Graduate Works For GM Remotely—On A Sailboat?

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Exclusions apply. This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories and we tell stories about everything here on this show. From the arts to sports and from business to history and everything in between, including your stories.

Send them to OurAmericanStories.com. Up next, the story from Emma McCormick. Emma is a Hillsdale graduate who decided to live somewhere interesting after graduating college because, in her words, she's a person who loves adventure and doing something new.

Here's our own Monty Montgomery, himself a Hillsdale graduate, with the story. The allure of the sea. It's hard not to deny it when it comes beckoning. If you've ever so much as looked at a boat, it's hard not to imagine what it'd be like to own one. One person who decided to make those dreams into reality is Emma McCormick, who did it on a whim of course.

Well, my name is Emma and I'm a financial analyst at General Motors. Right now I'm a sailor. I grew up in Idaho. I like never even noticed sailboats. Didn't know anything about it. And then after college, when I moved to Detroit, I was new to the city.

I didn't know anybody. And I was out for a run one day and I saw a poster that said free, no experience necessary, learn to sail. It's like, that sounds perfect. It sounds like so much fun. And so I just showed up and it was at a yacht club that had a race series and they would take new people and just put you on a boat.

I did some training and learning with them over the winter and then sailed with them and every regatta I could. But in 2020, Emma was told she'd be working remotely and decided to make the most of it. If she could work remotely, she could live remotely too.

But what to live in was the question she had to answer. I thought about a sailboat for a fleeting second, but then I kind of doubted myself. I was like, I probably can't do that by myself. So then I thought about a van and then I was talking to a sailing friend and we were talking about the possibilities of doing that. But that was also pretty far fetched. But then I was like, well, you know, I could probably just do this by myself.

I don't know. It just seemed like more fun. And sailing is a lot more fun than driving.

And it all came together really at the last minute. I canceled my lease before I had even officially bought a boat. The second hardest part about owning a boat is finding one to buy. Obviously, the first hardest part is maintaining the boat.

All of them are going to have something wrong with them. I spent almost two full months searching, just looking into different types of boats. But I ended up finding this boat. I found it. It was listed on Craigslist.

I found it on Craigslist. And the man who was selling it was 92. And he actually only bought the boat when he was 88. And with the boat bought, she did what so many other people from the Midwest do when spring rolls around.

She went to Florida. But what's her house like? So it's 25 feet long. It's about eight and a half feet wide. The headroom is actually about four feet, nine inches, which means I can't stand up in my boat. Technically, four people could sleep on this boat. We've actually slept five for a few nights in a row.

I had actually never slept on a boat until I bought this. I have a little galley or kitchen with a two burner alcohol stove. It's like your living room, your dining room. Your living room, your dining room. There's storage behind them. So yeah, I'm generally a pretty tidy person to begin with. I like things to be organized, which I think is good because living on a boat in such a small space where your living room, dining room, kitchen, bedroom, it's all the same.

If you leave something sitting out, the whole place looks like a mess. So I think you just need to be prepared to put a lot of work into it. I mean, there's definitely people who live on boats here who put zero work into it and their boats reflect that. But if you want to live somewhere nice, you got to maintain it.

I think just be prepared for work, be prepared for things to take longer than you expect and cost more than you expect. But to move down here definitely simplified things a lot, down to like one pot and one pan and a handful of shirts. So what's living in a marina like and who are the kinds of people who spend time there? Unsurprisingly, they're a very eclectic group of people who certainly like to talk to Emma. The sailing community, the boating community, everyone is so kind and so excited and they, especially if you're younger. Being around the marina, like I can hardly go to the bathroom because there's bathrooms and showers and laundry and everything in the entrance, lounging, in the entrance lounge area to the marina. So I can hardly walk there without talking to somebody because there's always people out and about and there's always interesting people.

And it probably depends on where you are. Like I'm in the marina here, so maybe a little bit different clientele than people who just anchor in some random bayou. But I do love hearing people's stories and what brings them here. Like one of my friends broke up with his girlfriend and so he just like wanted to move to a new state, do something different and it's a fun life. There's several families with young kids and they have day jobs. I think one family I'm thinking of, the wife's the doctor, the husband runs a sail rigging company and they've got their whole family lives on their catamaran. But have any of her friends from up north come to visit?

Of course they have. That's funny, I told all my friends, hey I'm in Florida, I have a boat, it's warm and sunny, come visit. And I wasn't sure how many people would actually jump on that and buy a plane ticket and come down, but everyone I've told about it has. I have guests basically every weekend, which is a ton of fun. Most of them have never been on sailboats and so they love my boat until I show them a friend's boat that's bigger.

But no, they're impressed. And just a delightful piece and a special thanks to Monty Montgomery for snagging it and a special thanks to Emma McCormick for telling her story. She had some time to do remote work and she did what so many Americans do. She pursued her own version of the American dream and decided to live on a sailboat in a beautiful marina in a beautiful part of the country where it was nice and warm.

The story of Emma McCormick sailing away while doing her work here on Our American Stories. Folks, if you love the stories we tell about this great country and especially the stories of America's rich past, know that all of our stories about American history from war to politics to innovation, culture and faith are brought to us by the great folks at Hillsdale College, a place where students study all the things that are beautiful in life and all the things that are good in life. And if you can't get to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come to you with their free and terrific online courses.

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Happy streaming. I'm Malcolm Grabber. I live way out in the country, I drive everywhere and you know what scares me? That feeling of finding myself stuck on the side of the road. But now all of us can avoid that pain by getting our vehicle the part it needs before that breakdown oh no moment. With eBay Guaranteed Fit and over 122 million parts and accessories you can make sure your ride stays running smoothly. For the parts and accessories that fit your vehicle just look for the green check. Get the right parts, the right fit and the right prices.

eBayMotors.com. Let's ride. Eligible items only.

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