changes in latitude

When I was an 18 year old boy, I was an idiot (redundant thought, you say? fair enough). I entered college with plans on becoming an architect only to discover that architecture sucks (apologies to all you architecties out there). Without direction, my academic pursuits crumbled like bad cake. I dropped out of college sans degree and went to work.

I've been working in the software industry for enough years to work myself into a comfortable job with a comfortable salary and a nice office view of Mt. Rainier and Lake Union. I bought a great little townhouse in Ballard right off the water about 3 miles from work. One of the side benefits of this arrangement is the ability to kayak to work. Sometimes, life is good.

But here I am, way too many years later and realizing that I need that bachelors degree. More to the point, I need the knowledge that comes with the degree. I've no interest in doing academic backflips for a pat on the head and a piece of paper. I need to understand computer science at a level that I just don't right now if I'm ever going to advance beyond Reasonably Competent Framework Programmer into Kungfu Software Master.

I put together a rigorous plan that would get me back in school, relieve me of full-time employment* and draw heavily on some saved money to feed the mortgage. It was all very specifically laid out and I'm eight months into the execution part of the plan. I'm working full time still while I knock down the ridonculous amount of pre-requisite math classes in the morning or at night. However, at one class per quarter, graduation and retirement will be racing along side each other, neck and neck. Eventually I need to quit fucking around and step up to full-time student status. Which means zero-time work status. Which means no income. Which means hemorrhaging cash out the bottom of savings account. My mortgage is plenty comfortable with money coming every month. Not so much when the coffers aren't being replenished. However, selling my comfy little townhouse to move into a $1000/month shite apartment holds no appeal. This has been gnawing at me for sometime and I hadn't really come up with any solution other than graduate really fast.

Then it dawned on me like a brick dawns on a plate glass window.

I live in a city abso-frickin-lutely surrounded with water. I could live on a sailboat cheap. Really cheap. Swap out the equity in my house for a boat. Pay moorage which even in Seattle proper is a fraction of what my mortgage payment is. Weekdays living on the water in the heart of the city, walking to restaurants, campus, coffee shops. Evenings spent sailing Lake Washington. Weekends living off the hook somewhere in the Puget Sound. Summers poking in and out of fjords all the way up Vancouver Island and British Columbia. Grilling salmon off the stern. Beers on deck. Sunning myself on the bow like a walrus. Just dog-damned beautiful.

Now, I need to learn how to sail.


*UPDATE 10.1.2007: it's a long and sordid tale but can be boiled down thusly: my company got bought out by an ogre of a company and I got shafted out of benefits. My boss and his boss swooped in with some heroic action and saved my ass. Big time. Working for folks like this is a rarity and will be much harder to give up than I previously imagined. Boat and school plan is still in motion but quitting entirely is now in flux.