So much of everything is determined by your job. I hate that, but I concede.
Now that I have a job 3.7 miles from the boat, the refit is looking like something strangely reasonable, and not a nuisance too far to be convenient but too familiar not to keep amidst the neurological upset of constant change and the sight of nice people sliding toward death.
Nothing ever turns out like you plan but the boat.
The plan for the boat is to drive up to the marina, park my car in my usual spot between the office and the bathroom, and take a nervous glance at the tarp. Is it still reasonably tidy? Have the ties frayed to extinction such that the assemblage is flapping away at an embarrassing rate?
I should have painted the framing hot pink like the rest of the project. But no, the wood is unfinished.
I don’t approve of unfinished wood. It is stupid.
The aimless clanging of the halyard is a sound well-known to boat people. That, and the screeching of gulls.
There is always more wind where there are boats. It is strange. It is almost as if boats cause wind.
When I am in the boat, relaxing with a dry cider after a long day of staring down the project after working a shift or two, I can sometimes feel the entire edifice shifting. I keep thinking that someday it will fall and I will spring suddenly bolt upright trying to brace myself as she goes over.
But no. That will have to wait for the next good earthquake, which, if my luck holds, will be when she is resting safely in a slip. Then the Richter scale cosine of change will register as a slight buoyance following by the neighbors yelling.
Hello again.
