Two Buoys and a Boat

My memory is hazy. Don't remember what year, but it had to have been last century, right?

In Savannah!

My bonding experience with Dave came on a boat. It has been many years. I am not in possession of all the facts. So I will make up what I can’t remember. 

I do recall that it did not begin well. 

We were set to spend a few days on an intercoastal waterway somewhere along North Carolina – South Carolina. I met Dave at a pier and we took a row boat out to his boat. He somehow got the row boat tangled up with the big boat and it took a good 45 minutes to extricate ourselves from this situation. And I’m thinking… This man is taking me out to sea?  

I’m not sure I was much help to Dave with this situation. And so I’m sure he’s thinking. I’m going out to sea with this landlubber?

Dave did the steering and set the sail (or whatever it is you do to get the thing going). Seems like it had a motor and a sail. Is that cheating to have a motor? At some point, Dave let me take the tiller. (Again is that what you call the steering mechanism?) Seemed pretty simple. You aim to go between these buoys and it’s hard to get lost. Don’t go amiss of these buoys or you are on your way to Africa or Antarctica and there’s no coming back and you are chum for the sharks.  

Now sometimes those buoys are separated a bit or maybe there’s a confluence of buoys (like its an interstate with cloverleafs or something) and that makes it a bit more challenging. But the real challenge (at least for me) was simply paying sufficient attention. And so I might let our little ship wander off a bit and Dave would remind me (sometimes very sharply) to get with it.  

We talked a lot. About what I do not remember, but I think politics and books mostly. The best part of the trip was Dave’s cooking. Every meal was outstanding, five star and done in a kitchenette that was as rudimentary as you could get. Do I remember Coq au Vin? Yes, I think so. I don’t remember what else. But I remember waking up in the morning only wishing it was time for dinner. 

Thanks for the memories Dave.

Dick Weiss