Sal likes rustic furniture. So do I. So, she ‘fishes’ worn boards and sea-scrubbed branches from the ocean now and then and drags it all up the beach to dry out. Then – when her energy is high – she tells me to make something.

When we are working out at the garden boxes, we are, of course, mostly standing but lately we have been taking a thermos of tea and having more frequent breaks than before. But there is nowhere to sit so the next ‘rustica’ is supposed to be a bench.

“Can we have arms this time? I’d like to have arm rests, you know, for the tea?”

“Arms? Sweetie, I can barely make the legs reach the ground. And I have gravity on my side. I can’t imagine adding ‘arms’. You sure?”

“Yeah. Arms. And a nice back. Something to lean against. Maybe a curved back kinda thing……………ya know?”

“Sure. Why not? I just hope the sea coughed up the right materials in the right dimensions and some of it is curved just so. If not, you might have to be satisfied with RUSTIC ya know?

“Sal, the charm of rustic is that it is, well, crude and clunky and make-do. Ya gotta accept ‘clunky’ if you want rustic”.

“Yeah, I know. I just want comfortable, ‘nice’ rustic. You know. Something like you’d see from those other rustic furniture guys.”

“I am too rustic for you! You are shopping me?”

“Well, arms would be nice.”

So, there you have it………….the ugly side of rustic furniture making. The keeping up with the Hatfields and the McCoys and their logs and branches, flotsam and jetsam boards.

The competition is fierce.

I know, I know……..can’t help it, tho. Sorry. Get on a tangent and the words just flow. Sorry. I’ll try to be more brief.

How do I know this (the last blog was too long)? Simple: the comments drop off. No comments means that the topic sucked, the writing sucked or it was too long a read to determine whether it sucked or not. I prefer to go with the latter explanation. Let me cling to that.

‘Course, I just used some of my ‘current blog’s’ words up with that………….

Anyway. Back to building for a sec………

……..if you are 60 or older and thinking of building a cabin off the beaten track, don’t do it! Sal and I started to build when I was around 55. We left it almost too late.

It took us three years – two years of ‘heavy slogging’ and six months on each end ‘starting up’ and ‘finishing off’. We only built 1200 feet officially but we also built a genset shed, a wood shed, a food shed and a lot of deck. Plus a lot of other stuff that doesn’t have ‘shed’ as a suffix.

It was all done ‘one nail at a time’ as Sal succinctly puts it. It was hard. And, to be honest, I could not do it again. Even if I could, I would not.

Think about it…………how long ya got, really? Say you are 63 (as I am) and say that you remain healthy and active (I am workin’ on it) til you are 80. That means that you are stretching physically, mentally and financially for a 17 year stint.

Frankly, the law of diminishing returns starts to enter the picture. Or diminishing lifespan. Take your pick.

Yes, I know there are some who keep chugging along. Sal’s 86 year-old dad will outplay just about anyone I know at badminton and still climbs on the roof all the time to…….well, we think he is fixing things ……. …………….hmmmmm………now I have to wonder why he goes on the roof so much?

Back to the point: if you’ve only got 17 good years left, why spend any of it tempting fate by building?

OK, to be fair, it seemed like a good idea at the time. For us. And it was! AT-THAT-TIME! But, today? Well, today, at 63, I would not build. I’d buy. Ask me again in five years and I’d say, “I’ll rent.”

Yes, I would.

I would buy something that was NOT my dream house and I would then pretend that it was. That is easy enough to do. I’ve rationalized things to that level before. I can still do that. That kind of thinking would save me three years and countless pints of blood both of which are getting in shorter supply as I age.

Hell, I am getting shorter as I age!

Think about it. This is now the age of least resistance. We are no longer irresistible forces and most of our challenges are now immovable. I say, ‘accept that gracefully and buy-already-built or rent’.

But there is a hidden point to all that. Do it! You don’t have to build. You don’t have to ‘go nuts’ but time really is running out. If you have a dream, go for it. Go for it now!

I am glad we did.

Building a retirement home is, unquestionably, a big challenge. But it can be made even more so by the initiator being barking mad. Or, perhaps, better put; being so woefully ignorant about what they are about to undertake that they waltz in casually where even fools would not dare to tread. I know all too well from whence I speak.

Arf Arf!

Actually, to be fair, some things were done right on our cabin and the experience was greatly rewarding. Other things, as you’d expect, were done wrongly and the best that can be said when things went terribly awry is that lessons were learned and tails were spent tucked firmly between legs for lengthy periods of time. Or were bandaged heavily and treated with antiseptics. Hard lessons. Life-is-tough-and-then-you-die kinda lessons.

