Uncharted Waters: Romance, Adventure, and Advocacy on the Great Lakes

By Mary McKSchmidt

Written in a voice that is charming, witty, and honest, Uncharted Waters shares the stories of a Fortune 500 executive learning to sail, learning to love, learning to fight for the water and life she holds dear. Mary McKSchmidt is an adventurer—a woman who wanders across southern Africa, achieves success in positions typ

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mary McKinney Schmidt
• Release date: Jul 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9781732100916

Mary McKSchmidt

Mary McKSchmidt replaces a briefcase, calculator, and business suit with a notepad, camera, and foul weather gear and journeys into unchartered waters to help build the political will necessary to clean up and protect the Great Lakes. A published writer, photographer, and blogger, when not in West Michigan, she may be found wandering the planet, usually by boat, foot, or bicycle.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

My fingers shook with excitement as I dialed my parents’ number. Standing in a cramped phone booth outside Casco, Maine, a few miles from the camp where I was teaching whitewater canoeing, I was calling less to get their permission than approval. Especially my dad’s.

"My friends, Andy and Lynne—here at the camp—are traveling to South Africa for six months. They’ve invited me to join them. Andy’s parents live in Johannesburg. They’ve offered to let us stay with them. His parents have even found me a potential job as a writer for SA Tennis Magazine!"

My words were rolling across the phone lines fast and furiously. We’re to leave in late August. I mean, when else will I have this kind of opportunity? To really explore another country? To have friends with me, a place to stay, a job? What do you think?

Twenty-two years old, I was midway through a college degree, an education I was financing first through a full-time job at the city newspaper, then pickup jobs, and then as a whitewater canoeing instructor. My dad, a professor at Michigan State University, also loved the adventure and learning associated with travel. When I was a child, and it was my turn, I accompanied him to the university’s auditorium on Saturday nights to watch and listen to travelogues. Flashing across a gigantic screen were photographs of faraway places, not merely explained but romanticized by the wandering adventurer behind the podium. When Dad’s job took him to places like Massachusetts, New Hampshire, or Washington, D.C., he would pile us into the family station wagon so we, too, could see the country.

His silence that evening hung like a shroud around me. I had never crossed him and had not anticipated anything but enthusiastic support. As I waited for his reply, I grew more nervous. For the first time, I realized the enormity of my decision, and I, too, said nothing.

After several minutes, he answered slowly. I think it’s a bad idea. But you’re an adult, old enough to make your own decisions, old enough to live with the consequences.

Permission. Not approval.

I never asked my dad why he didn’t approve. Never really thought about it until he passed away, decades later. Now, as I reflect on his response, I think it was more than a father’s concern for the safety of his daughter. Deeply embedded in him was the belief that education must come first, must be the highest priority for his children, his students, for everyone. Without an education, doors do not open. Options are limited. He wanted our future to be brighter than his distant past. He did not want us scarred by the pain of poverty. He wanted me to stay the course, to finish the degree.

One month after that phone call, I was standing, head bowed respectfully, before a uniformed South African Customs Agent glaring at me from behind the counter. I did not notice if there were drinking fountains in the Johannesburg airport. It was not important to me at the time. I did see the Whites Only signs above the restrooms, and they unnerved me. I was raised by a father who not only initiated and helped facilitate the first visit to campus by Martin Luther King, Jr., but also was responsible for opening doors so a black family could own a home for the first time in our community. Intellectually, I knew the Republic of South Africa was governed under a policy of apartheid. Still, the signs rattled me.

Beads of sweat dampened my armpits. Straight from camp, I had my possessions stuffed in a backpack strapped to my shoulders. My hair fell in long, stringy waves, partially hiding the top of my faded blue-denim overalls. Eyes lowered, all I saw was the Customs Agent’s gun strapped to his belt, and yet I felt him undressing me with his eyes. A flaming red blush crept up my neck, burning my cheeks.

Let’s see your money, he growled, pointing to the counter.

Required by the government to purchase a round-trip ticket when I obtained the visa, I was also told I had to show enough funds to support my six-month stay in the country. Otherwise, the embassy official explained when I called to begin the approval process, the agent had the right to put me on the next plane home.

I didn’t know for sure how much was enough, but I suspected it was more than the ten $20 traveler’s checks with my name on them. Long before credit and debit cards and ATM machines defined a traveler’s financial options, traveler’s checks were the international currency of choice. Knowing I had to find a job to finance my stay, I purchased the smallest denomination available to pad my minuscule wad of money.

