ABOUT WOMEN
Don't go overboard with worry

By Tanya Bricking Leach
Advertiser Staff Writer

My parents called last Sunday morning when I was in the midst of cramming for the last day of my sailing class, praying that reading would make it all sink in.

"Dad, there's a good chance I could fail the class," I said.

My dad was on the way home from sailing himself. He lives for summers boating on Lake Erie.

Sailing has been a part of summer in my family ever since I can remember.

Aboard the sloop Walt's Fault, on the Ohio River, my grandpa used to test the boys before he'd let them take the helm. At the time, the girls never volunteered for the challenge. The men in the family would always let the girls steer or grab the ropes, even though we didn't really know what we were doing.

This year, I decided it was about time to figure it out. But I thought I was sunk in my class.

I told my dad about the "man overboard" drill we'd practiced with a float. I ran over it. Would have killed the man overboard. Not to mention the two times I almost ran into the instructor.

My dad was reassuring.

"Even if you fail the class," he said, "you'll know more than when you started."

So I went to my class, practiced the "man overboard" without killing him, and by the end of the day, I earned my certification.

Later in the week, I met some women who inspired me to keep at it.

I laughed the first time I heard their group's name: The Wet Hens. They're military wives whose theories on sailing revolve around developing a sense of camaraderie.

They owe their start to Lewis "Papa Lou" Foster, who designed Hickam Harbor marina and taught the first group of officers' wives how to sail. In 1961, the women wanted to start a ladies' sailing club.

"I said, 'I don't know what to do with you wet hens,' and that's how it got started," said Foster, 82, who lived in Hawai'i for 36 years and retired to Fairfield, Calif.

Over the years, more than 1,700 women have gone through the class, and Papa Lou (aka "Ornery Old Rooster" or "The Henpecker") still comes back for reunions.

I saw myself in recent graduate Liane Turner, a 37-year-old 'Aiea woman who spent family vacations on her dad's sailboat but never imagined herself as a skipper, until now.

"There's a sense of empowerment that we don't need a man to do it for us," she said.

Sally Fortson, 60, a Wet Hen since 1979, also made me feel better about my future in the sport.

"At first, a lot of us weren't sure we were enjoying ourselves, but we just kept coming out," she said. "After a while, the ones whose dads sailed started to understand why they loved it so much."

I want the feeling they've found. So maybe I should make this a warning: Steer clear. I'm getting back in the water.

Reach relationships writer Tanya Bricking Leach at tbricking@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8026.