Some were even harder.

I am reminded of all this again by reading Barry Golsom’s attempt at building in Mexico (see book: Gringos in Paradise). Despite not doing any of the construction and not having to build the infrastructure into which the so-called dream house was being placed, they were still beaten about the ears, the pocketbook, their schedule and their hopes and dreams! And they did fairly well!!

The American dream is really the American fantasy.

They undertook their task ignorant of the building process, lacking any skills or even perspective on construction and with the limp wrists and spoiled tastes of New York magazine writers. They were motivated by whim and habit, clichés and ‘image’ and, of course, by picture books. Those damned, cursed, picture books. Trust me; I know the path they took path well.

Oh my Gawd! There is a special place in hell for the photographers of architectural pictures, ‘views’ ‘settings’ and ‘features’. Those damned pictures that instill an unachievable image as the standard to which one should aspire.

No matter how well you do something, no matter what skill is called on, no matter how much money is spent or how many attempts are made, it is impossible to replicate a scene from an architectural digest or even a Home Depot flyer for that matter.

Best not to even try. I call it the Lee Valley syndrome. Whatever they picture in their catalogue is a lie. Even the Hummingbirds shown feeding in the gardening catalogue are stuffed and hung from string to get ‘just the right shot’.

The tool is not that shiny. The work shop floor is not that clean. The skill levels displayed on the featured woodwork were computer driven and are humanly impossible to replicate. You will never see any of that. Ever.

Maybe the compost.

Think of the Lee Valley catalogue like you might the Victoria Secrets catalogue. Pure fantasy.

You see, the pictures are ‘set up’ to achieve the best possible image for some ‘dupe’ being lulled into thinking ‘our house/garden/baby-doll pajama wearer should look like this’. It never will.

The flowers in the background are fresh and bountiful, the table setting is clean, beautiful and sports expensive ‘designerware’. The artwork is chosen and rented for the setting. It did not arrive by way having shared your life. The floors are shiny and all the lights are on. Real life ‘shots’ have wet gloves that fell from the rack and lie on the floor along with a muddy set of boots and an even muddier dog. Maybe a dust bunny or chew toy.

Sorry, dear readers, I am way too smart to carry the Victoria Secret comparison any further……

But trust me anyway: do not let designer books influence you too much, if at all. Floor plans, maybe. Picture absorbing from magazines and architectural renderings are to be considered at one’s own mental, emotional and financial peril.

You want the first step? Camp out on your property for a summer. THAT is the first step. Second step? Camp there for a week or two in the winter!

I mention this because most people start envisioning their new ‘place’ from the comfort and warmth of their old one. That is the wrong place to even start to think.

They see pictures of log homes, timber frame homes and designer homes and imagine themselves living in them – but also in the invisibly installed ‘infrastructure’ in which they already live. They don’t see the sewer or the power or the road or the stairways.

They imagine their boat bobbing nicely at the dock. But don’t see building the dock. They imagine a drink in hand without carrying the fridge up the hill or starting the genset. Or the drinks, for that matter (they came a long way, too). The sun is always shining in the vision. Flowers are exploding over designer gardens. The dreamer has clean clothes.

You can do that too, if you want. I did. And it was wrong.

Suggestion: read Gringos in Paradise. It ain’t anywhere near that easy!!!!!!!!!!!

I am currently reading about some couple in their late fifties who chose to leave their urban New York life behind and start anew in Sayulita, a small Mexican beach village just a bit north of Puerto Vallarta. It is called Gringos in Paradise.

The author talks about how his friends wonder if he is crazy, how he wonders if he is crazy and how the transition from one life to the other is made through colourful-but-mild anecdotes that confirm his craziness.

Barry and Thia also, natch, build their house and that, in essence, is the bulk of the story. They have to find architects, don’t you know, and builders and potted plants. So stressful. They don’t actually build anything and, for the most part, seem to spend a great deal of time worrying and fretting about colours and plants and copper pots. Still, even tho our story is considerably more macho, skilled, daring, heroic and bloody it is – as much as I hate to admit it – much the same.

I hate him.

To be fair, running away to join the squirrels or parrots is not new and neither is building your new house once you get there. This retirement journey has been told before. But Barry tells the story with much the same wide-eyed wonder about the ‘new life’ as I do and, even tho he is considerably more useless at building (he is a New York writer, after all), we are both still telling similar tales of being out of our elements and hurting ourselves while our wives blossom and grow more beautiful in the sun.

