"Neutral! I said NEUTRAL!" I look up at the sound of the raised voices and see a fellow female at the helm, trying her best to do a job she hasn't been trained for and understands incompletely. My heart goes out to her, and I am briefly, selfishly, thankful that it's not me.

I am resigned to my place as a second-class citizen on board the sailboats we cruise on; I'll always be catching up and never quite arriving. I am not a stupid woman, at least not until I step into the long shadow of a man who grew up around boats and works on them for a living.

Oh, these are the compromises we make. He suffers with incompetent crew and I suffer being the incompetent crew.

It happens like this: A situation has arisen, sometimes I am aware and alert to our state, and at other times the need for quick action is a complete surprise to me. A command is given. My mind slowly wears round until it fixes on the problem, then clumsily casts about for the required response. I reach for a piece of the boat and start to do what I believe I am being asked to do. I rarely hit upon it on my first try. Occasionally the commands increase in volume as if yelling at me to "LIFT THE DOG!!!" will make it clear to me what the dog is, what I do after I lift it, and how that will help. I yearn for an accompanying explanation though I know that the process of sailing doesn't allow time for questions as you go.

I was 4 when my family moved from the Midwest to a town on Long Island Sound. My Nebraska-bred father threw himself into life on the Atlantic Ocean. He tried clams and lobster, went saltwater fishing and bought a 16- foot Comet with another family, learning the rudiments of sailing from a book. The family went for day sails on the Sound. I remember hats blown overboard, rudders snapped off in the harbor, and the eternal rigging and unrigging of the trailered sloop. There was a glorious run east my parents made, halfway up the coast of Connecticut on a beautiful day, only to realize that they weren't going to be able return home by just turning the boat around.

For the past seven years, my family has borrowed or bartered time on sailboats and cruised the unbelievably beautiful coast of Maine for a week each summer. The first couple of trips were very difficult. Fifty-one weeks of the year, I use skills and knowledge that have nothing to do with being a crewmember on a sailboat skippered by my husband.

Every time I had to pick up a mooring buoy with the boat hook I was faced with my gross inadequacies. Days went by when I felt as if I hadn't done a single thing in a satisfying manner. I was secretly relieved as I ticked off the last day of the trip and my tribulations were at an end.

Years and many humiliations later, I have come to like being outdoors on the boat. The breeze off the land is fragrant and balmy, the wind off the water, cool and fresh. I am content to watch the changing scene all day, and am slowly acquiring more ease and less apprehension about sailing. The water is a friendly community for the humans who live and work on it. Everyone waves in passing, like we used to in my neighborhood. There is a lot about cruising that I love.

Oh, but the sailing itself can be a trial for me. Sailing is a complicated activity requiring careful attention to what is above the water, on the water, and below the water. Starting at zero with little knowledge and experience is a daunting enterprise. Remembering the nuances from one year to the next requires a few days of walkthroughs.

So, friends, if you are hoping to share your love of sailing with man, woman, or child, go gently and keep the challenges to a minimum. We're ready to do our best, and we want to enjoy ourselves. But you'll have to explain things, with good humor, again and again and again. Time, repetition, and infinite patience are required on the part of both duffer and teacher.

With careful attention to our spirits, you will have us ticking off the days until we get a chance to go on the next sailing trip.