Evanston: LE MANS and waiting
Evanston: LE MANS and waiting
A few weeks ago a reader sent me a quote from the 1971 Steve McQueen auto racing film, LE MANS, and a question.
The quote, spoken by Steve McQueen’s character to the exquisitely beautiful German actress, Elga Andersen:
A lot of people go through life doing things badly.
Racing’s important to men who do it well. When you’re
racing, it...it’s life. Anything that happens before or after...is
just waiting.
The question: Do I feel that way about sailing?
It’s a good question, and the answer is no.
As I mention on the Introduction page of this site, I like to believe that I do three things well, and sailing is only one of them, though the one for which I am best known.
For the first thirty-three years of my life the quote might have been true. I have called that period “longing”, and certainly toward the end I was counting the days, and nothing and no one was going to stop me from setting out for Cape Horn.
When I pushed away from a San Diego marina on November 2, 1974, I left behind not one, but three women of great beauty and charm. There was no deception. They all knew of one another, and they all knew I was going.
And from that moment on, I’ve lived in the present. Not the future, though I consider it and make tentative plans; not the past, though I have not forgotten much as of yet.
Although I’d rather live on a boat than land, when I am in Evanston I write almost every day and I enjoy being with Carol.
When I return to New Zealand I enjoy being on THE HAWKE OF TUONELA on her mooring.
That mooring, as regular readers of this journal know, suits me perfectly. I love just being there.
And I also love sailing oceans alone. But when I’ve been sailing alone and not had a woman in my life, I have not been happy.
It is the unmet need that calls the loudest.
After a while when I’m in Evanston, I increasingly miss being on the boat. And when I’m on the boat, after a while I increasingly miss being with Carol. And during my fifth circumnavigation, I missed being on my mooring.
But I accept that they are mutually exclusive, and my life is not any one, but all three.
…
I saw LE MANS when it first came out.
It happened that a few days after I received the quote by email, I noticed that it was being shown on Turner Classic Movies and watched it again.
The plot is slight, a short story at most, but the footage, both of the spectators and particularly the racing, is excellent. Though loud. Very, very loud.
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I am again Harmony sitting, while her owners are on vacation.
Harmony is a harmonious cat. She is not black , but gray.
She is waiting.
Friday, August 13, 2010