I would’ve thought that a psychologist would know his stuff. Two weeks later, we’re still essentially adrift at sea and no one is getting on any better.
‘The 40 Day Ocean Challenge’, they called it. Take your family out to sea in a boat! The proximity will cause all the tension to vanish as you forget your petty squabbles and unite to keep everything ship-shape. Day 24, and Maria still isn’t talking to me. Codey is being a typical teenager and shirking on ALL of his jobs, while Chiara has spent most of the voyage hanging off the edge of the boat, trying to get reception for her phone so she can talk to her boyfriend.
I’ve TRIED to create some sort of teamwork. Last night I hosted an interactive seminar on how Melbourne’s anchor winch industry functions, and the lessons we can learn about our own sailing from our city’s attitude towards marine trailer repairs. I…didn’t really know what I was doing. The seminar was sort of well-attended, but that’s mostly because there are only two places on this boat to go: on deck and inside. It’s too cold to spend much time on deck in the evenings, so…everyone was there. But not there. I had a whole presentation planned on anchor winches and such, but everyone chose to ignore me.
This experiment isn’t doing what it was supposed to. I don’t know…maybe once we hit day 32 we’ll suddenly come to understand each other as a family, we’ll slot into our roles and my nightly sessions where we list the things we were thankful for during the day will not be utterly scorned. At the very least, we should learn the basics of outboard motor servicing. Melbourne has a proud history of such things…but I don’t think it’s going to happen. We’re coming back from this just as dysfunctional as ever.
Oh well! Just got to hang out for day 32, I guess!
-Max