Scanning the crowd were armed guards, dressed in khaki shorts and crisp short-sleeved shirts. There was not a friendly face among them. Dutifully, I pulled out the black plastic sleeve containing my checks, my heart beating rapidly as I tried to appear nonchalant. No one else had been asked to do this. In hindsight, I probably looked like an American hippie, rather than the kind of visitor this conservative blend of Dutch Afrikaans and British government welcomed with open arms.

Glancing over at the crowd on the other side of the Customs gate, I saw alarm written all over Lynne’s face. Waltzing through ahead of me, she was standing with Andy and an elderly couple, who must have been his parents. Shortly before landing, Lynne had suggested I add several of her $500 traveler’s checks, just in case. At first, I refused, insisting, They never look. I was determined to do this alone, to bear the consequences of my decision, just as my dad had directed. But at the last minute, I tucked her checks from the same bank, in the same color, but with blatantly different names, into the sleeve.

I scarcely breathed as I watched the Customs Agent thumb through the traveler’s checks.

Okay. He finally waved me on, his irritation obvious.

I didn’t know at the time that the country’s policies would affect my ability to find work. When the job at the magazine did not materialize, my options were limited. Careers for women were primarily in the fields of nursing, teaching, and secretarial support. I was untrained in the first two and told I was overqualified for the third. Worse, when I applied for the type of short-term jobs I assumed I could pick up easily—waitressing, retail sales, yard work, painting houses, even babysitting—I was told such jobs were for people of color, certainly not fitting work for a white woman.

For the first time, a quiet fear would shadow my days as I experienced life with little to no money with which to make choices.

Several months later, I remember baking under the scorching rays of the South African sun and staring at the black wrought-iron fence enclosing a plush two-story motel. My feet glued to the rocky soil on the other side of the street, I was thinking of my three new friends from Australia and New Zealand: Jon, Anne, and Kent. We’d met at the bistro at the Carlton Hotel in Johannesburg, an American-owned hotel, where I had eventually found a job as a bar waitress. After working with them for a few months, they invited me to join them on an excursion exploring Botswana, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Swaziland, and the eastern coast of South Africa. Traveling in a crotchety old white van, we made it to the coastal city of Durban, South Africa, before our funds, like the van, gave out. Our job searches were not going well. My friends were at market, bartering for food with the few remaining coins in our possession.

You can’t go with us, Kent said emphatically. Hearing your American accent, they’ll jack the prices up.

My job was to obtain fresh drinking water. My job, always, was finding the water.

Taking a deep breath, I crossed the road, empty plastic jug in hand. My heart was beating so hard inside my T-shirt, so fast, I feared someone would hear as I slowly opened the gate, stepped into the gardens, and walked toward the door. I tiptoed past the busy receptionist and down the nearest hallway. Seeing a door marked Women, I scurried inside and quickly filled the container with water. Hastily retracing my steps, I entered the sweet-smelling gardens and felt relief pour from every muscle in my body.

I didn’t see you at breakfast this morning. An elderly woman appeared from the shadows of the building.

Oh, I exclaimed, startled by the unexpected voice. I’m not much of a breakfast eater.

But this is Sunday, she continued, friendly but probing. They don’t serve lunch here and only a small supper in the evening.

I know. My cheeks were flushing. I’m not a big eater. But thank you.

I’ll look forward to seeing you this evening, she said with a smile.

Fighting an urge to sprint across the road, I turned and attempted a casual stroll around the side of the motel, as if the door to my room was just around the corner.

Was it wrong to take the water? Swirling in guilt, I trudged along the dusty road to our campsite. My conscience accused me of stealing, of violating values ingrained since childhood. But was it fair that water was a luxury, easily available to those with money? Doesn’t everyone need water? Have a right to water? Didn’t I have a responsibility to survive?

I felt sweat dripping from my hairline, rolling down the back of my neck. I was weary, hungry, and frustrated by my inability to find a job in an environment where white women were not supposed to work. Above all, I was thirsty. As I felt the stifling heat of the afternoon sun drain the energy from my body, I longed for a drink of ice-cold water.

As nightfall approached, I had no choice but to return to the only motel within walking distance. We were out of water. Again. This time, I was trembling. Please God, don’t let anyone notice me, I prayed silently as my hand grasped the gate’s latch. My tennis shoes, powdered with road dust, heels worn, edges tattered, were a stark contrast to the manicured gardens. I slipped into the motel and back out, unobserved. But as I turned to leave, I saw a silhouette shaped by the fading sun on the building’s peach-colored walls.

I gasped. I could see myself handcuffed and pushed into a filthy vehicle, driven to a sweltering jail. Without money for a lawyer, there would be few options. I would be detained in a windowless prison cell for months. Best case, they’d put me on a plane and send me home, with shame as my life’s companion.

Paralyzed, unable to breathe, I waited for the uniformed men to emerge.

