You know, the way David and I look at life aboard a boat at sea is…different. Just now, he tells me while reading a March issue of Science Magazine (have I told you how truly behind on our professional reading we are? That’s another topic for the blog, I suppose) he says something along the lines of “see, we could suffocate on methane! that’s one reason NOT to do the Northwest Passage.”

Whew, this is the first reason he’s ever given for “not” doing the NWP. I’m all ears. He goes on to read a bit of the Heimann article and relates his fears. I listened with interest, David doesn’t have a whole lot of fears. The mismatch between his adrenalin-junky behavior and my wimpy risk tolerance have always been a point of friction between us.

I must admit that being suffocated by methane bubbling up from the oceans deep really wasn’t high on my list of worries or thoughts about ways I could die at sea. My visions of my final moments have more to do with stumbling over a shoelace and plopping face-first into the cold Pacific. Oh, yes, I use our jacklines, but my fear centers around once I’ve plopped overboard that I’ll be dragged along by the jackline tether that I won’t be able to release. Oh, yes, our jacklines do run along the centerline of the boat so it’d be probably be almost as hard for me to achieve the “death-by-drowning-while-dragging on one’s tether through the water” as it would be for David to have his “death-by-suffocation-due-to-giant-methane-bubbles.”

The difference? I believe my death will be entirely my own klutzy fault. He thinks his will be something totally beyond his control. My fears…me. His fears…highly improbably weird stuff.