Sue Williams - Ready to Come About: A Memoir

Inia, anchored off Ilha da Culatra, near Olho, in the Algarve region of Portugal.

ITS DARK LIKE MIDNIGHT. Were a mere speck tossing about in twenty-foot seas on the vast North Atlantic Ocean. Two hundred nautical miles north is Newfoundland, the closest point of civilization. Winds are screaming through the rigging. Theres a fierce clanging against the hull. David pokes his head up from the companionway to investigate as streaks of salt foam fly horizontally across the deck drenching him, yet again. I stay huddled below decks on the makeshift bed of cushions arranged on the cabin sole, blankets tucked under my chin. My body braces for the next breaking wave, which I know will soon pound against the fibreglass walls of our small sailboat, Inia. I smell the brininess. I scan the edges of the floorboards for signs of water seeping in as the bilge-pump light turns on, then off, then on again. I vomit in the bucket beside me. Three days after leaving the shores of the Gasp Peninsula, Inia is hove to and we are riding out a full-blown gale, just my husband and me.

This was Davids dream, not mine. Far from it. I loved family and friends, our dog, our home, my job as an occupational therapist. Appliqu was my idea of a thrill. I didnt have an adventure-seeking bone in my body.

Christmas Eve 2005 changed everything.

While doing last-minute shopping, David had a grand mal seizure of such violence his spine fractured in two places and cuts on his head took fourteen stitches to close.

The doctor said stress and sleep deprivation were likely the cause. And it made sense. Over the preceding years, he had worried non-stop about our three sons. So had I. As they headed toward adulthood, we questioned their lifestyles, fretted about their plans, wondered if they would ever be able to make their own way, feared they might never find their spots in this world all this while David was being buried alive at work. In retrospect, something had to give.

It could have been worse; he could have been disabled by a stroke or even died from a heart attack. He made a full recovery. The seizure was a warning for which we were grateful.

When David returned to the office, the scars still raw, he attended a pre-arranged meeting that he thought was to finally address his impossible workload. Instead, he was fired. Restructuring, the CEO called it.

I was immobilized by the news at first, the feelings of betrayal, the hurt. In time, though, I realized this, too, was a blessing in disguise.

If you want to cross an ocean, this is your opportunity, I said. Davids eyebrows spiked. And freedoms what the boys need now, time and space to figure things out for themselves. So Ill go, too, I said, surprising even myself.

May 21, 2007, David and I, both in our fifties and with no real blue-water or night-sailing experience, cast off the dock lines in Hamilton Harbour, the westernmost point of Lake Ontario, and headed east. Destination: the Atlantic Ocean.

That was six weeks ago. Now, with barely a thousand miles under our belts and potentially another ten thousand to go, David is worried about storm damage and Im cold and sick and afraid. I pray for reprieve. I long for solid ground. And I cant help but ask myself, What the hell was I thinking?

WINTER 1981, in our second-floor apartment of an old brick house in downtown Ottawa, I sat at the drop-leaf table David had set with a faded chintz tablecloth, a pair of candlesticks, and the sparkling cutlery we had been given as wedding presents, while he prepared dinner. There were blizzard-like conditions beyond the frosty panes of glass, but the kitchens baby-blue radiator kept us warm.

Whats cookin? I asked, watching him turn stove dials up and down, lift and lower pot lids, and open and close the oven door like a one-man band.

My own recipe. He stirred a dollop of butter into a steaming pot. Pork Shake n Bake, except on chicken, he divulged with pride.