Boat building has stalled in the last few weeks as I realize that the raising of each frame will bring the project one step closer to completion or calamity. At this point, I'm not sure which it is going to be and am thus reveling in a rather blissful ignorance. When the frames do go up next week (!), I will know once and for all whether Luna will be a beauty or a god-awful mess. The quality of the lofting job I did over a year ago will be put to the test when I can use a batten to check the three-dimensional curvature of the chine and sheer.
The last couple of days have seen me drinking a lot of wine, eating a lot of tamales, avoiding the boat shop,and over-analyzing each step I've taken to get to this point. For each part of the project there were setbacks and things that didn't turn out quite like I'd imagined (these lessons have been mentally filed under "The Next Boat"). After spending a lot of time before each new step thinking about what could go wrong, I realized that the sooner I could deal with what went wrong, the better. I'd stall before each new venture (just as I'm stalling now), think about various outcomes and contingencies, and ultimately had to decide to just do it. Just take a chainsaw to that keel piece you spent a week in the hot sun laminating. Just run a Skillsaw down the side of keel. Just buy that planking even if you aren't sure it'll wrap around the hull. Just use that adhesive even if it's not proven. Just glue this piece on that piece and bolt it to this piece.
