beach. As well intended as that might have been – we quickly learned that that was apparently not the right approach. Maybe if any of us knew anything about boats or common sense we would have also realized that if the boat isn’t turned on and isn’t tethered to anything… it seems that floating things start moving with the water. Moving in ways that maybe you didn’t expect or anticipate, like, for example, moving directly towards the boat docked beside you.
Suddenly we realized we were heading directly towards a serious collision and there was ZERO way we could afford our damage deposit! I wish I could say we handled it cooly and calmly and kept our shit together, but we did the opposite. We lost our fucking shit.
“TURN ON THE BOAT. THIS IS GOING TO BE TITANTIC WITH AN ICEBERG REAL QUICK!” (Side note: All of our earlier Titanic jokes were not having the same comedic appeal in this particular moment).
“WE CAN’T GET IT TO TURN ON!”
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU CAN’T TURN IT ON- YOU’RE THE CAPTAINS!”
Basically it was mutiny. That may not have been an exact play-by-play of what happened, especially because I got so stressed out by the high tensions that I had run upstairs to hide, but it is the general idea. I knew I had to leave the situation because I had absolutely zero capability to help. I barely know how to drive my car, let alone a massive boat of 22 people. At least I can now confirm that I am 100% useless in a crisis- which is something I had never tested, but always suspected.
Our captains started paging the main port frantically on our boat radio to get advice. I guess the radio also had an important function rather than just yelling “I’m the king of the world” over the radio waves. Weird. (#leoforever)
FINALLY, from the safety of my hiding spot, I heard the engine come on!
I let out a sigh of relief “Oh thank God- We’ll be fine!”….Or so I thought.
By now our boat was only a few feet from our neighbouring boat and completely parallel to the shore. The people on the boat next to us had come out of their boat and started taking pictures. My immediate reaction was UGH, how embarrassing – This is going to be something they post on their Facebook pages captioned: “group of idiot girls can’t even drive a boat in a straight line,” but I quickly realized, this had nothing to do with publicly shaming us. It was for liability purposes! One of our captains had told me the one thing they did remember from their orientation was that they were advised to take pictures if another boat damaged your boat! WE were THAT boat!
I thought that once the engine was on we would just be able to sail away, but all of the sudden I realized we were moving even closer to the boat and it almost seemed like we were purposely trying to hit the boat behind us. Was I on a suicide boat mission that I didn’t realize?! I thought I trusted these girls!?? I ran downstairs to where my friends were still anxiously snapping at each other.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“It’s different than driving a car- we’re stuck between the boat and a bunch of rocks!”
In a mad panic half of us jumped into the water half clothed and tried pushing the boat away from the shore, but it seemed to only be making things worse! But luckily, just as we were at our breaking point, our saviour was on their way.
Someone on the boat next to us (which we were about to hit) actually knew how to drive a boat! How convenient! They came out to the shore and directed one of our friends. She had a take-charge attitude and got shit done so she took control of the driving and followed this kind stranger’s instructions. Our friend safely maneuvered the boat away from the neighbouring boat with only a few feet between them. We were FINALLY free! We were basically saved by a modern day Jack Dawson (minus the third class dancing and steamy sex scene).
I wish I could say it was smooth sailing from then on out, but that would be too simple. We didn’t hit any other boats on the trip (BONUS), but we certainly realized driving a houseboat wasn’t necessarily as easy as we thought and definitely had a few other bumps and stabbed eyeballs along the road. Also, in addition to being the most unstable sailors on the lake, we were probably some of the craziest and got into some other questionable trouble. Like I said, we could all be kind of dumb…but those are stories for another day 😉
And now I’m going to go and spend the 15 hours it takes to re-watch Titanic.
lisa prose 