Same and Different

Over Thanksgiving this year we spent a week in Seattle- visiting friends, eating lots, and buying things! The pertinent part for this blog is all the questions our friends in Seattle had. They made me realize I have not done a very good job portraying our life on this blog! So over the next few blog posts I'm going to try to paint a picture of life in our home, at our job, and in this wonderous place.

Let's start with life on a boat. We live on a sailboat, a unique lifestyle we have taken for granted, surrounded as we are by other boat-centric people. Our boat is 40' long and 12.5' wide at it's widest point. If you exclude the cockpit and take into account the tapering hull, we probably have about 250' of living space. This may seem small. That's because it is. We downsized considerably to move aboard. But it's amazing what you learn you don't need when you don't have the space for it!

To see pictures and to get an idea of the layout of our home, read this post.

Taking an average land-dweller's home, here are some similarities and differences between our life and yours.

The Bedroom
Same:
~We sleep in a full sized bed with plenty of foot room (enough, even, that there's extra so Chaco can keep our feet warm on the coldest nights).
~We have a hanging locker [closet] with plenty of space for our limited selection of hanging clothes.**

Different:
~Aside from the bed, our bedroom consists of 4 square feet of standing space. Only one person can stand in there at a time
~We get gently rocked to sleep most nights (and violently pitched around some nights...)
~The hanging locker butts up to the hull, so we have to watch for condensation (it's also, technically, outside the bedroom, but just barely).
~There is a small entrance into the bed, so some acrobatics are involved if the person on the inside wants to get up first

The Dog Bed:
Same:
~Chaco has a dedicated bed where he spends most of his time when we're home

Different:
~His bed is above the couch!

The Galley [kitchen]
Same:
~We have a full galley complete with a stove, oven, two sinks, counter space, and lots of storage. I challenge you: anything you can make in your kitchen I can make in my galley. I bake lasagna, make bread, and cook homemade pizza.
~When we are at the dock, we tie directly into a hose that runs from a rain collection cistern and so we have pressurized water

Different:
~We don't have refrigeration, but this time of year that is not a problem. We keep things we want cold in a box in the cockpit, easy to reach from the companionway [doorway].
~We have a manual foot pump that pumps in salt water to conserve freshwater when it doesn't rain enough (ha!) or if we're not at the dock
~When we are not at the dock, our freshwater comes from a 5-gallon jug (*this is only because our water tanks leak, once we replace those, we will have running water all the time)

The Work space 
Same:
~Our [nav station] desk houses work, electronics, and paperwork, and is frequently cluttered! 
~We have a great sound system with speakers throughout the boat including in the cockpit [back porch].
~We can listen to our Ipod or to the radio (though we only get one station- that's not because we live on a boat, that's because we live in a very remote place!)
~When we are at the dock, we plug into shore power and have all the lights, electronics, and hot water we want

Different:
~We get our internet through a cell "dongle" that connects to John's computer. (My computer is too old to support the software, so I go to the house to use the internet).
~When we are not at the dock, we are limited to the electricity our batteries put out. This means less lights, limited electronics, and no hot water (unless the engine is running)

The Head [bathroom]:
Same:
~We have a bathroom with a toilet, sink, showerhead, mirror, and storage

Different:
~The toilet has a manual hand pump to flush, and flushes with sea water. It can either go into a holding tank and get pumped out or go overboard.
~We use marine-grade toilet paper that degrades quickly
~We do not have a separate shower stall, so the whole bathroom gets quite wet during a shower. We chose to shower up at the house, since that option is available to us right now, and much simpler. 

The Vee [guest room]:
Same:
~We have a guest room!
~It has a bed and lights and shelves and sheets and pillows (it's comfy, come try it out)

Different:
~It is in the shape of a "V", so you play footsie with your sleeping partner
~It rocks gently in the wind and waves
~The window is above your head, and provides a beautiful view of the stars (or...clouds...)

Heat:
Same:
~Our home has a heater. While I don't think I can call it centralized heat, the heater is quite central

Different:
~We use a diesel stove to heat the boat
~To turn on the heater, we prime the stove by letting some diesel into the cup, soaking a piece of paper towel, lighting the paper towel, dropping it back in the diesel, and hoping it catches before the paper has burned up.
~The fuel comes from our main fuel tank, there is a small electric pump that pumps the fuel into the heater. It makes a dull 'thump' every 5 seconds or so from the engine room. I've come to expect the sound, like the ticking of a clock, and miss it when it's not there

Cockpit [back porch]:
Same:
~We have a fantastic back porch, which is great for parties, summer evening dinners, and sunbathing
~We enter our home through a doorway from the back porch
~This space is unhelpful in the winter, and serves primarily as a wet, slippery entrance to our home

Different:
~We also drive our home from our back porch
~The door into the boat is two wood panels that slide into place vertically and a large panel that slides horizontally over the top. There is no door knob. (but don't worry, mom, there is still a lock)
~The use of this space practically doubles our living space in the summer, when we can leave the door open because it's warm and sunny (ahhh)


**After I wrote this post, I read it to John and he pointed out how skewed my vision is- the hanging locker I describe as having "plenty of space" is 3' wide, 4' tall, and 2' deep. Everything we hang, hangs in there.  I'm sure many other things I think of as "same" are actually quite "different", at least in scale!