girl scouts, land legs, and the homeless

This past weekend found me sailing with twenty girl scouts and a smattering of moms on a two-day aqueous adventure. It also found the boat turning around and heading back to Baltimore when a massive thunderstorm imposed itself upon our route, but the trip was still fun for all and ended in campfires and s'mores. The event reminded me of why i enjoyed girl scouts so much as a kid--these kids were basically my friends and I when we were their age, and they were smart, sassy, silly, and complete pyromaniacs. They were also a bit nerdy and liked learning some history of the chesapeake, knot tying, pig latin, parts of the fish, and how everything works. It rocked.

We all loaded up in vans and drove over to their campsite after we tied up back at pier 5. It was the first time i'd slept on land in over a month, and it was rather odd. I didn't sleep well, and there was this sapling blowing gently in the wind outside my window, which gave me the impression that the building was rocking. Yeah, a tree, outside my window. There was, like, nature around us. Everyone who lives shipboard had an allergic reaction.

The other day a homeless guy gave me a book. His name is Lonny and he typically hangs out between the Taney and the work boats, and he's very nice and chatty and a big fan of mystery novels. He frequently gets trays of books from the baltimore book thing, which is a local free book program, and keeps a few to read and hands the rest out to his friends. ("Hey, I'm homeless. You think I want to be hauling a huge heap of books around with me wherever I go? Take one, you're doing me a favor.") I took Stephen King's 4 Past Midnight, which includes the Langoliers. It's been interesting getting to know Lonny, as he's clean (he's sober and recommended a laundromat to me) and friendly, and while I think he does panhandle, its not the most important part of his day. He's been friends with many of the Living Classrooms crowd for a number of years and likes to be on top of the latest shipboard gossip. If he wanted to get a job and a house I think he could, but he doesn't want to, and of all people I seriously think he's happy the way he is. Go figure.

It's been getting hot in Baltimore, and yesterday's deck wash was cool and refreshing. We've been painting a bit on Sigsbee when we're not out with kids. Every time I do maintenance someone reminds me that it's not fine furniture, and while it needn't suck, it doesn't have to be pretty. I guess old habits die hard. But the sailing is going pretty well, i think, and so far there really hasn't been any drama that i've been privy to. We work hard, we drink hard, we sleep hard.