It's been a very hot week on the water. Cloudless skies and high pressure have made the days pretty when the wind blows, oppressive when it's still. Yesterday was the first day we had fair breezes blowing in the right direction. We were heading from Sturgeon Bay up to Sister Bay in Door County. I love it here. From the water it looks like such a pretty place; pine forests on high rock bluffs that fall into the cold azure water. The peninsula is dotted with cute little towns full of ice cream and ceramic souvenirs and vacationers from Illinois eager to pack as much fun as possible into one week vacations and long weekends we Americans have come to settle for. Anyway, yesterday was a perfect day on the water save for one thing. We hit a rock. Actually, more like a group of rocks. It was late in the afternoon, Sister Bay was in sight, less than five miles dead ahead. We'd been sailing wing on wing, looking nautical, running with the wind and probably feeling a bit too cocky. We'd avoided every hazard on our charts and thought we were home free. The problem is lake levels are so low that things we'd never have hit a few years ago are now present and dangerous. Luckily, we were able to rock off (pun intended) and remain underway. We won't know what damage was done until the boat comes out of the water this fall. We're working on the assumption that if we'd damaged the keel, the boat would rattle or sail improperly and if we'd damaged the hull, we'd be knee deep in water issuing panicked calls to the Coast Guard. It's always a gut wrenching experience feeling the boat lurch to a halt and lean back to wind. You start ticking off the checklist and sorting the things that you're supposed to do from the things you should never do. We dropped sail, started the engine, killed the tunes, turned on the VHF radio and hauled in the dinghy. We were remarkably cool considering our predicament. Even cooler than last time ... and the time before. Not that we run aground all the time but, if you haven't hit a rock with your sailboat, you're not sailing in interesting enough places. It was surprising how well Bob took the impact. Even as we were still shaking with adrenaline Bob calmly noted, "We should come back a different way." Bob's a pretty safety conscious captain. We don't sail if there's a hint of bad weather. We'll reef the main if there's 22 knots of wind. Best of all, about a decade ago he bought the best life raft in the industry. It's called a Winslow. It's maybe 10" by 18" by 48", all trussed up, both solid as and heavy as a rock. I bet it weighs 100 pounds if it weighs one. There's a lanyard hanging off one end. You carry the beast on deck, attach the lanyard to a stanchion and toss the package into the water. As soon as it hit the water, it inflates and folds out to become a six-foot by six-foot fully enclosed survival cocoon. There's dried food, a radio beacon and a water purification system. As long as you're successful getting from the sinking boat to the raft, you're as good as saved. That's what we're told. We've never actually had to deploy the Winslow though their sales material is full of testimonials from happy customers who survived to write.
As they say, “all's well that ends well,” though it did feel particularly good to get into port last night. We tied up and before even paying the dock fees, drank two beers apiece. They go down so easily on a hot evening. Plus, we made a remarkable discovery. Our thermal coffee mugs aren't only good for keeping coffee warm. They're also great for keeping beers cold! We've decided to share this discovery with only the most trustworthy of our friends since, falling into the wrong hands, this information could lead to a calamitous increase in drunk driving.
I’ve loved marinas since I was a child. Hung around them every chance I got and I got a lot of chances when my cousin Russell and I learned that we could earn walk-around money by clamming in the Great South Bay. $32 a bushel for clams, around two days work. That was quite a windfall for a couple of ten year olds in the sixties. I bought a year's worth of Playboys from this kid named Brucie with part of my earnings. Unfortunately, the only place to keep the stash was in the woods and all pre-pubescent boys spend the summer in the woods. It didn't take long before others discovered my treasure and it was dispersed. Still, that was the summer I developed a real appreciation for naked women, something I nurture even today.
Twelve years old. I'd guess that about the median age of the gaggle of kids who were fishing from the breakwater in front of our boat. They were part of a small flotilla of power-boating parents and kids who we'd met in Sheboygan on the way north. Just by chance they'd arrived here the day before and we were given the slip right next to them. They're a friendly group. Too friendly for Bob, who talks for a living and looks at the boat trip as a chance to be less friendly with strangers. They were perfectly friendly for Greg who enjoyed their hospitality and generous pours long into the night we'd all met. They didn't seem any less than thrilled to see us even though that first night Greg passed out in one of their fold-up loungers. He finally stumbled on-board after midnight and after peeing off the finger pier. Though Bob and I were mortified, the Sheboyganers seemed genuinely amused. Personally, I'd seen evidence that these were pretty nice people. I'd witnessed their tolerance, hospitality and got some insight into their moral standards thanks to a very long and loud discussion they had arguing whether Lowes was justified in firing an employee who collared a shoplifter exiting the store with hundreds of dollars of stolen merchandise. For the record, it wasn't Lowes, it was Home Depot and yes, they were justified in firing the "hero" because his heroics could have inadvertently created a situation where the company was liable for his safety (if the robber had been more determined or better armed) or he could have opened the company up to a lawsuit if he'd simply been mistaken. Sad but true.
