Summer Begins

It happened. I've emerged from the desert and slaked my thirst. I've come down from the mountain. I've risen through the ashes and been reborn.

Hyberbole yes, but it's the way it felt when I actually got out on the water this past Saturday. Though drifting on Long Island Sound (see above red nun 32 off Stamford, CT) in barely ten knots of light and fluky wind is nothing to crow about...but for a guy with two young children, a beleaguered stay-at-home wife and a corporate job, well, it was bliss. Through the long northeast winter it's easy to forget how the smell of the water and the sounds of winches clicking, sails snapping, the water rushing by the lee rail - transports me to that place where the day-to-day hassles drop away, the mind clears and time slows before gathering itself in a rush of wind, water and sunshine. The summer begins.