By: Laila Wani
Each time I go home and
visit my family, I get some advice. Though I am past the age where it’s not
“cool” to listen to your parents, sometimes I still think I know better. And
those thoughts are inevitably followed by the parental version of I told you
so: “I guess you wanted to learn from your own mistakes.”
Learning by doing. Not the craziest of ideas, but
something our parents would like to save us from. Instead they want us to heed
their warnings. While reading “First You Have To Row A Little Boat” by Richard
Bode, I was reminded of my mother. Unlike Bode, my mother taught my sisters and
me numerous lessons. The book reads like a letter of sorts. He has a list of
regrets, ones that maybe he thought could be rid of by writing this book.
Bode was a Public Relations writer for nearly 20 years,
before he decided to make the beach his new home. Here the aspiring poet began
writing books that gave life lessons. It is abundantly clear that the Bode had
salt water flowing through him as he wrote “First You Have To Row A Little
Boat.”
As the book progresses, it is heavy with sailing
references. Just in the first chapter, he compares the deaths of his parents
to, “a colossal storm, an irreversible wind that changed my destiny,’ (p. 3).
Bode’s dedication to the analogy is admirable, but at times unnecessary.
This book is for those like Bode, lovers of the open
water. I prefer to keep my feet dry and to stay on steady land. The constant
comparison of life to the open water did not register with me. But if you yearn
an adventure on the sea, this might be the book for you.
More on Richard Bode
No comments:
Post a Comment