Short (very) Story

Mid-April, somewhere in the Pacific about 1,000 miles off the Mexican coast I woke up to the sounds of the wind picking up speed fast. It was about 2:00 in the morning and I knew I needed to reduce sail as quick as possible. I put on my foul weather gear, grabbed my head lamp and switched on the spreader lights to help me see. I clicked into my safety harness and attached the tether. I always attached the tether; it was a condition and promise I made to my wife Sandy before she would let me go sailing single-handed out in the ocean.

     Up on deck I released the main sheet, the line that holds the sail in place, which makes the sail move into the wind, flapping but loose so I can lower it a bit to its next reefing point. I released the main halyard, the line that raises and lowers the sail, and pulled the sail down to its third reefing point, making the sail about half its normal size.

     The trick once you do this is to tie off the sail area that you just pulled down, so it isn’t flapping in the wind. To do this I put sail straps in my teeth, gather up the wet sail in both my arms and try to hug it to the boom, while taking the strap from my mouth and tying the extra bit of sail around the boom. All the while the boat, and the boom are rocking violently from side to side because we are not moving forward because the sail is temporarily disengaged.

     I remember holding on the boom for dear life while I tied it off. I could feel that at any moment a large enough wave could move the boat in such a way that the boom would act as a slingshot, launching me over the side into the ocean. The tether would not be able to hold me from the inertia and I would be in the Pacific watching as my boat sailed away. The thought brought be to hysterical laughter for some reason. Maybe it was just adrenaline: probably. But I thought to myself “how did I get here”?

     That’s essentially why I write about Frankenbrew. I was 49 years old and sailing my boat single-handed in the ocean from La Paz, Mexico to San Francisco. I only had two concerns. First, I missed Sandy, terribly. Second, I wanted to survive the trip.

     What I didn’t have to worry about was my vacation time or when I had to be back at work. I didn’t have to worry about a mortgage, car payments, or any of the money stresses that are typical of someone my age. This was because I was financially independent.

     I wasn’t rich by typical standards. I was of course compared to most of the world, however. I never had a high paying job either. Sandy and I got to this point by following some basic savings and investing principals.

Tomorrow is part 2 of a very simple High School Graduate (and brewer) guide to financial independence.