The Serenity Prayer or Neibhur’s Prayer starts with an almost universally recongized: God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. My friend Grant wrote that being a twin isn’t always easy, but he wouldn’t trade it [...]
Today, I had cheese stuffed tortellini for the first time in over a decade. It is strange, but I didn’t realize that I hadn’t bought or made this type of pasta in over ten years, even though it was always one of my favorites. It was also a dish that I cooked a lot for [...]
Happy New Year’s Eve to all my friends and family. This is the last day of the year and I, for one, am very happy to see 2011 end. I hope the New Year brings all of you success, health and happiness. I hope that 2012 will be a better year for many of us. [...]
A little over ten-and-a-half years ago, Gee came home for the last time. It was Thursday, June 7th, 2001. She had been released from the hospital, where she had been since May 28th, Memorial Day, for home hospice care. As I carried her into the house, what she said to me was bittersweet. She said, [...]
Wishing all my family and friends a very Happy Thanksgiving. May this holiday find all of you happy, healthy and safe. I ask that my beloved weather goddess watch over all of you during your travels this week. May you all have safe journeys to warm hearths and berths this week. Even though this has [...]
Tomorrow, I will give Ellie’s mother all the documentation I have about why I believe that Ellie is ill and needs help. I hope that the reasoning and conclusions that I came up with as well as all the evidence that I have, in Ellie’s own words, from my conversations with her, and from my [...]
I found this definition of Querencia on a website: “In Spanish, querencia describes a place where one feels safe, a place from which one’s strength of character is drawn, a place where one feels at home.” I have always defined it as it was taught to me by a friend many years ago–home of the [...]
I’m lying on the foredeck of my friend’s sailboat, thinking about and missing Ellie. When she was younger, she used to love sleeping on the foredeck of S/V Pretty Gee. She also used to curl up under the dodger, above the S/V Pretty Gee’s companionway. Right now, she appears to be missing in action and [...]
Tomorrow, I head down to Connecticut for the annual summer cruise on my friend’s boat s/v Slight Breeze for a nine-day cruise. This will be the second year I am participating in his summer cruise. He asked me along last year when one of his normal crew, and the only other sailor in the crew, [...]
Over the past few weeks, I’ve received a lot of support and love from friends that I met via online sailing forums and through blogging. While many of these friendships started out on the Internet, I have been lucky to meet quite a few of them in real life as well. They range across a [...]
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The other day I was in West Marine, picking up some supplies for s/v Pretty Gee. There was a bucket of assorted candies at the register, so I dug through it to find the miniature Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. The cashier commented that those seemed to the be most popular candy they had in the [...]
Recently, I encountered something that is quite upsetting. One of my neighbors has been very aggressively requesting donations for the American Cancer Society. While I am a huge fan of the American Cancer Society and all the good work they do, I think that the behavior of Carolyn Burke is way over the line. She [...]
Earlier this year I was asked by John and Lorie if I could help them with moving their boat, s/v Felix, south for the winter. Since the sailing season here in New England was over, and they are good friends, I volunteered to help with the leg from Norfolk, VA to Belhaven, NC. After discussing [...]
s/v Felix has made it to Norfolk, which is their first major stopover point on their winter cruise south. I understand that John, Lorie and Chris will be staying in Norfolk for a few weeks, outfitting the boat and getting her ready for the next leg of their trip south. They’re actually only a few [...]
I’m happy to report that s/v Felix is headed south for the winter. John, Lorie, and Chris have headed for Norfolk, VA, as their first major destination, with plans of heading south to Florida’s Gulf Coast eventually. Norm, my friend who captained a section of the delivery from Annapolis to Marion back in May, is [...]
Well, this past weekend, had me working on three different boats on three different days. Three days and three different boats—Saturday: an O’Day Javelin; Sunday: an O’Day 302; Monday: a Gemini 105Mc Catamaran. It started out on Saturday, when I was helping my friend’s son and a friend with the O’Day Javelin that they bought [...]
Got a message from a friend of mine that he was going to be stuck at Logan Airport for a couple hours and asked if I could meet him and have coffee at the airport. Since I wasn’t that far from the airport and could take the time off, I decided to head over there. [...]
Today, I was working at my friend’s company and a strange thing happened. When she walked in, she asked me to take a look at some photos that were on her cell phone. On her way into the office, she had passed a sailboat for sale. She wanted to know what I thought of it. [...]
Originally, my plans for the Fourth of July were to go and anchor out in Buzzards Bay, just outside the New Bedford Hurricane Barrier, and watch the fireworks over Fort Phoenix. I changed those plans because there was supposed to be a 70% chance of thunderstorms and the New Bedford Hurricane Barrier was going to [...]
Seven years, seven months and seven days ago was one of the happiest days of my life. It was November 4, 2000, and I married the most amazing woman I’ve ever met. I knew I was going to marry her the very first time I heard her voice. It is difficult to believe that today, [...]
My friend Alex was stuck up in New Hampshire for work. He lives in Portugal, but occasionally visits New England because of his job. Since I had some boat hardware for his boat, I went by his hotel yesterday to drop it off. Alex looked miserable, sailing withdrawal… Since my boat isn’t quite ready to [...]
Today is always a day of mixed memories for me. Twenty years ago today, my identical twin brother, David, was killed by a drunken driver just outside of Nashville, Tennesee. The drunk driver only got 90 days suspended due to the incompetence of the police department that handled the accident investigation. It took the police [...]
Well, I am an uncle again. Earlier this month, my new niece was born. Abigail Kim Morrissey is the first grandchild in my in-laws family, and I am very happy to be an uncle again. She was born on August 1, 2007 and weighed six pounds and 13 ounces. Her mother is my sister-in-law, Michele. [...]
I’d like to wish two very special people a Happy Father’s Day today. They are my father and my father-in-law, Gee’s father. These are two of the most important people in my life, and I don’t believe that I tell them this enough. My father-in-law honored my in a way that I had never expected. [...]
This past weekend, we celebrated Brad’s birthday. Brad was the best man at my wedding and one of my three closest friends. I was the best man at his wedding a few years ago. He and I met in a journalism class at Northeastern, many years ago. He needed a photographer who could ski, and [...]
In the last week I’ve had some friends and family visit Boston and the surrounding area. My friend Cindy, who lives in New Mexico, was in town for a training last week. One aunt and uncle came here from Honduras to celebrate my mother’s birthday. Another friend, Alex from Portugal, has been working up in [...]
Today is my nephew Nicholas’s sixth birthday. He is very excited to be six. My sister had a massive party with tons of his friends. I avoided the party… that many five and six-year-olds are way too noisy for me. It is also the forty-something birthday of one of my best friends, Brian. He’s over [...]
This morning, I awoke to find another Valentine’s Day card from Gee. The world outside my window was blanketed in a fresh New England snowstorm. I guess it is her way of wishing me a Happy Valentine’s Day, and reminding me that not only is today Valentine’s Day, but also her birthday. She would have [...]
As many of my blog readers also read Tillerman’s Proper Course blog, I thought I’d share an interesting discovery. I am indirectly connected to him, and his family. I just got a comment, as did he, from his daughter-in-law, Anne. Anne just realized that I am Debbi’s little brother. Debbi and Kathy, Anne’s older sister, [...]