My head is buried in a wall of water. I can’t see anything in front of me except the wake, which I am plowing through like a human submarine. Fighting my way to the surface, I see my water ski sticking straight up and down. My shoulders feel like they are being ripped from their sockets. My nose, filled with water, is burning. ‘What the heck is going on, why is the boat going so slowly, why am I not popping out of the water,’ these thoughts and a few obscenities are racing through my mind.

“Faster! Faster!” I croak, barely audible above the boat’s roar. Finally after a slow aching struggle, I manage to get out of the water and I’m off, skiing into the sunset.

Back at the dock, I give my husband the look. “What happened out there?” I ask. Actually, it sounds more like a demand. Bill returns my look with one of his own. “The boat was wide open,” he replies, “Wide open.”

Having just spent another $800, our second of the season, I am beginning to wonder when we call it quits and walk away. Our boat, a used Sunray, was purchased from the previous cabin owners. Wanting to ensure that I would be able to go waterskiing the moment we had the keys to the cottage in our hot little hands, I insisted on buying their boat.

Bill, the calm prudent voice of reason, wanted to shop around and get a newer model. Now, having lost the battle and the war, I am conceding defeat. I wish we’d waited, at least then I could blame Bill, versus the other way around.

Calculating the costs of our Sunray, including insurance and gas, I figure we’ve sunk at least $2,000 into it this summer. Assuming I ski 20 times, that’s roughly $100 a ski or $20 a minute. A new boat is only going to drive up the cost of my favourite sport.

At this point I am open to any and all suggestions and offers on our boat. Hey, I’ll even throw in a generator, used of course.

Cheers,

Julie

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 at 9:45 pm and is filed under Fix It. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.