Here, the woman said gently, stepping toward me and taking hold of my sweaty hand. Here, take this. I am a mother. I know what you’re going through. Into my wet, sticky palm, the gray-haired woman from earlier that day placed a handful of Rands, the South African equivalent to dollars.

I felt my insides crumbling in the face of her kindness. I wanted so much to be strong, to be independent, to appear in control. But at that moment, I was none of these things.

Wrapping my arms around her briefly, I tucked my head on her shoulder to hide the tears trickling down my cheeks. Thank you, I whispered before slipping through the gate, a jug of water in one hand, the Rands clutched in the other. I remember that, of the two treasures grasped firmly in my hands that evening, it was the container of clear liquid to quench parched lips that felt most like gold.

And gold is not something to squander.

RELATIONSHIPS: 1978–2003

One can sail any compass heading save that which points directly into the wind. Therefore, when face-to-face in a blustering blow or even the breath of a breeze, to sail forward one must first fall off the wind, honoring its direction.

The same is true with relationships.

THE ICEBREAKER

I remember when I first fell in love with Lake Michigan. Standing no taller than the kitchen counter, I received a gift from my mother. Actually, it was a bribe. Trying to persuade me to quit sucking my thumb, she gave me the book A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson.

During our mandatory rest period after lunch, I lived within Stevenson’s poems. On its lime-green cover, a little boy and girl relax on the edge of a pond, framed by flowers and leaves of every color and shape imaginable. On the pond, a tiny boat sails effortlessly. A robin, perched on a floating leaf, serenades the little girl with a pink ribbon in her short, blond hair.

The illustrations created my fantasies; the memorized verses became the fabric of my dreams. When my mother encouraged us children to post lists for Santa on the refrigerator, I knew exactly what I wanted.

A cabin in the woods near a lake, I asked her to write at the top of my list, for I longed to be an artist, a writer, and live immersed in the book’s romantic illustrations of nature.

My siblings gave me a hard time. Santa can’t give you something like that, they told me. But I kept it on my list, year after year.

The summer of my eighth year, my father piled the three eldest of his six children into the family station wagon to go camping at Orchard Beach State Park outside Manistee, Michigan. Scrambling from the car to a fence marking the edge of the world, I looked down a steep bluff at miles of clear, blue water, shimmering in the sunlight. I was mesmerized.

For an entire week in August, we dove like fish into the waves. Burrowing deep into the sand, we created moats around our castles, rivers meandering through our kingdoms. After supper, we raced each other to the split-rail fence, guarding the sandy cliff, high above Lake Michigan. Perched on posts, feet dangling over the edge, we watched in awe as the sky became a brilliant array of pinks, reds, and oranges. We waited, spellbound, for the night sky to come alive with the twinkling of thousands of tiny stars, and for Dad to point out the planets.

My greatest fear was that I might never see the lake again.

I amended my Christmas list that winter. I wrote, I’d like a cabin in the woods near Lake Michigan. It remained at the top of my list until I went to college and was no longer eligible for the refrigerator postings. And while initially my college curriculum was filled with the lyrical words of poets and authors, and my backpack stuffed with notebooks, pens, paintbrushes, and canvas, everything changed after the six-month trip to Africa.

I will never be poor again! I told my mother when I returned. The woman—who had once listened to a child’s dreams of being a writer, who had encouraged me as I studied grammar, punctuation, and sentence diagramming, who had given me a book so I could learn to type and allowed me to practice on her manual black-and-white Smith-Corona, who had been my biggest cheerleader when my part-time job as a high school reporter for the local newspaper evolved into full-time employment as one of the first five women sports editors in the country—said nothing as I switched my major from English to business. Words were replaced with numbers, palettes of paint with spreadsheets, essays and poems with income statements and balance sheets.

Only much later would she admit I’d returned from Africa a different person. Hardened. Intense. Focused. For fear, once it has planted its seed, burrows dark, winding tunnels through the heart. Even dreams risk being lost forever.

And then, three years later, a business degree and job in hand, I met the boy on the lime-green cover.

Introducing myself to Rubin is Sharon’s idea. My first administrative assistant, she is worried about my social survivability in Saginaw, Michigan, an industrial city renowned for bowling and beer. I, a 1977 graduate of Michigan State University, who lettered one year in tennis, am interested in neither. Sharon, who quietly is coaching me through the political intricacies of my first corporate office job, is convinced the guy on the second floor is perfect for me. She insists he is polite, fun loving, and good-looking—and he plays racquetball, as do I.

I don’t believe one should mix one’s personal and professional lives. At least that’s what I tell Sharon. In truth, I am very uneasy about approaching a man socially. In the late 1970s, it just isn’t done. At least not by me. But a