Seven at Sea

by Erik Orton

  “We can make T-shirts that say, ‘We put the O in chromosome,’” he said. O for Orton. I smiled through my tears. I quit wasting time worrying and started learning. Along with Lily’s diagnosis came speech therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, and play therapy. Over the next two years, while Erik created by day, earned by night, and occasionally chauffeured buddies to sail, the older kids and I fitted our lives to Lily’s eight weekly therapy appointments.

  We had taken two steps forward toward autonomy. This therapy schedule felt like one step back, but we were all happy to take it. Lily’s siblings were her biggest cheerleaders. Karina read and sang to her. Alison tickled her. SJ bounced with her on an exercise ball. Eli loved to hold her. They all mimicked her squishy faces. We raved about every incremental success—not only Lily’s success; each child’s success. Obviously, Lily’s path would be atypical. She helped me realize each of my children would progress at his or her own pace. I quit expecting them to achieve on a predetermined schedule. This meant less worry about timed milestones and more focus on interests and strengths.

  With therapy, the kids and I stayed close to home on weekdays. In between, we bounced from co-op to playdates, playgrounds to the local library. Saturdays were our family days. Sometimes, Erik took a vanload of friends sailing. It wasn’t much to ask. On Sundays, we all attended church. Erik and I volunteered in our local congregation. That was part of what made life abundant. Our days were full and our routine worked—for now.

  ERIK

  I was born in late March. March is technically still winter, but—inspired by the Nortons—I thought a great way to celebrate my birthday would be to go sailing. Emily thought I was crazy. Steve, who rented out boats in the Bronx, was always happy to make a buck, so he kept one twenty-three-foot boat in the water that time of year. Emily wanted to make my birthday dreams come true, so she joined me in City Island on the last day of winter, which I prefer to think of as the first day of spring.

  There was another, equally “enthusiastic” guy who also wanted to sail. Steve insisted we take him with us on our date. Steve didn’t want anyone sailing alone in the still-very-cold water. It wasn’t the most romantic date, but we did get a good piece of intel. Our new sailing buddy told us about another sailing option that might be a better fit for our family.

  The New York Sailing School was farther up the Long Island Sound. They offered classes but were mostly a club. Members could sail as often as they liked for a flat monthly fee: $160 a month between April and October.

  I did some research and pitched it to Emily. “Since we’ve already done ASA 101, our entire family could join for roughly the cost of basic cable TV. Did I mention it’s a flat monthly fee?”

  “Really?” she said. “So anyone could give up cable and join a yacht club?!”

  “Pretty much.” We didn’t have cable, but that was beside the point. “And you do realize, since we don’t mind sailing when it’s colder, we could really get our money’s worth.”

  “You mean, since you don’t mind,” Emily said. I seemed to be the only one who liked bundling up in coats, scarves, gloves, and hats to go sailing. Weird.

  We splurged on a full set of life vests and started taking the kids sailing nearly every week.

  People assumed we were loaded. In reality, I had an average income that Emily stretched to fit a larger-than-average family in an expensive city. We weren’t money-rich, but we figured time with our kids was its own kind of wealth. We did the math on the intangibles and decided it was worth it.

  The boats at NYSS were called Sonars and were a lot like the boat at Toms River—about twenty-three feet long, a small jib sail at the bow, and a mainsail in the middle. The varnish on the wooden tiller was weather-worn and sometimes gave me splinters, but it did the job. Parallel benches lined the open cockpit. There was a small “below-deck” cubby that held a couple of sail bags, a bailing bucket, and some extra life vests. Jane would tuck in there with Eli and Lily to keep them out of the way while Emily and I rigged the sails with Karina and Alison.

