Teamwork

There are quite a few cruising couples in the Vero Beach marina.  Like most cruisers, (not to be confused in the least bit with swingers) the majority...meaning pretty much everyone else but us... is over the age of 55.  Their children have grown, they have sold their paid-off house and actually have an income, many live at the marina permanently.  One thing all cruisers have in common, however, is the fact that we all spend a great deal of time with our spouse.  Now that Cyrus is visiting his friends and grandparents in Colorado, Tyler and I see each other A LOT.  I think I mentioned before that Cyrus' absence allows Tyler and I to work together on some boat projects and that is exactly what we did today.
Teamwork took on many forms today:  the biggie was Tyler's first adventure up the mast.  We bought a new bosun's chair in Ft. Lauderdale, similar to the one that I borrowed to go up the mast a couple of weeks ago.  I would have gone up the mast again today, but the task involved a good deal of electrical expertise, and even though Tyler said, "Oh it's easy..you just blah blah the blah blah wire to the blah," as a way of trying to get out of being hoisted up the mast, today was his big day.
Not surprisingly, teamwork is essential when one is going to the top of a mast. The first part of today's teamwork was simply talking through the task and trying to be proactive about what Tyler might bring with him to minimize the amount of time waiting for tools to be run up a little line. The second part of today's teamwork involved working together to lift Tyler, this ultimately involved a combination of pullys and our handy-dandy wench- a metal fixture to which you can wrap your line and use a handle to wind the line- as opposed to just pulling on the rope until your arms fall off.  As Tyler was moving up the mast, he tried to stop the entire operation claiming that it wasn't going to work anyway and it was too dangerous.  I knew better, and so I told him he was going up the mast and kept winding the wench handle.  Sometimes being part of a team means you don't listen to the other team member.  Tyler eventually made it to the top and then spent a good 3 1/2 hours up there installing a new anchor light/navigation light (of which only the anchor light works at this time) and windex- a lightweight device that indicates true wind direction (because your perception of the wind is affected by your velocity through the wind- whoa).  What did the other team mate do while Tyler was at the top of the mast?  Not much- looked up a lot, fetched tools, turned breakers on and off- what I was really doing was being readily available in case of a problem and helping to ease Tyler's mind.  Walking around the deck made the boat sway- which is not a good top of the mast feeling. Going below was out of the question because I wasn't able to hear when Tyler needed something. I was simply at hand.
We accomplished a few more things together today: Ty went to the grocery store and I cleaned the cabin, dinner was definitely a shared effort, but the mast ride was the topper (so to speak).  I'm so thankful that Tyler could wire and install the mast light correctly today....and that we are a close enough team that I know when to force him to face a fear.