Turn Into the Wind

 

Turn Into the Wind
by Dave Wright

The party spread out over a vast expanse of manicured grass. Tables covered with linen table clothes laden with hors d’oeuvres that I could not pronounce and did not recognize had been set up on the lawn. A three-story, red-bricked mansion loomed in the background, its chandeliers twinkling through French doors. Uniformed maids emerged from the house to replenish the food trays. Lake Minnetonka stretched beyond the beach and sparkled like champagne. Guests dressed in floral skirts and elegant Oxford shorts mingled with one another holding crystal glasses and plates heaped with delicacies.

“I don’t like the façade, and it only has five bedrooms,” said one of the guests. “Reginald assured me that we would remodel soon.”

“We just purchased a Rogue Cabin Cruiser,” said another. “I can’t wait to tour the lake with it.”

We had been invited to a birthday party for a college friend. His older sister’s friend of a friend had married well and was eager to share the spoils of her new-found wealth and status by hosting the party. Blair and I had received an invitation, but most of the crowd were strangers to us.

We arrived in T-shirts and shorts—Blair with boxers that hung below his cutoff jeans, and me in tan cutoffs with frayed edges. We hurried through the food line, filled our plates with a generous sampling of the strange tidbits, and after thanking our host for the invitation sidled off to the periphery of the crowd.

“I feel out of place here,” I said as I swallowed the last morsel of goat cheese on rye.

Blair laughed and looked me in the eye. “David,” he said with an expression that suggested he had something profound to say. “Don’t you think they’re the ones out of place? Look. We’re at a party on a lake for heaven’s sake.”

“Maybe so,” I said, “but I still feel awkward. I don’t think I have anything in common with this crowd. Now that we’ve eaten, do you suppose we can slip away unnoticed?”

“No way.”

Blair scanned the scene again and pointed his hawk-like nose in the direction of the beach. “See that sailboat?”

I followed his gaze. A small sailboat rested on its cradle, fully rigged and ready to be launched.

“What do you think?” said Blair. “Should we take it for a spin?”

“I don’t know, Blair. I’ve never been on a sailboat…a canoe, yes, but never a sailboat.”

Before I could argue further, Blair had left me to secure permission. A moment later, he returned. “Let’s go. The wind is perfect for a sail.”

A modest chop covered the lake as we kicked off our tennis shoes, strapped on life jackets, and eased the boat into the water. The boat was a fifteen-footer from bow to stern and was rigged with a mainsail and a small jib in front of the mast. We gave the boat a push and jumped into the cockpit. I had no idea of the terms at the time, but we had pulled on the halyards to raise the sails.

The breeze blew from shore, so we started out wing-on-wing heading to the middle of the lake. As we picked up speed I said, “I didn’t know you knew how to sail.”

“Ha!” he laughed. “Nothing to it. Just turn into the wind. Can’t be that hard.”

I double-checked the straps on my life jacket—too late to turn back.

“Isn’t this great?” shouted Blair as the breeze tousled his wispy hair.

“Love it!” I cried. “So quiet. Only sound is the wind.”

“Yeah…too bad about those motorboats,” we groused. “Just a bunch of noisy polluters.”

I clung to the main sheet (the rope attached to the end of the boom that holds the wind in the mainsail) while Blair manned the rudder. We felt like we were flying.

“Time to come about,” said Blair. “I heard we can pick more speed if we go sideways to the wind.”

“Alright. Let’s do it,” I said as Blair pulled on the rudder.

I ducked just in time as the beam swung over my head and the sail filled with wind. The boat rocked. I quickly shifted to the windward side of the boat.

“I don’t think that was quite how it is supposed to be done, Blair.”

“Ha! We’ll get the hang of it next time around.” Blair leaned into the rudder as the boat picked up speed.

“Aren’t we tipping too far?” I shouted as I tightened my grip on the sheet.

“Nah. I’ve seen this lots of times. Lean back and pull tighter on the rope!”

