Lexi… why did you abandon the boat?
You made the wrong decision…! You coulda/shoulda saved what was left of the vessel. You coulda/shoulda done this or that… the clear lense of hindsight and the lack of wisdom men exercise.
I have decided to address this one central issue that has people fuming, attacking and judging me. It was a decision, it was my decision, it was the decision I made on the ocean in the dark at a specific moment in time. It seems to be a controversial decision.
So many men have said so many stupid things about this I will kindly help them comprehend. For some reason the male brain often gets so fixated on the idea of CAN I…? do a thing… but often they miss the deeper reasoning of SHOULD I…? do the thing.
Maybe I could have fought the hard fight and suffered to save what was left of WildChild without killing either me or my crew in the process?
But should I…?
This is the more important question I had a minute to debate in my head in a bikini and a lifejacket in the dark standing over my wrecked boat 20 miles out to sea off cape fear after some unknown unseen force ripped her apart with alarming speed. It was my decision in a critical moment… my decision to make and nobody else’s… and standing there alone in the dark I made it.
I hit the EPIRB SOS button
As soon as you do that… you are abandoning the ship, and it becomes marine salvage you release all your rights to.
Most of my critics are BOOMERS… wealthy spoil old ignorant boomers… Boomers who have no concept of what the term “I have no money” actually means. Boomers who have never lived on the streets or been homeless before. Boomers who have always had the ability to pull money out to get other people to fix everything for them and stay comfortable. Boomers who have always lived the most safe blessed comfortable lives in human history like spoiled brats.
Boomers attack me for not having insurance on the boat. Lexi you are so stupid for going on the ocean without insurance on your boat, this is all your own fault. Like they cannot comprehend that I had an easy decision years ago,
food OR Insurance
not both. Not a difficult decision but one the Boomers have never had to make before. A decision they cannot comprehend. Hey you dumbasses…
I have no money
Most people can only see the string of causality one or two moves into the future. For these people the decision seems simple; save what you can, if you can, therefore it follows that you must.
I am a super smart brilliant human being who can see further into the string of causality than most people… let us analyze this from my perspective… Let us look many steps down the “save the wrecked boat” path men seem convinced was the “right” thing to do.
Save what is left of the damaged boat…
- Even in perfect condition she cannot be sold for any reasonable amount of money, therefore as a wreck not sell able at all. I will be stuck either fixing her or paying to have her crushed up and disposed of “properly” both options require a lot of money. I have no money
- the damage was more extensive than you think, the boat did sink the next day, we could have been in serious trouble if I could not prevent her from sinking while struggling for days to get her back to shore.
- America can be insane about liability with such things, study long enough and find the stories of boat owners incurring thousands of dollars in fines for damaged boats, liability beyond reason. WildChild was in international waters, out of reach of government stupidity. Getting her closer to American shores in this destroyed condition, bulkheads had ripped out down below, would only invite fines and penalties (money I don’t have)
- Towing her in would incur thousand of dollars in fees. (money I don’t have)
- Motoring in a sinking boat might have been possible, against the gulf stream current, but not guaranteed to be successful and very risky, but then what?
- Pay a marina for a slip? Pay a marina to haul her out and pay a marina a ton of money every month to store her in a boat yard? isn’t this like paying a storage locker thousands of dollars to store a few hundred dollars worth of material belongings? Not logical… and… I have no money
- find myself living on a wrecked boat far from home with no money that needs $50,000 dollars worth of repairs? Do you invest $5000 changing the engine on your 20 year old car worth $500 dollars? No… ? wonder why…? Men… try to be more logical please
- Boats are really holes in the water people throw money at. I have no money.
- I would be forced into paying a boatyard to have her destroyed “properly”. I have no money.
- What would struggling to save the boat achieve?
- Would that benefit outweigh risking my crews life to do it? NO..!
- Saving the boat would only force me $50,000 dollars into the hole and save a few thousand dollars worth of personal belongings even if it was successful, which in itself was not certain.
- Saving the boat would only make my hard life harder… why would I want that?
- Saving the boat only keeps me enslaved to my responsibility to her… why would I want that?
A Captain’s responsibility is first and foremost to the safety of the passengers and crew.
I did what was in the best interest of saving and protecting my crew, despite the personal cost to me. This is the first responsibility I saw and felt and weighed highest on my priority list. I will die to Protect Valerie if I have to, I will save and protect her at all costs. What is the best thing to do to protect my crew? I have to get her safely back to land, back to her family and husband, no matter what.
When I had a minute to decide if I should risk my crews life a lot to try to save WildChild… the answer was NO..! People are always more important than things.
***
Getting out of this adventure financially at ZERO and guaranteeing my crews safety… is better than… getting out at NEGATIVE $50K and risking her life further.
Sometimes we have to cut off the arm to stop the hemorrhaging. Most people are not strong or smart enough to do this, I have experience with it, making very difficult decisions, taking short term harm for long term gain, acting completely logically. But you have to be able to see further down the string of causality to see these things. My critics cannot understand such things, they see only 1 move ahead.
I had 2 possible long term options in front of me… That I had to size up under great stress suddenly in the dark, in a bikini and a lifejacket, and make a life changing decision on the spot, within a minute.
Save the boat and continue living a very hard miserable existence, risk my crews life to save my stuff, and get stuck for another year or more far from home with this anchor around my neck, stay enslaved to the wrecked hull of this boat?
OR…
Accept this disaster as is, let WildChild go to her grave… start fresh and clean from the bottom, financially start over at $0.00, with nothing but my health and body.? Have faith and trust God and the angels to carry me forward into freedom? Finally escape the ocean.
Not so illogical as you men think… I was not making emotional decisions out of fear, I was calm and completely logical despite feeling great fear and stress.
I hit the EPIRB SOS button
I do NOT lack the courage to jump
I would have preferred the option I was exercising 5 minutes before the tornado found me in the dark… bring WildChild home, save my stuff and find a job get more money and begin building a lovely new life on land until I could sell WildChild to new owners for new adventures.
This good option was taken from me in an instant.. and I was down to the red or green options mentioned above.
Real life has real risk, real dangers. I know this, I took every step, every risk, fully aware, it was why I am braver and tougher and have bigger balls than you do. So many of you dirt dwellers think life is like a video game with imagined danger, or like an amusement park ride, it feels scary but you know you are safe the whole time, no actual harm can come to you. This is why you sit at home judging me from the safety of your chair, no balls, no ability to actually risk everything for your dreams, or you would be out here too.
You who live playing it safe, never knowing actual danger or harm, having never actually gambled your whole life to achieve something very difficult, have no right to judge me.