Eventually Bob decided to go square up with the dockmaster and Greg decided to nap. I was left sitting in the cockpit soaking in the gentle pleasures of marina life. There was a couple on a boat further down the pier feeding crackers to their giant parrot. On the next dock there was a very tanned woman in a very yellow bikini. I couldn't tell if she was a young woman or an older woman but, either way, a yellow bikini and a good tan will always look great to me (see “Playboy” above). On the rick-rack directly in front of us the kids, silhouetted against the bright evening sky, cast their lines over and over. Finally one little girl yelled, "I got one!" and pulled a fish from the water. It was barely six inches long but couldn't have generated more excitement in the small group if it had been a great white shark with a pair of Keds sticking out of its mouth. They looked at it and poked at it until the little girl shooed them all back a few paces as she lifted the rod over her head and applied all the centrifugal force its sixty inches afforded her. The fish slapped hard against the concrete pier. "It's not dead!" one observed. She took another swing and, after yet a bit more wiggling, another. Once the fish had been declared dead the little girl deftly removed the hook and tossed the lifeless fish in the water. Not exactly consistent with the spirit of "catch and release," I was disappointed at the children's cold-bloodedness and even more disappointed in the parents who sat not twenty feet away, talking and joking and not reacting in any way to the gory spectacle. What kind of parents would allow this kind of senseless killing? Killing to eat is one thing. Killing for fun is the purview of bull-fighters, seal skinners and other outcasts. I watched this band of future juvenile delinquents repeat the scene over and over, catching, killing and tossing carcasses back into the water. With all the commotion on the dock I don't know how Greg had been able to continue napping. He had knee surgery just three weeks ago and probably shouldn't be on the boat. Yesterday, if we'd actually started taking on water, he'd have been hard pressed to make it into that commodious life raft I told you about. Anyway, Greg slowly made his way on deck and sat down across from me in the cockpit. Not a word passed between us until I called his attention to the crowd of little killers gleefully snuffing yet another fish. Greg's a fisherman and spends a good deal of his time either fishing or talking of fishing. He had only watched for a second when he said, "That's a mud bass." He was right about that. I had heard the little girl yell it to her parents. It just didn't mean anything to me at the time. Apparently mud bass are an invasive species detrimental to our waters and the kids were actually doing us all a favor by killing as many hapless mud bass as they could hook.
About five years ago I had the opportunity to present a proposal for a documentary to the American Theater Organ Society. Their meeting was down in Indianapolis and the plan was for my associate and I to drive down, make the pitch and drive back the same day. We wanted to look fresh for the presentation so we carried our suits, planning on changing in a hotel bathroom. We arrived in plenty of time and found that the American Theater Organ Society is a rather small group and didn't use up much of the Convention Center. She headed off to find a ladies room. I located a men's room on an upper floor of the meeting facility and slipped in to change. The bathroom was quiet and empty and, being a big guy, I opted for the spacious handicapped stall on the end. It took me a while to lay out my suit and generally get ready to change skins. I went about my business, undressing and dressing and found myself disappointed when, even though I was far from the busy convention halls below, I heard the door open and the quiet voices of two men. They seemed to stand quietly for a few moments before both entered the stall right next to mine. I could see their feet under the partition. They were facing each other and though I have no problem at all with homosexuality, I was a little taken aback to hear all the grunting not two feet from me as they bumped and struggled. Almost changed, I hurriedly pulled on my suit jacket, deciding I could tie my tie outside. I gathered my suit bag and briefcase and unlatched the door. I didn't take one step before having to fall sideways to avoid tripping over an empty wheelchair. You'd think, after all these years of watching children kill or guys couple, I'd learn to withhold judgment. Things really aren't always what they seem.