Yesterday I made a fatal mistake – I allowed Peter to ‘pop’ down to the video store in Batehaven alone.
We often hire movies – we go down together and come back with a few. Watching movies is something we all enjoy and while there is a picture theatre in town, we enjoy relaxing and watching movies all together way too often to make that practical!
But yesterday something went badly wrong in this process. I knew once the trip had taken more than an hour that something was amiss. The extent of the problem would soon reveal itself to me. An hour and a half later, Peter returned. He had taken Liam to the basketball court at the local high school on the way – and Liam had played and then walked all the way home before Peter made it.
He walked in and we all breathed a sigh of relief.
‘Where have you been?’ we all chimed together.
‘Just at the video store,’ he replied, smiling and showing us the movies he had brought home.
‘Just look’, he continued.
And that’s when we all realised the toll not being able to go out sailing often enough has taken on him!
He had six movies.

I will list then for you so that you can see what I mean.

1. Blackbeard;
2. Moby Dick – the two part recent double-disk (and of course double-length) version;
3. The Sea Wolf (the Jack London story);
4. Deep Water (the story of the first round-the-world solo yacht race);
5. River Kings (an Aussie movie about life on the Murray steamships) and, thankfully,
6. Muriel’s Wedding.
Do you see what I saw?
I sighed! ‘How have you spent that long and come home with only movies about the sea? Oh, and Muriel!’ We had reserved Muriel’s wedding as we had never seen it before. What a relief that that had come in while he had been there or we might have all found it necessary to fling ourselves overboard!

I have, since yesterday, suffered through I don’t know how many hours of sea movies, storms at sea, constant remarks about the superb lines of the schooner in the movie, what actual boat was used in the filming, where it is now and how much he’d like to see it. Thankfully, because of Muriel, we did have a brief reprieve last night and watched some footage that had not a single boat in it! I have been patient but when the credits rolled for the last disk of Moby Dick – the last of the movies to be watched – I cheered!

I have learned a few things I this. Of course, the most important thing is to never again let Peter go to the video store alone! Clearly this is not very time-efficient, to say the least, but then of course it’s not just the time he took, but the fact of what he was looking for that is the problem! He searched every section twice or three times looking for movies about sailing – I’m pretty sure he found them all! The other lesson to learn is to see the warning signs for sailing-itis a little sooner. People around us speak of going out on their yachts – ones with a shallower draft that can get across the sand bar at times other than high tide. People invite him to join them. I must encourage them to get moving – clearly this is a man who is missing the thrill and delight of getting out into the ocean again!
Is there a cure? Well yes, I believe there is, but we can’t access it yet – but when we can sail again I know I shall have a very happy husband!