Part 1: The Story Behind Leaving a Clean Wake
Welcome to Leaving a Clean Wake!
In this newsletter, we will be exploring the principle of leaving a clean wake, a maxim we first encountered some 25 years ago amongst the bluewater cruising community, but which—as you will see!—can apply to so much more than sailing. The idea of doing something to create broader awareness of how each of us inevitably leaves a wake in life and, therefore, might as well try to make it a clean one, began to take shape about ten years ago when Vienna was still at Stanford, but the stars only recently aligned in such a way as to make it feasible for us to make it a reality.
We aim to foster dialogue and community around living an intentional and ethical life, getting in touch with and embodying your values, and leaving the world a better place as you move through it. We want to (diligently) avoid being preachy or overly prescriptive—if you see us crossing that line, please tell us! At heart, this newsletter is simply our way of sharing some of our thoughts and observations on how leaving a clean wake can lead to a better life for all of us.
So let’s dive in!
Source: Merriam-Webster
Before exploring how the sailor’s credo to “leave a clean wake” might encourage each of us to live intentionally, in accordance with our deepest values, it is helpful to understand what a wake is.
Typing “wake” into a search engine quickly leads to definitions for emerging from sleep, or standing vigil for someone who has died. We will overlook both of those meanings for now.
The wake that concerns us is the series of V-shaped waves generated by the displacement of a boat as it moves through the water. Every watercraft, from the mightiest tanker to the little toy boat pushed to-and-fro by a child in a bathtub, leaves a wake. Although we won’t delve deeply into the physics, one crucial point is that—despite appearances—a wake doesn’t actually move water. Rather, like any wave, a boat’s wake transmits energy, not water, across the surface.
Waves, like wakes, transmit energy rather than moving water
A wake is not the only wave generated by a boat. As they move forward through the water, boats also generate a bow wave. As this bow wave spreads out, it forms an ever-widening “V” that constrains the outer limits of the trailing wave, giving rise to the familiar V-shape of a boat’s wake.
For our purposes, we will consider a “wake” to be the inseparable combination of the bow wave and trailing wake. Crucially, unless obstructed by something—the shore, say, or another boat or the wind—a wake can travel for vast distances, its energy ultimately merging with that of the countless other wakes and waves that make water—from a tiny tidepool to the Pacific Ocean—so endlessly fascinating.
SV Atalanta, the best boat there ever was
As the Water Rat said to the Mole in The Wind in the Willows: “Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing—absolutely nothing—half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.”
Anyone who has ever looked out an airplane window at a cargo ship making way on the sea below will have seen its wake sketching miles of lazy white lines upon the water. Wake-boat sales are booming, powerboats that deliberately generate such a large wave that thrill-seekers can surf at high speed behind them. Surfers aren’t the only ones who find wakes entertaining; dolphins will streak from far away towards a passing boat just to play in its bow wave. Wakes can generate opportunity—think of seagulls and cormorants fishing in the churning water behind a ferry boat. Wakes can also be destructive. The wake thrown by a large ship or a pleasure boat traveling too fast for local conditions can swamp a smaller vessel or crash into shore, destroying habitat and property with abandon.
Not surprisingly, the term “wake” has long been used metaphorically, so much so that we no longer have to make the mental transliteration from a physical wake to a metaphorical one. The phrase “in the wake of” effortlessly (and often alarmingly) conveys the sense of an aftermath. “Trailing in the wake of…” is an announcer’s offhand way of dismissing the also-rans in a race.
Vienna and Michael
So what do we—Vienna and Michael—mean when we talk about a wake and the importance of leaving a clean one?
Simply put, a person’s wake traces our passage through life: triumph and despair, kindness and pettiness, love and loss and pain and healing, what we do when we are alone and no one is watching, and what we do when we are the center of attention.
Some people’s wakes might be enduring and consequential, though most will be modest. But ripple or swell, tempestuous or calm, each and every one of us cleaves an unavoidable wake as we sail through life. And like that of a ship, the wake we leave unfurls wider and wider, touching other people, other living things and, ultimately, the planet and beyond. Whether we like it or not, we are all truly in the same boat.
All in the same boat
In the weeks and months ahead, we will explore what it means to leave a clean wake in life. We’ll start with the literal—don’t throw plastic overboard—and progress to the metaphorical—treat others with kindness. We’ll compare “leaving a clean wake” to other maxims such as the Golden Rule and Leave No Trace. We will highlight people and organizations who embody clean wakes and what we might learn from them. And throughout, we will do our best to not preach and decry but rather, to inform and encourage with practical suggestions for living ethically and in alignment with one’s beliefs—as parents, as partners, as leaders, and ultimately as citizens of the world.