Welcome to the Lake Pleasant Sailing Club website. Each month, I present a “Commodore’s Blog” covering an issue or issues important to LPSC’s members and to anyone interested in the world of sailing. Enjoy the website and come back often!
I have issues. You can help. As your commodore, there are things that really matter to me,and issues that frankly are not of great concern to me personally. However I understand I am responsible, along with the board, for assuring the club handles both large and small issues to the membership’s overall satisfaction. I want to share what I perceive as one of each; a small issue and a huge one. You may not agree with my opinion which is the big deal and which is not, so, I’ve clarified where I stand.
Holiday/Christmas Party
What I see as a little issue: A change to the holiday/Christmas party. A change, yes. But of little consequence. Many people thought our celebration had gotten too expensive–$20 for each participant even after the Club pitched in a respectable chunk our annual budget, hours of work on a few people throwing the party (they get there at 1pm!) During the January meeting many of you expressed a desire to simplify our celebration. Someone suggested the Tempe Parade of Lights, followed by a get together with hors d’oeuvres and drinks in typical LPSC style. That seemed like a great idea. We want to know what you think and YOUR ideas to make if as much fun as possible. Help the board with “little” issue. Let members of the board know:
1. If you love or hate the parade of lights + party plan. If you hate it, please help us with your suggestion
2. Should we enter the parade with a glittering LPSC boat? Leave entries up to individual members? Or just watch and admire?
3. Should we have a before- or after-party, or both?
4. Where in Tempe should we meet to watch the parade? And we are looking for ideas of where to hold the party component.
I hope all of you will contact a board member, or better yet copy all of us on an email, to express your opinions for this issue.
Safe Sailing
What I see as the important issue: Our safety.There is one over-arching goal for the club I choose to reach towards. Unlike hosting a great party, what I am focusing my term on what will not be among the reasons anyone would join the club. As a matter of fact, I am 99% sure no one ever signed up for LPSC to be convinced to wear a life jacket. Yawn… okay, I know it’s a snore and may even sound … naggy? Hear me out. I earned the prerogative — the bully pulpit — since I raised my hand and said, “Sure, I’ll run for Commodore,” to try to convince each of you to put a life jacket on when you climb aboard your boat.
I didn’t always wear my life jacket. It took me over a decade to make that choice. It was a process with many influences that convinced me to make it my habit. Mostly it was the stories. I heard them through the Coast Guard Auxiliary, Game and Fish and the State of Utah where I was a volunteer boating safety instructor. I heard them more often when Ed went to work for Game and Fish. Now that Ed is a Coast Guard Recreational Boating Safety Specialist he shares with me the part of his job he will never love, the stories he reviews every day of simple falls overboard that result in a fatality. Most people don’t realize more than half of all fatal boating accidents are that simple. Oops! Splash. If a life jacket would have been worn, there would be no tragedy. Maybe just a fruitcake burgee.
A Life Lost
Here is one story from this week. Grandpa, dad and his 12-year old son went fishing. Three generations playing together, what could be better? But when the 12-year old fell overboard, both grandpa and dad jumped in to help him. It got complicated. The young man was returned safely to the boat. He was wearing a life jacket, because it’s the law. Dad and grandpa were not wearing one, because it’s not required. Now this child is fatherless. A grandfather has lost his grown son. An entire small community is mourning the loss.
This story did not need to end tragically, all of you can figure out the one thing that would have changed the outcome.
I finally decided to wear a life jacket when I accepted the fact these stories could be about me, or someone on my boat. I didn’t want that to happen. And as Commodore I am appealing to you to make that very good boating decision to WEAR IT!.
WEAR IT! Challenge
As part of the Wear It! grant program, we are asking you to share your thoughts on the process of choosing to wear your life jacket. Submit a paragraph (or more) to add to the Club’s life jacket chronicles. Your submission can take any form. Be creative. Maybe write what you would think, do or say if you saw young children not wearing a life jacket. Write a poem about when you put on your life jacket and why. Make a video how a life jacket is like a seat belt, and how it may seem inconvenient, until you need it. Or if you have your own a life jacket story, share it. By doing any of these things, you will earn 5 Wear It points, but more importantly you will play a part in the process of getting more members to choose to wear life jackets.
And now, even if your PFDs are squished under the emergency anchor, you can take a big step in the Wear It process. Give an inflatable a whirl. Find a life jacket you can live with. Literally. You can check out a variety of easy-to-wear life jackets at the Sailboat Shop. Ask Tom where the bin is. Read the check out instructions. (They are brief and easy.) Enjoy wearing an inflatable of your choice. Return when you are done. All we ask is you read the instructions to understand if you are selecting a manual or an automatic model so you are aware if you need to pull the tab, or not, if you fall overboard. If you want to collect Wear It! points to win one of the life jackets in the tub, wear it the whole time you are underway. Then send a photo of yourself wearing the life jacket to info@lakepleasantsailing.com. You will earn one Wear It! point for each day or outing.
I probably will never know to what degree the Wear It program is successful. A member dusting off their life jacket or purchasing one they will wear will not be a notable event — like a FUN holiday blast — nor will it make the club’s newsletter or history page. Still I believe it is a worthy issue to focus on. Encouraging you to wear a life jacket is boring, but it has the quiet potential to prevent an unthinkable story. It a big deal to me to work to assure you will be around to celebrate at your LPSC party in December.
Fair Winds,
Debbie Huntsman
2012 Commodore
