What will be will be

[Levitation]

The sharp eyed amongst us (there seem to be many) will notice immediately that there has been a change in the name that will be on the transom of the tug I called Levitation even though the transom has been pristine since we brought the boat home in August of 09...

It could be political correctness has set in... Or perhaps better judgment... Or just the peregrinations of an aging brain... It is funny/strange how it seemed to happen all of a sudden after twenty some years of simmering on the back burner...

Short story, long
We sold our last boat in the late 80's - Risque sailed away with her new owner leaning back against the bulwark with his left arm draped casually over the tiller, the new Genoa I had only used a few times pulling strongly on a gorgeous summer morning and his face looking forward at the curling bow wave not back at the past... The intended next boat purchase just didn't seem to happen as the years dribbled past... We were busy running a 24/7 medical practice and we got up at 4:30 AM and went full throttle until we fell/collapsed into bed at 9 PM... There was not time to go use the lonely boat that sat on it's cradle for 4 years at the end so it was better she be loved by someone who had the time to use her...

The fact is that Char hates boats and planes, she cannot even sit on a swing without turning green- I have no idea why she ever took up with me... Anyway, an airplane fitted our needs better in those years as we could zip across 3 states to visit grandchildren and to ferry the herd to the cottage for summers, etc. She gamely clutched my arm as the plane bumped through the lumpy air of hot summers going to see her beloved grandchildren... Still the purchase of a Levitation lay in wait through all those years...

Twenty years , almost to the day, of selling RIsque - and countless hours of thumbing through the boats for sale section of Yachting magazines as I waited for my supper (boats I could never afford) Levitation happened unplanned, unforeseen, and unusual... I wanted to replace my gas pickup with a diesel that could better haul the farm's bulldozer, etc... I found a deal I liked in Houston and we flew the airlines there on a Saturday morning at 5 AM and by 11 AM we were on the expressway across Houston to push the truck back to Hemlock in 2 days of driving... During that run I casually commented to Char that this truck would be able to pull a pretty nice boat - she just gave me a glittering glance from the corner of one eye; no comment... Oh well, just one of those rambling, impulse thoughts we all have... We arrived at home in the evening hours of Sunday and fell into bed to go to work Monday morning... Monday morning at the office I checked the the Tugnuts chat group and there was an R25 for sale - hmmmm... I sat there rolling all this stuff through my brain... I had just spent the annual income of a middle class family on a new diesel truck: Now here I sit contemplating spending more years of that struggling family's income on a boat...

Long story, short...
I picked up the phone and in 5 minutes made a deal to buy that Tug - after 20 years Levitation was going to actually float...

Which brings us up to this morning... I came out to the shop to order a name decal for the transom of Levitation - that was an issue I just never had time to do until now... After my spinal cord surgery I decided it was time to smell the roses... I pulled up the iBoats web page yesterday, brought up the order page, selected the color and font and size for the letters spelling LEVITATION and went to the checkout page; and the phone rang... Supper was ready... I went to the house and never returned to the shop... So this morning I staggered out here, wiping sleep from my eyes and shivering at the winter morning and briskly set about finishing the transaction... Being that the checkout page had timed out (smart folks) I had to restart the order... I bent to my task and diligently worked at it, went to checkout, hit enter, and voila the decals are mine (when they come)... Leaning back with a sense of a job well done I raised my now less than steaming tea to my lips when my eyes beheld what my subconscious had done - this R25 Tug will proudly carry the name on the transom of lev i t. . . err, CHARLOTTE ANN

hoo boy, now what have I done?

 

[cap10chuck]

Wise decision; you're a smart husband.

 

[JamesTXSD]

We've had a couple boats that waited a year to get their name. And a couple that had the name picked out when the boat was ordered. Sometimes you need the boat to tell you what she wants to be called. Charlotte Ann is a lovely name.

It was time. Good that you waited and listened. 😉

Best wishes,
Jim B.

 

[walldog]

Great story. Thanks for sharing. Not quite as dramatic, but along the same lines as how our Tug is named Willie's rather than "Los Gueros" as was originally planned.

 

[SlackwaterJack]

Congrats on making a decision, I generally have had a difficult time naming boats myself... by the time I finished mulling over a name I was usually tired of the name...I used the excuse that I wanted to get to know the boat first ( get it to "tell me it's name?). That plan left a couple of them nameless.
I've only (re)named one boat immediately upon possession....A '78 S2 9.2 cutter originally named "Breakn' Wind"... Changed it to "Mandolin Wind" while the check was clearing.

 

[Sterellie]

Great story... The name for my boat came about when I first met my wife to be. I was in London at the Grovner House bar. I had just ordered a liquer, when I was introduced to the most beautiful girl I had ever met. She ordered what I was drinking. Within five days I was hopelessly in love. We were married a year later. We later learned that "those who drink Straga together will never part."

Sterling

 

[Levitation]

Well, the boat's namesake is innocently unaware of what hath been wrought - or over wrought as it may be...
The transom is packed up against a wall that accessible only to the determined... So it will be interesting to see when she 'see's' once the boat is pulled out and readied for Florida... For someone who acts like she is in a fog 99% of the time, the 1% containing hypercritical vision seems to occur mostly when I'd rather it didn't - or in this one case when I'd rather it did...