  Those day sails were a bit of a production: getting five kids ready with snacks, first aid kit, ginger candies, seven life vests, sunscreen, etc. Emily and I hiked to wherever we’d most recently found parking on the street and piled the kids into the van. Then there was getting from the van to the dock: stairs, vending machines, random cats wandering the docks, coils of rope, hoses. Any distraction could derail our train. Then we piled into the launch for a ride out to the boats in the mooring field. Lily had learned to walk, so the main goal was to keep her seated. After pulling up alongside, we transferred everybody and everything to a sailboat. Once we finished our sail, we repeated the whole thing in reverse.

  Getting cable would have been easier.

  We sailed with the NYSS for the next three years.

  I came to love those sailing days. Cell service was lousy, so Emily and I didn’t worry about getting calls or checking emails. The kids didn’t have phones yet. There was nowhere else to go and nothing else to do except be together for three hours. We read books aloud. We played question games. We sang a lot of songs, preferably ones that involved nautical terms and stomping. We all became better sailors.

  Everyone had a chance to steer the boat and trim the sails. I gave Alison control of the tiller and said, “Okay, you’re driving.” She sat up a little straighter and did her best not to smile too wide. We practiced man-overboard drills and heaving to.2 One week we’d head up the sound. The next week we’d head down the sound. We tacked and jibbed, sailed wing-on-wing.3 Karina became expert at snagging the mooring ball on our first pass. She got low on the forward deck as I eased us up to the mooring ball. Once within reach, she grabbed the mooring ball line and quickly looped it over the deck cleat. She smiled big when she got it right.

  One bright, crisp afternoon, Lily knelt on the bench, facing out and dragging a bit of extra rope in the water. “I do ropes,” she said, looking back at me and Emily with happy eyes. Our kids were growing up on the water.

  EMILY

  Over those three seasons of family sailing, Lily grew from a wobbly baby into a running toddler. The kids and I had spent hours walking her up and down our building stairwells with therapeutic weights Velcroed around her ankles. We all took pleasure in her progress. She was into everything, as any toddler would be, but the messes didn’t bother me as much. When we took Lily into new environments, like a weekend at Grandma Orton’s, I noticed her natural curiosity catapulted learning. Her motor skills and language skills jumped. The kids and I were still tethered to our same, boring apartment thirty-two times per month for therapy. I wondered if Lily was getting too much therapy and if it was actually holding her back. The rhythm of the routine wore thin. I persuaded her team to run a trial month cutting back to twenty-five percent of her normal therapy so we could take more field trips. Afterward, Lily’s therapists agreed she was continuing to progress at the same rate or better. All of the kids were thrilled.

  Our kids were growing up on the water.

  After a few more months of prayerful consideration, Erik and I decided Lily would quit therapy altogether. That is not the answer for everyone, but we were able to provide a language-rich environment where Lily got constant feedback and encouragement from her siblings and me. The world of special education puts a lot of emphasis on kids with special needs being allowed to progress in the “least restrictive environment,” and we totally agreed. When I discovered that what was best for our whole family was also best for Lily, I happily threw off the restrictions of therapy. We went to the Jersey Shore for the day. Lily built sandcastles—well, she mostly ate sand, but it was a tactile experience. We saw dolphins. We met new people. We had our life back.

  The older kids were working on their homeschool assignments one morning when Erik leaned against the wall next to me and said, “I think the seven of us on a boat would be enough universe to keep me engaged for th
e rest of my life.”

  “Really?” I asked. “You wouldn’t get bored with just us?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “And you’d want to live on a boat?” I asked.

  “We’d be together,” Erik said. “I would be with you and the kids full-time. We could explore the world together. There would be no packing and unpacking. We wouldn’t have to leave home, because we’d take our home wherever we went.” Erik strummed all of my major heartstrings at once: family, home, and firsthand experiences. I was happy with my life. Even without sailing, having a family is an epic adventure—a long-term, high stakes proposition with daily surprises and unpredictable outcomes. If I stood our children in a row from youngest to oldest, each was a head taller than the last. But I could see where this was going, and it was going too fast.

