I first read the adventures of Stuemer family, not in this book, but as the series of articles that Diane Stuemer wrote in the Ottawa Citizen. The book that tells the entire story of their four-year odyssey circumnavigating the globe in a small yacht is titled
The Voyage of the Northern Magic, published in 2002. When the articles first started their run in our local paper, I was home on maternity leave with Mitchell. It was 1997. I read of their experiences - every Saturday morning over coffee - over the next several years with equal parts admiration, envy and longing. Not that I have ever had any desire to live four years, or even four months, in a sailboat, but I did certainly share their desire to travel, see the world and live in the moment. I re-read the book this summer and enjoyed it on a different level - reading it more this time as a student trying to glean some tips on how they organized everything. They were an ordinary suburban family with three boys ages 11, 9 and 5 years when they left Ottawa. Here's an excerpt that gives a picture of what Diane Stuemer and her family had to pull together in their final weeks before leaving:
"By now we had sold our two cars and were running around in a rented car. There was an unbelievable list of details to sort out before we could leave. It's a good thing I'm a list-maker. I had read and read and read, so I had everything pretty well thought out, from medical kit to books. Address changes, radio licences, consultations with doctors, sprucing up our sails, creating an extensive medical kit (even down to IV lines and cathetars), setting up powers of attorney, banking, paying bills, getting inoculations, taking care of school books, these things and a million others filled page after page of lists. My list for August 26, 1997, was 63 items long, not including a separate shopping list. We had lists of what things we had left in our house. We had lists of instructions for our tenants. We had lists of what we had on the boat and where it was stored. What we lacked in personal experience we made up for in research. And lists. There are people in my family who make fun of me for my lists, but as far as I'm concerned they are what held us together" (p. 13).
The first time I read this book, probably about five years ago, I hardly noticed that little paragraph. This time, it grabbed me. I have started a similar list but we still have a good 18 months to cross everything off. I remember when we prepared to move to Saudi Arabia back in 1999, coping with a list of 50-odd items. We took unpaid leaves from work, sold our home, our cars, underwent various medical tests of the blood, chest and fecal variety to prove we would not be bringing in deadly parasites or viruses from the First World into the Second, and basically severed all ties so that we could officially and legitimately be non-residents for tax purposes. I also recall when my sister Sue was organizing things in Vernon, BC as she and her husband Ken got ready to move to South Africa for four years. We talked on the phone a few weeks before they left. She couldn't chat long as she had a list with 70-odd items on the go. It seems to be more of a female thing. This list-making, organizing tendency must be a trait we are biologically pre-disposed to develop.
Anyway, lest you mistakenly think the book is only a catalogue of their detailed preparations, let me just say that you will be inspired to read about all the friendships they develop and the good works they accomplished everywhere they went. Truly an amazing family. The work they began in Kenya continues today. Check out their website for more details at
http://www.northernmagic.com/main_page.html. I was entranced to read about the "Friendly Islands" of French Polynesia (Marquesas, Tahiti, Fatu Hiva and Palmerston Island where they single-handedly resurrected schooling for the island children). I wonder if there is still a Canadian teacher there. If you know, leave a comment! Honestly, if we landed in a place like one of these islands, I fear we would never leave.
Sadly, Diane Stuemer died in March 2003 from cancer. The thing I really took away from re-reading this book is that, as much as she loved travel and adventure, it was her love for her husband and boys that led her to set sail like she did.
Ted found out, a few days ago, that he passed his written French (comprehension and grammar) in order to get his "levels" as they say in the federal government. Massive relief in our house. Could not have asked for a better Christmas present. Even better than a Wii. Anyone who has talked with us in the last year knows that this whole business of Ted's French language training has taken its toll. As much as it sounds like a taxpayer-funded holiday to the rest of us, it is a shock to the system (from my second-hand perspective anyway) to go from being on the move, visiting construction sites, attending meetings, etc. to sitting in the same stale-aired, windowless room with exactly three people for eight hours a day, five days a week trying to plow through a book of French exercises . . . Now he just has to focus on the more difficult oral exam in March. Bonne chance, Ted!
