Velociworld

DOING WHAT DON'T COME NATURALLY

Acidman has a post up about doing what you don't want to do, because it has to be done. Most of us don't come across those situations often, especially in these days of plenty, when the only real sacrifices are being made half a world away. I've seldom found myself in a situation like that, either, but I can remember once, when I was 18, when I had to put my nuts in my pocket, and face down a little piss-inducing fear.

I spent a couple of years at the Coast Guard Academy. I've blogged before on why I went and why I left, and the Honor System and the corruption of it, but that's another story. This story concerns a sea voyage, and that defining moment in a life when you can either push forward, or shrink back.

The Academy had a square-rigged sailing vessel, the Eagle, that was used to train cadets in seamanship. Built by Hitler in the '30's, the Academy acquired it as a spoil of war. It was truly Old School, with underclassmen sleeping in hammocks, many hours spent hauling on lines, and days spent on sail theory, knot-tying, and, of course, brass-polishing. I spent parts of three summers on it, but the big voyage was the European cruise taken one's second summer.

On the return trip, about 300 miles off New York, we hit a nasty blow, a northeaster, that was churning 20 foot swells, with lacerating rain and following seas. About midnight we lost the main topgallant sail, which is the next to the highest of five sails on the mainmast. As I was on the midwatch on the ready boat crew, it was our job to climb aloft and furl it before it ripped into useless tatters.

There were 12 of us on the crew, and 6 had to go aloft while the remaining six tended the lines. I honestly don't recall if I volunteered or was ordered, but it didn't matter. It had to be done, so I strapped on two safety belts and swung into the rigging. Normally you wore one safety belt to snap onto a yardarm or ratline once you were aloft to prevent, you know, brain damage or broken spines or death if you fell. I took two, because I was scared shitless.

The mainmast on the Eagle is 150 feet tall, which means the topgallant yardarm must have been about 130 feet up. Getting up actually wasn't the scariest part. Climbing out on that yardarm was. Three guys out on each side. I was in the middle of my side. Reefing that torn sail wouldn't have been so bad, even in the storm and the dark and the altitude, but the problem was the yawing. The vessel had headed into the wind, "in irons", to facilitate the repair. This meant you weren't on a tack, heeling over at some degree, but were swaying back and forth. So you might be 130 over the ocean one minute, the you'd yaw over, and you were looking down at ocean from 50 or 60 feet above. Then it would yaw to the other side, so you swung in a huge ripping parabolic arc from one side to the other. All you could do was hang on.

It takes a lot to scare me, but I don't like heights anyway, and I was terrified. It took us about 30 or 40 minutes to reef up that sail and lash it down, and it seemed like 3 hours. When I finally got back on deck my hands felt like they'd been beaten with tire irons, I'd clutched the rigging so hard.

The mast captain could have let that sail shred. There was a spare. It never occurred to him not to save it, and it never occurred to us not to go aloft and do it. I think a lot of "brave" things are just doing what you're trained to do.