  At Karina’s recommendation, I read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: How I Learned to Live a Better Story. The author, Donald Miller, says the same elements that make a great story—dreams, struggle, risk—also make a great life. If I were watching a movie of my life and I were the hero, what would I want myself to do? I wanted to create memories that would strengthen and sustain us individually and as a family. I wanted to live a more dynamic story. I wanted to pursue a dream so big there was room for my whole family. I wanted us to deliberately disrupt our family, not just to do more or see more, but to become more.

  I wrapped one arm around Erik’s waist and rested my head on his chest. Lily pressed the buttons on her musical pop-up toy. Eli rolled a red car across the floor. Karina and Alison read on the couch while Jane drew at the table. I liked this universe of seven.

  “When should we go?” I asked.

  “Sometime before Karina leaves for college,” he said. She was fourteen. We had four years.

  “I guess we’d better get cracking.”

  Erik didn’t waste any time. Driving home from another day of family sailing, he said, “We should take some more ASA classes. 103 and 104. Then we can take out bigger boats. Maybe even overnight.” He’d looked into this.

  “Do they have home study?” I asked. “Or daytime classes?” Erik still worked nights.

  “No. You can’t learn that stuff home study,” he said. Clearly, I knew nothing about it. “But we could finish both classes in a week if we take them in the Caribbean.”

  My usual questions sprang up: time, money, and childcare.

  I said, “That’s a lot to pack into one week.”

  * * *

  1.All three of these families are awesome and, as of this printing, are still living mobile lives. You can find them at bumfuzzle.com, sailingtotem.com, and thelifegalactic.blogspot.com. Tell them the Fezywigs sent you. :)

  2.Heaving to: a maneuver in which the boat is stopped by setting the jib sail and tiller in opposition to each other. Nothing to do with vomit.

  3.Tacking, jibing, wing-on-wing: not dance moves; rather, sailing maneuvers. Tacking = sailing with the wind in front of you. Jibing = sailing with the wind behind you. Wing-on-wing = sailing with the wind directly behind you.

  Chapter 2

  What Could Go Right?

  Road Town, Tortola, British Virgin Islands

  3 Years, 6 Months before Fezywig

  ERIK

  “I packed too much,” Emily said, unzipping her duffle. At least we avoided the most obvious boat newbie mistake: hard-shell luggage. Our duffles tucked nicely under the V-berth.1 My parents agreed to watch our kids, so Emily and I were now in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) . . . in July. My secret desire was to sail as a family in the Mediterranean, but turns out the Caribbean is a lot closer and more affordable, especially—we would learn—during hurricane season. We were nervous about the cost, about $1,250 per person plus airfare, but Emily and I were also both a little nervous about spending the whole week on a boat with strangers. But, if we were actually going to sail as a family, we had to take some risks.

  The other students turned out to be a lovely couple from New Jersey. Our instructor, Matt, was the best. He had red hair and wore the biggest broad-brimmed hat I’d ever seen short of a sombrero. I immediately vowed to someday own a hat like that. Everyone on the dock called him Big Red. He put Emily and me at ease right off the bat. We would all spend the next six days sailing the BVI on Barnaby, a forty-six-foot monohull. After some book work on shore and making sure everything was properly stowed in its precise location, we tossed off the lines. Matt asked for a volunteer to take the helm. I raised my hand. We pulled out of our slip and headed for Peter Island.

  Matt was all calm positivity. You could, hypothetically speaking, be pulling a forty-six-foot monohull out of a slip for the first time. You could, ostensibly, be about to slam this forty-six-foot sailboat into the dock or another boat, and he’d say, “Why don’t you just turn the wheel a bit that way to make sure we don’t bump into anything?” He was my kind of teacher.

  EMILY

  The first night, Matt, Erik, and the other couple pulled on their fins and slid into the water—in the dark—at night—when you couldn’t see anything. They all went on about how bathtub-warm the water was. Miniscule bioluminescent creatures sparkled after every kick or stroke, making this terrifying night swim in thirty feet of opaque water look like a Disney cartoon romance. I didn’t care what anybody thought of me. Well, I did care, but I was more scared than embarrassed. I stayed on the boat.

