It's been one of those weeks

Back in the day when my daughter was about five years old, I had a good friend with two girls, ages 5 and 7, who was trying to balance a career as an assistant district attorney with motherhood and marriage. Her observation was that as long as everything went as planned, it was completely worth the effort, but if one thing went wrong, down went her carefully constructed house of cards. The “one thing” could be anything from a sick child to a husband’s out of town business trip to forgetting to do the laundry and having no clean socks. Those of you who have been there can relate.

We’ve had a spate of that “one thing” this past week and David and I are going glassy-eyed coping and trying to stay centered enough to know that it will all work itself out eventually. The downhill slide started Halloween weekend with a quick sailing trip to Offat’s Bayou. Offat’s Bayou is a really nice anchorage right behind Moody Gardens on Galveston Island. There is plenty of room to anchor out and a small marina for anyone who wants electricity. We’ve been down there only twice since we moved here, but enjoyed the trip tremendously both times. Weirdly, both trips involved stormy weather, but even the bad weather was fun because 1) it was warm weather, 2) we know the waters around here really well, and 3) Raven sails wonderfully regardless of the weather. We joined some other Cape Dory owners on the trip, had a dockside party, and enjoyed ourselves very much.

Unfortunately on the way home things began to unravel. David started sneezing and coughing with a bad cold and Hobbes, the cat, peed all over the settee, which was completely out of character for him. Then as we approached Redfish Island, the exhaust coupling sheared off, filling the cabin with diesel smoke! We turned off the motor and sailed in toward the channel on 22 knot winds with no problem, but called Tow Boat U.S. for a tow down Kemah channel to our slip. The next day it was clear Hobbes was in a bad way, having peed all over his bed and not even moving to get out of it. The vet confirmed diabetes and dehydration and our very sick cat spent the next 5 days in the cat hospital. Now he is home, being hand fed, dosed with insulin, and placed periodically in the cat box, since he is still very wobbly on his pins. In the meantime, David suffered through his cold and then generously shared it with me. I am still hacking, but better.

The cabin is a wreck. I haven’t given it a good cleaning since before the Offat’s Bayou trip. There are piles of clothing and mislaid boxes on one side, bare wood on the other settee since we had to take out the one the cat peed on and haven’t had it cleaned yet, and a third of the cabin sole is walled off by seat cushions to make a “cage” for the cat. Meantime I cower at the nav station trying to earn enough to pay the vet bill. Even as reasonable as the vet was (very reasonable, considering all the time and care they gave Hobbes), it was $700 at the end of the day, which consumed every dime I made this week.

So. We are very, very tired and feel as though we are truly living a Matrix-like life on a real Nebuchadnezzar. I have always sympathized with Cipher and for today at least I wish I were plugged back in eating a phantom piece of steak.