Sea time

This year marked my five year anniversary on Pioneer, and I decided it was time to count up my sea time. It also has been the year I was promoted to relief mate, and I did not want to see that advance as the apex of my sailing career; I needed to look forward to what was next. Over two days I poured through the Pioneer logs dating back to 2005, and did some accounting of my time so far. I haven't tallied it up yet, but I'm hoping that by the end of next season, I'll be able to have the 180 days for a mate's license.

As I was looking through the logs, I wanted to tie dates to certain memories that I have on the boat. There is a certain tedium of looking through five years of logs, endless pages of different handwriting, some good, some really atrocious. I had to find some way of entertaining myself.

July 16, 2005: My first training sail. I had found the boat through a co-worker at Rafael Vinoly Architects, Elaine. She had organized a charter for our office at the end of a substantial deadline, and I went along. I don't remember the exact date of the charter, but it was in June. One of the crew members kept talking to Elaine and I, he mostly trying to convince me that I just had to come and volunteer. I had never sailed before, thought I was completely unqualified, but figured I'd give it a try. I was looking for something else to do outside of work; at the time, I felt that work was all I talked about. I guess that's what happens when you're somewhere 10-12 hours a day.

September 17, 2005: the Mayor's Cup. I was not on this sail, but it's become legendary - t-shirts have been made in tribute. The incident report was in the log, and it was interesting to read an account of the collision. Briefly, it goes something like this: "Schooner Adirondack collides into starboard side of vessel abeam race boat. No serious injuries, 2 stantions bent, lifelines parted."

May 27th, 2006: The first time I was on the boat with Barbee and Tom, two people who have become very important to me. In looking back, I remember each of them being on the boat, but my memory doesn't have them together.

August 13, 2006: My first day back on the boat in eight weeks. I had sprained my ankle in June of that year playing soccer, and really screwed it up trying to play tennis the next day. The doctor had told me that I really needed to stay off of it for six weeks, and that turned into eight weeks away from Pioneer. After the sail, a couple of us went to Fresh Salt. It was the first day I'd spent a lot of time on my feet, my ankle was sore, and Tommy, the mate, offered to give me a foot massage. Barbee was also on this sail, and I gave him the impression that I was a cold person. I didn't know him very well, and have always been reserved around people (especially men) that I don't know.

2007 Season: This was the year that I started sailing more regularly, and Barbee became my mentor. Lots of memories, lots of training - too much to list here. This was also the season I became more confident about my skills.

May 24, 2008: During the week before, Magno, the chief mate at the time, called and asked if I could be deckhand for one of the evening sails that week. I told him that I wasn't a deckhand yet, and he told me that something needed to be done about that. On this training sail a couple of days later, Fielding and Captain Glenn Mariano ran me ragged, having me complete almost the entire deckhand checklist in one sail. After the sail, Magno asked how things went, and whether I was interested in the position. It's what I had been working towards, so of course I said yes. I was physically spent, and went to Fresh Salt and had a huge pile of pancakes, completely content.

May 30, 2008: My first sail as a deckhand. Captain Malcolm Martin was at the helm for that sail.

September 12, 2009: There had been a lot of talk of when I was going to be promoted to mate as I was almost done with my checklist. On this sail, Tom was mate, and decided to give me the opportunity to be acting mate for the sail.

August 11, 2010: Captain Richard Dorfman had called me on August 2nd to offer me the promotion to mate, and this was my first sail in that position. My first sail was scheduled to be on Friday the 13th, but the mate on the 11th was sick, so I filled in.