  Every day started with a snorkel as well. I was learning to sail so I wouldn’t have to be in the deep water. By daylight, I was more embarrassed than scared. I didn’t want to be the wimp of the group. I pulled on fins and hopped in. Everyone else was way ahead of me. I was alone. I saw the underside of the boat. I saw the thick metal chain running straight to the anchor. There was plenty of room for a pod of dolphins or a frenzy of sharks to sneak up behind me. I looked straight ahead at the island and kicked as fast as I could. In my head, I sang a children’s song over and over again. I slowed my breathing. A giant turtle glided past me. I stopped singing. I followed it with my eyes until it was out of view. I continued to the rim of the undeveloped island. Fish were everywhere, yellow ones the size of my hand, tiny purple ones, so many vibrant colors. I followed a multicolored fish with a friendly turquoise face. Lacy plants I’d never seen before fanned out, waving in the current. I was on a different planet. I’d seen nature movies, but to experience it myself was a revelation. I’d never realized this world was here on the other side of the water’s surface. Will death be like that? Passing through some permeable surface, suddenly able to see strange and amazing things that immediately engage my attention and distract me from thoughts of land, safety, and my former life?

  “Ready to head back?” Erik asked when we both came up for air.

  “Not really,” I said. “Snorkeling is my new favorite thing.” What other favorites were hiding inside my fears?

  The week felt long because everything was new. Learning slows time. Hurricane season is hot, muggy, and sometimes rainy. When it was clear, Matt kept us at the helm practicing maneuvers. When it was inclement, he kept us in our textbooks. Matt gently drilled us on navigation techniques, chart reading, sail trimming, emergency procedures, propane safety, plumbing procedures, diesel engine maintenance, and countless other topics I’d never imagined had anything to do with sailing. Erik regularly volunteered to go first. I preferred to watch all of the other students before trying myself. Sometimes I volunteered to go second to impress Erik.

  I was uncomfortable piloting a man overboard drill or heaving to even though I knew I would have to do that if Erik were ever thrown overboard on our hypothetical boat. The things I liked were going barefoot, working with the ropes, and steering toward a visible destination. Barnaby had a big round helm that made sense, like a giant car steering wheel. If I wanted to go right, I would turn the wheel to the right. Easy.

  The Baths are probably one of the big
gest tourist attractions in the British Virgin Islands. Cruise ships drop hundreds of passengers on the beaches daily. We arrived early to compete for a mooring ball. The travel magazines showed a secluded pool of water surrounded by smooth boulders illuminated by a shaft of sunlight dancing off the bronze shoulders of some gorgeous couple. I loved the Baths. The whole place is more playground than romantic hideaway. It’s like a family reunion of granite boulders, half on land and half in the water. Erik and I saw the quintessential romantic spot and the line of tourists waiting to take their pictures in that shaft of light. A little boy in a lime-green lifejacket was holding his mom’s hand. He had Down syndrome. I introduced myself. “Sure, we take precautions to keep him safe, but so far there hasn’t been anything he can’t do,” his mom said. There was nothing he couldn’t do, just like Lily.

  We took our romantic picture and took off exploring. We used some fixed ropes and a few wooden steps, but mostly we scrambled over boulders and shuffled through hot sand. I set down my load of responsibilities and worries for a couple of hours to play in the waves with Erik. I couldn’t remember the last time I had felt such unselfconscious curiosity.

  “The kids would love it here,” I said.

  “We should bring them someday,” Erik said. It didn’t seem realistic—about as likely as our buy-a-boat plan. Learning to sail, that was a lot easier than purchasing a livable vessel. We were reaching for the moon and catching the stars.

  By the end of the muggy week, which felt like a month, I sat next to Erik in the air-conditioned testing room. I got an A on my exam. Surprise! As expected, Erik did too. We both certified as bareboat charter captains.