Adventures in Sailing! - Quotes

I purchased this book called 'Things I Wish I'd Known Before I Started Sailing'. I basically goes through the alphabet and has short entries for everything under the sun in regards to sailing in it by a guy that has been sailing forever, including some circumnavigations I think.

Anyway, through out the book there are some quotes taken from others that I have found really really cool. I wanted to post a few of them that I really liked.

The first has to do with sailing becoming an obsession. I think my experience over the past week pretty much testifies that I've caught that bug. The quote is from E. B. White and goes 'If a man must be obsessed by something, I suppose a boat is as good as anything, perhaps a bit better than most'. Amen.

The next one turns out to be from a book my mother used to read to my brother and I back in the day, 'The Wind in the Willows'. In it, Mole is talking to Rat and admits he has never been on a boat before. Rat, astonished, replies, 'there is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats'. To this I have to totally agree. One of the reasons sailing has always been in the back of my head even while I had the speedboat was because there is so much more to DO in sail boats. Rat continues, 'In or out of'em, it doesn't matter. Nothing seems to matter, really, that's the charm of it. whether you get away, or whether you don't; whether you arrive at your destination or whether you reach somewhere else, or whether you never get anywhere at all, you're always busy, and you never do anything in particular, and when you've done it there's always something else to do...'. Love that and I am totally looking forward to never doing anything in particular.

Fear is the subject of the next quote. Fear is a part of sailing, no matter how experienced you are. This quote is straight from the author and says: 'Part of the attraction of sailing is that it frightens the pants off you now and then. Those of us who spend most of our lives cosseted in the comforts of civilization seem to crave the occasional brush with a manageable slice of terror, the better by contrast to appreciate those comforts. So we go sailing, we get a little scared, and everyone's happy.' That quote really put some perspective on this for me. I had never thought of being attracted to the scary times as part of the deal but it is true. I literally can not WAIT to sail in heavy weather. To have to fight the weather helm to keep the boat from broaching and wave whacking her on the beam all the while the wind and rain is pelting my face and I'm laughing in utter joy. Goose bumps, right there.

Finally, and this one applies to everyday life really, not just sailing, is this quote from the author: 'Three thoughts will keep you safe and add much to your enjoyment of a voyage. Think simple, think strong, think upside down.'. I already have the upside down part well practiced.