Doubled Docklines

Mixed feelings.

I have mixed feelings about this time of year.  On the one hand, the weather has made it uncomfortable to be off the dock.  It is cold; rain is frequent. Winter storms are lining up out there in the North Pacific, jockeying for position to attack the Pacific Northwest, one after the other.  The sun is visible less and less every day, not just because of the now ubiquitous clouds, but because the tilt of the Earth's axis and its progress around its orbit puts the sun lower and lower in the sky every day.

But on the other hand, the "nesting instinct" returns at full strength this time of year.  We like to think we are "above" the animal kingdom, that we are too "advanced" for the instincts that govern the behavior of the lower animals to affect us.  What bunk! 

Perhaps because of my retirement, for the first time ever, we enter the stormy season with all the preparations completed:

• Docklines have been doubled.  
• The winter fenders have been added.  
• All the failing seams in the cockpit canvas and a total of eight new (YKK #10) zippers have been installed.  
• The sail covers have been completely restitched. 
• The annual brightwork refinishing tasks are done.
• The prop nut zinc has been changed.
• The spreaders have been inspected and repainted.

We are ready.  And there is huge satisfaction in that.  We have evolved so that complying with those instincts is one of the most satisfying things we can do.


So yes, mixed feelings.

Doubled Docklines