We flew along in what I now know is a beam reach, the fastest tack on a sailboat. We leaned back against the leeward gunwale as the boat dug through the chop.

The breeze freshened and caught the sail. The boat tipped precariously. Blair stubbornly pulled on the rudder as I clung to the main sheet.

“Whoa!” I shouted, scrambling to maintain my balance. “Turn into the wind. Let some of the wind out of the sail. We’re gonna’ tip over.”

Blair flashed a toothy smile and held our course. “Lean back farther! Let’s see what she can do.”

A moment later a gust of wind caught the sail and flipped us on our side. We catapulted into the lake.

We came up sputtering. “You okay?”

“Yeah. You okay?”

“Yeah…Now what, Captain Blair?”

“Nothing to worry about,” said Blair. “I’ve seen this lots of times. We swim to the other side of the boat and just pull the boat upright.”

The waves lapped behind us as we put our feet on the centerboard and pulled against the gunwale. Slowly the mast came out of the water. The sopping mainsail followed it and fluttered in the wind. As soon as the boat was upright, we clambered onto the side to get into the cockpit.

The boat listed in our direction, tipped, and then flopped on top of us. We ducked out of the way of the beam, mast, and sail, and came up treading water at the stern of the boat.

“I’ve never seen that before,” I gasped. “Isn’t a sailboat supposed to stay upright in the water.”

“Yeah, I know. I don’t know what happened.”

“What’s that?” I said, as I pointed to a white disk of plastic that was drifting a foot below the surface of the water.

“That’s the plug!” shouted Blair. He lunged for it, but his life vest kept him from diving deep enough.

Just before it slipped out of sight, I made a second desperate attempt at a surface dive. I was a few inches closer to the disc and plucked it out of the water. “Whew! That was close.”

“It must have been lying in the bottom of the boat before we left shore,” said Blair. “I guess we were supposed to screw it into that hole in the cockpit.”

“Water must have flooded into the hull,” I said. “That’s why the damn thing flipped over on us after we capsized.”

By now the sailboat had turtled—turned upside down with the mast staring at the bottom of Lake Minnetonka and the center board gazing at the clouds.

“We’ll have to try to right it again,” I said. “Once it’s upright we’ll get in from the back, so we don’t flip it.”

We repeated the maneuver, pulling on the centerboard, then the gunwale, then carefully easing the sailboat to an upright position. When we tried to board the boat from the stern the boat remained afloat, but the back of the boat sank beneath the waves.

We slid back into the water and gave each other a questioning look. Just then, one of the noisy motorboats that we had been cursing pulled up next to us. “Need a hand?” shouted the skipper of a vintage Chris-Craft.

“That would be great,” I said as I treaded water.

In embarrassment, I held up the plug. “We forgot this.”

The captain of the wood-grained beauty laughed. “Happens all the time. Throw me a lead and I’ll tow you in.”

“We’ll drag along behind,” said Blair. “It’s only a short distance.” He pointed to the shore. “See where the party’s going on?”

“If you don’t mind,” I said, “How about dropping us off by the lift at the side of the property?”

The skipper laughed again at our predicament. “Will do.”

He dropped us in the shallows as we waved our thanks for the tow. We waded to shore dragging the water-logged boat to the lift, then winched the boat onto the rollers and watched as the water streamed out the drain.

“Do you suppose we need to return to the party?” I asked. “The other guests appeared to have forgotten us.” Most of them had crowded around a fresh table of hors d’oeuvres.

“Nah,” said Blair. “I think we gave them enough entertainment.”

We snuck around the far side of the mansion and threw towels on the seat of the car before returning to campus.

I turned to Blair and laughed. “Just turn into the wind. Huh…I’ll remember that.”

That first lesson may have dampened my clothes, but it did nothing to dampen my enthusiasm for sailing. Soon after our family purchased a cabin on Lake Sylvia from my grandmother, my wife found a deal on a thirteen-foot Sunfish. It has a single lateen (triangular) sail mounted on the mast and can be sailed by one person with another guest or two.

