COOKING UP A DEPARTURE PLAN

The final ingredient, the last component, should have been easy. Instead it was bureaucratic, illogical, improbable. And left me (almost) speechless.

Janice Anne Wheeler Nov 15

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Long before I became an accidental boat builder, I earned a Hotel School hospitality degree from currently-beleaguered Cornell, went on to work in Colorado resorts, then opened an I-learned-everything catering company in the high desert. You may (or may not) have wondered how to make a Chef happy. (Chefs have become so trendy the last few years, maybe you even have one of your own. Or have become one, or whatever…) Here’s my wholly unsolicited advice. Offerings can be simple, a little spice, a fresh idea, fine wine, copious appreciation, or something big and shiny. This time, I went with big and shiny, a gift to myself, really. I highly recommend those, and this one, close to new at a third of retail dug out of a dusty used equipment warehouse, is perfect. What’s one more project after the 111,000 we already completed, right? Exactly. My Sailor is a handy guy.

The stove is a Force 10, which refers to the Beaufort Wind Scale (1-12) used to describe the level of our propulsion. Force #10 is labeled Storm, 48-55knots/55-63mph, pretty damn powerful. Stick your hand out the car window at those speeds and you can feel how strong that really is. Not sailing weather, necessarily! STEADFAST’s wooden-handled version lasted four and a half decades and didn’t owe anyone a thing when one of the knobs seized and all the paint that indicated light-hi-lo wore off (always interesting) and the broiler quit and it wouldn’t keep oven temp and I had to hold my mouth a certain way to get the big burner to stay lit under any circumstances.

I was planning to get through another season with it, but then decided life was simply too short. Reward yourself, the best-sellers tell us. There’s a lot of advice in this world. Take it or leave it. I’m no best-seller. So what do I know? Well, I know more than I did last week.

I know that I cannot tolerate policies, rules or regulations that are simply WRONG. Wrong no matter how you turn them over, wrong no matter what shade of glasses you choose to wear. The no-possible-excuse kind of wrong, the wrong that does not give you a choice or a solution. I have become intimately more familiar with the immoral, greedy, irrational, company-profit-oriented kind of wrongs which can ruin your day or negatively effect every aspect of your life. Uh–Oooohhhh I’m spitting mad.

Deep breath. Yoga breathing. That always works. OK.

It’s time for a little backstory, if I may. Please stay aboard, it’s from the heart.

The five-year plan that started in ‘23 never came to fruition. This crew returned to the states from the Out-Islands of the Bahamas (instead of continuing south) to investigate and solve the Sailor’s failed back fusion surgery; three years later he has far more pain than prior to the procedure. While investigating medical options in the summer of ‘24, it was determined that STEADFAST had some failing parts, too, and that discovery multiplied into a project which immersed us for thirty-two months instead of an estimated four.

Her rebuild/refit morphed into serious long-term simmering, sourcing and sorcery, sweat and grind and money. Among the numerous galley tools I sacrificed was a whistling teapot, used to seal the new bow with 400-degree asphalt. You can see three YouTube videos here on the barely burgeoning Yachting Steadfast Channel. And if you’re a crazy wooden boat owner, you may want to note that those expensive Pampered Chef frosting spreaders make great caulking tools.

For the first few months of SPARRING WITH MOTHER NATURE, I told stories of living on a transient sailing vessel: destinations and darkness and dolphins. That floating home required monumental on-land repairs, so SPARRING became more about wooden boats and the myriad choices and challenges that can present. What I’ve never really discussed here is that while we ensured STEADFAST was rock steady, we have never been able, specialist after specialist, to determine the cause of the Sailor’s intense chronic back pain. What works for him is a universally bastardized and effective opioid. That legal, legitimate prescription allows him to do what he needs to do, inspections, surveying, manual labor, ladder climbing, engine work, life work, day after day. Does anyone want to need those medicines? ABSOLUTELY NOT. But he does.

Because of the ‘crisis’ caused by the abuse of millenium-old pain quellers, the US has determined his medicine is a “Schedule 2 Controlled Substance” and control it they do. Thirty days maximum, pre-approvals required, hoops to jump through, hassles and phone calls and insurance companies who simply transfer you to some other department which in turn offers potential solutions that are days away instead of simply solving the problem. It’s not something one can wait for and still maintain functionality. The nature of the beast. A many-fingered demon, as it were. No one wants to adopt one.

Chronic pain is something that most of us don’t have to deal with; and now I understand exactly how lucky I am.

Can you imagine, can you fathom a medical system that allows ridiculously profitable insurance giants to control WHEN AND IF you can refill a legitimate, physician-written prescription even when they gave you only 30 days supply last time? They know you ran out. Yet they won’t authorize the pharmacy to fill the prescription. And the pharmacy listens to them. Somehow, their hands are tied.

I call it BLUE CROSS. NO SHIELD.

It’s illogical, insane, immoral and egregious. We were swearing like sailors, let me tell you. The insurance was paid for and confirmed to the tune of thousands of dollars a year. YET THERE WE SAT. Waiting for some department somewhere in Corporate America to determine what, exactly? He’s been on it for years; clearly they don’t care, or he’d have what he needs. If we had one pill for every time someone said, “I’m sorry but there’s nothing I can do,” we’d already be on our way! I’m just getting started but won’t keep ranting, promise. The US system is broken. AND THERE WE SAT. BLUE CROSS NO SHIELD. Completely prepared, provisioned, planned and ready with a weather window wide open, very unusual for this time of year.

An individual’s health is the ultimate SPAR WITH MOTHER NATURE and a very, very precious thing. We’ve touched on this before. It’s touched us all.

I live with his pain too, in a different way, of course. Even though I use the word strong to describe myself, I don’t believe I could tolerate what people like my Sailor are forced to confront on a 24-hour basis. He is able to maintain function only because of ancient medicine derived from the Opium Poppy (Somniferum or literally ‘sleep-bringing’); now most of the ingredients are synthetic.

It’s all a big-ass mess, isn’t it? Someone abuses something that brings comfort and then those who legitimately need that comfort are corralled, criticized and controlled.

We just want to live our life, and some person in some ‘healthcare’ office has the power to stop us even when we follow all their rules.

It’s an astounding thing.

And I hope it never happens to you. Life is too short.

Until next week, friends, stay healthy and happy. On to brighter days! ~J

Just for fun & to showcase the beauty of our world, I began THE SUNRISE PROJECT on Janice Anne Wheeler & Yachting STEADFAST Facebook pages as well as Substack NOTES. Every day at exactly sunrise I will take a photo and post it from wherever we are, dependent on technology.

Once a week just isn’t enough & I truly hope you enjoy a daily dash of glory.