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Sailing with Angels
Thu Sep 01, 2005
Listen in RealAudio 
Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton and today Weather Notebook commentator and author Jan DeBlieu talks about how the wind challenges her as a sailor-and sometimes lets her win: In a region with winds as volatile as those on North Carolina's Outer Banks, sailing can be a rather dangerous hobby. And yet we go sailing, my family and I, as often as we can. For me it is a form of renewal and prayer. Our small boat, filled with the personality granted it by wind, reminds me of a great horse. The breezes joust with us. They test my mettle as a sailor.
In Roanoke Sound one afternoon a northwest wind builds without warning, until the pleasant, rocking waves brim with whitecaps. The boat pounds through the gray, frothing swells, responding less and less to the tiller. I am no longer in charge. I try to come about, but the boat will not turn. We are being carried due east, into rougher waters and heavier breeze. I take a deep breath, haul the sail in close to build up speed, and veer hard into the wind. A wave slams the hull. The boat teeters on the edge of the wind for a heart-stopping moment and swings around.
Relieved, I retreat to the more protected waters of Shallowbag Bay. Now the wind promises me an easy passage back to shore, but it glances off a point of land and forces me to fall off my bearing. The boat keels wildly. Try again, the wind says, I dare you. I take the challenge, and win.
I pull up to the dock with the sense of having wrestled an angel."
Jan DeBlieu is an author from Manteo, North Carolina. She is the winner of the prestigious Burroughs award for nature writing for her recent book "Wind." Thanks to Subaru and the National Science Foundation.
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