I was eager to share my new boat and hobby with friends and family. One breezy July afternoon we were sitting with another family on our cabin deck overlooking the lake. My new sailboat bobbed restlessly next to the dock.

“Neil, would you care to go for a sail?” I asked. “The wind is kind of brisk, but with two of us on the boat we could have a real boomer.”

Neil who weighed in over two hundred fifty pounds, delivered a quiet, disarming smile. “Do you have a life jacket that will fit me?”

I rummaged through the boathouse. “Here’s the largest one we have.”

“That’ll do,” he said as he strapped it around his chest allowing his belly to protrude below it. “Let’s go.”

We stepped from the dock into the cockpit. I took the rudder with my left hand and held the sheet in my other. The boat rocked as Neil took his place directly across from me in the center of the boat. “Hoist the sail, matey,” I said.

The wind was from behind us, so as soon as we drifted out from shore we were under way.

“Lucky I’m with a big man,” I said as the sail filled and we flew into the white caps. “If I’d be out here alone in this wind, I’d be tossed around like a toy.”

“Where’d you learn to sail?” asked Neil.

“I picked it up on my own.” I paused and smiled. “Of course, I had a mentor or two along the way.” We were in the middle of the lake, and I shouted to Neil over the wind. “First rule is turn into the wind. Get ready to come about. Duck when the beam swings over us and shift your weight to this side with me.”

The Sunfish changed course and bounced into high gear. The boat dipped into the waves. Water poured over the bow spilling on either side of the splash guard.

“This is exciting,” cried Neil. “This little sailboat can really fly.”

We changed tacks a couple more times when I asked Neil, “Would you like to take the rudder?”

“Sure. I’ll give it a try.”

“Let’s switch places as soon as we come about again,” I said as I pulled on the rudder and felt the boat swing into the wind.

I moved across the cockpit and sat on the leeward gunwale while Neil slid to the stern and took the rudder from my hands. At that moment, a violent gust of wind caught the sail, and the boat lurched forward.

It was as if the scene were in slow motion. I watched in horror as Neil, back to the water and feet in the air, slid slowly off the rear and of the boat and summersaulted into the water.

I grabbed the rudder and turned the boat directly into the wind, putting it into irons (a position where the wind rushes past the sail, not allowing it to fill). In a light wind, a sailboat in this situation stops dead in the water. Today was an exception. The wind was so strong that the boat drifted away from Neil. His life jacket clung to his neck like he was wearing a neck brace. He floated just above the waves, his bald head looking like a bobber.

“Can you swim to me?” I shouted.

All I could hear above the din of the wind was, “Can’t swim!”

With a man overboard, I would have had to make a triangular approach to reach him—first tacking at an angle into the wind, then changing course to arrive upwind from him. I would be sailing fast, so I would have to estimate exactly when to turn the boat into irons again so that I would be next to him in the lake. All the while, Neil would be treading water and trying to stay calm.

I began the complicated maneuver when a speedboat approached from the far side of the lake and pulled up next to Neil. I couldn’t hear what was said, but a moment later Neil caught a tow rope and was being pulled in my direction.

We shouted our thanks, and while I leaned on the opposite side of the boat, Neil heaved himself over the side and into the cockpit.

A moment later, after the boat had stabilized, Neil said calmly, “Second thought, why don’t you hang onto the rudder?”

We fought our way back to the dock and dropped the sail.

“Sorry about that, Neil.” I said as I clambered onto the dock. “I didn’t know you couldn’t swim. Were you worried?”

“No,” he replied thoughtfully. “As I was bobbing out there in the waves, I just thought to myself, ‘Compared to Viet Nam, this is nothing.’”

Neither of my two dear sailing companions are with us anymore to remind me to turn into the wind, but if they were, I would tell them that I haven’t capsized or lost a man overboard for more than twenty years.

Even so, I’m certain they would offer some additional words of advice:
“If you plan to sail with Dave, always wear your swimsuit.”

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