"Dove," "Avventura," and the Path Less Traveled

With my voyage drawing to a gradual close it seemed only natural that I flip through the pages of "Dove" one more time. The book had changed the course of my life since the day I first picked it up and fanned the flames of my sailing dreams. I had already read it three times (more than any other book), so I figured I'd just flip through it and revisit my favorite passages already underlined in blue ink. I started with the first few pages, and in minutes I was hooked once more. In a matter of days I had read it cover to cover once more.

"Sailing already meant much more to me than 'mucking about in boats,' as the neighbors used to call it. It was the chance to escape from blackboards and the smell of disinfectant in the school toilet, from addition and subtraction sums that were never the same as the teacher's answers, from spelling words like 'seize' and 'fulfill' and from little league baseball. It was the chance to be alone and to be as free for a while as the sea gulls that swung around Morro Rock."

While my true introduction to sailing had come much later in life, I was quick to find this same quality in sailing and the sea. It provided the chance to get away from the rat race of modern society, to escape the conveyor belt that guides the masses through 17 years and more of schooling and on to comfortable 9-to-5 jobs that their piece of paper helped them get. But best of all sailing provided a window to the world--a means by which I could see faraway lands and gain a true and simple education at hands of life herself. While I've never been able to provide a clear and concise answer to the modern age's favorite question ("What are you going to do to make a living?"), I've long known I wouldn't fit the standard mold and would fall off the conveyor belt long before reaching the promised land. With that in mind I decided to jump off early and see what direction fate would pull me. Never once have I regretted my decision, and while some may say I've fallen behind my peers by not pursuing an "education" I say I've received a better education than any college could hope to impart. I've visited distant lands and befriended people from a number of distinct cultures. I've learned more about meteorology, geography and oceanography than most students forget they knew. I've multiplied my experiences a hundred-fold through ravenous reading and voracious living. And I've come to know myself; what I'm capable of mentally and physically, and how I can persevere through tough situations. No, I wouldn't trade places with the average college graduate even if I knew it would lead me to a life of leisure swimming in worldly riches. I'll take a wealth of memories, a bundle of friendships, and a close affinity with Mother Nature that will last a lifetime.

"At eight o'clock...'Dove' nosed into a berth at the Long Beach Marina. I threw a line. 'Dove' was tied up. I'd circled the world....
"'What made you do it?'
"There were many reasons. I didn't like school--but that's not unique. I wanted to look at the world, at people and places, without being a tourist. I wanted personal freedom. I wanted to know if I could do something alone--something really difficult. But somewhere deep in my mind I felt there was another reason and that it had something to do with fate and destiny. How could I phrase that? How could I tell these newsmen that I had sailed across the world because I had to do so--because that was what I was meant to do?"--Robin Lee Graham, "Dove"

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than those you did. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from safe harbor, catch the tradewinds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."--Mark Twain

"To the hunted, not to the hunter;
To the passage, not to the path."
--Sterling Hayden, "Voyage"

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