Christopher Buckley, on his dad. (h/t, Am. Digest) A quote:
And so off we sailed into the storm. This was in my father’s last sailboat, a 36-foot fiberglass sloop named Patito. We somehow made it across Long Island Sound, through a screaming, dark night and 15-foot seas. I kept the radio tuned to the Coast Guard frequency. I thought of my two young children. I thought of my warm bed in Washington. I thought, What the __ am I doing out here?
The next morning, after a sleepless night at anchor listening to the halyards slap furiously against the mast, dawn arrived greasily. The wind had increased. It was now gusting to 55 knots. The radio reported that half a million homes in New England were without power. Various governors had declared a state of emergency. We had gone for an overnight sail in a state of emergency.
I proposed that we row ashore and flag down a passing car. Or perhaps a passing FEMA vehicle.
“No, no,” said my father. “We’ll be fine.”
It was daylight now, so we could see the seas we were up against and there was nothing pleasant about them. Perhaps you’ve seen the movie The Perfect Storm?
Somehow we made it back across Long Island Sound. My mother had spent the morning on the phone to the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard kept saying, “But Mrs. Buckley, what are they doing out there in this?”
Good question, I thought, gulping down a brandy with trembling hands.
I simmered for a few days, and wrote my father a blistering letter. Never again, I vowed.
Read the whole thing. Photo from the piece at National Review.