Worse, his book seems to be loosely based on a journal-cum-diary. It is largely chronological and loose-boned, having no real theme except ‘look at me’.

I hate him.

Clearly, I am going to have to kick this blog thing up a notch.

We got blood. We got pain. We got life threatening accidents. But he’s got sweat. Barrels of it (especially in the Mexican summer). He’s got foreign government red tape and a different language to deal with (tho my new neigbours are mostly odd, monosylabic or both and so we are pretty close on that one).

He is also retired-before-his-finances-allowed and, given their penchant for shopping, his financial predicament may be a smidge worse (hard to imagine). Plus – this idiot figures to earn a a few bucks now and then from his writing!

I hate him.

We don’t share a lot in the background but we seem to share the basic story: couple leaves familiar for unfamiliar and finds life lessons for the umpteenth time.

Sheesh! Life as a cheap B flick, subcategory; romantic comedy for him, romantic action comedy for me.

My brother turned 60 today! Harsh.

But, as I am the older brother, I have little in the way of sympathy for him. Too far apart in our ages for much empathy either. 3 years is a long time in family politics. Mom always liked him best, anyway. So did Dad now that I think about it and my sister claimed neutrality to my face but they did hang out a lot together. Ours was a divided family, really. Over me, anyway. Of the five of us, only one really thought I was great and he suffered from severe doubt now and then. Four against one on a good day, a unanimous majority against on most. Oh well.

60 was a number, eh? I remember it well. About the only thing I do remember well, actually. Not the year, of course, just the number. I’ve still got 1-100 down pat, even at this age. Gasoline prices climbing as they do have me pretty good to 130 as well. As I recall, my 60th year was spent living dangerously on a remote island up the wild BC coast. I must have been crazy.

Funny thing about age……there isn’t any. I distinctly recall the incidents of my giggling uncontrollably disappearing before I was 21 and the frequency of laughing hilariously beginning to dissipate around 30 – 35 (coincidentally with the arrival of the children). I laughed out loud and guffawed genuinely less and less after 50 and I have chuckled with mirth only at Xmas when I am wearing rosy cheeks, red long johns and drinking rum eggnogs by the gallon. I can’t help myself. I just ‘let go’.

Nowadays the best I can muster on a daily basis, as a rule, is a smirk of sorts, sometimes a leer depending on where we are and who’s nearby. I occasionally pop a ‘snort’ when someone says something surprising but, of course, at 63, less and less surprises me. Hilarity, it seems, is the second thing to lose as you age.

I confess to feeling the edges of my straight, thin lips trying to turn up a bit when the new motor got the boat, fully laden and all, up on a plane yesterday. That was good times! But I was simultaneously trying to keep a straight back in the light chop as I had strained it earlier this month and have been whining about back pain ever since. Won’t do to start giggling after putting Sal through Hell for the last three weeks. Mind you, she looks like she could use a good laugh or at least a gallon of rum eggnog. Poor sweetie. She should not have to live with an old geezer with a bad back and a worse disposition. The woman is a saint.

I am quite pleased, however, that Spring has sprung. Hard to explain the change in me now that winter has seemingly passed. And Sal is positively giddy. We are definitely more attuned to the seasons and that means susceptible to the blahs of winter. It was always our intention to ‘get away’ for a month or two in the winter but it seemed more like an option before. Now………..well, let’s just say that the it is less of an option and more of a necessity.

So, there you have it: the retirement recipe is 10 months in BC and 2 months elsewhere, preferably sunnier climes. No more pretending. Next year will see rosy cheeks and rum by way of the Caribbean beaches and bars. Or a reasonable facsimile.

Unh, just in case – would you remind me in November that I have plans?

The following uses Anne and Roger in the Springroll, so to speak. But that is simply a literary device to illustrate a point. They are only as guilty and innocent as the rest of us. I used them as the subjects this time and beg their tolerance of it.

You can find them at most electronics shops and, of course, they are at Costco. They are billed as having a range of up to 20 miles but we know better – if they go two or three, we are lucky. I am talking about walkie-talkies, those little palm-sized, hand-held, two-way radios made by Cobra, Motorola and Uniden, just to name a few makers. We rely on them up here.

By ‘we’, I mean my neighbours John and Jorge and our summer neighbours John and MC. Roger and Anne are our half-year neighbours and they, too, rely on these little communicators.

Or, more to the point, they rely on me. Kind of.

They shouldn’t really. But because Sally and I use walkie-talkies more (while we range all over the property and nearby) and because we live full-time here, I seem to be able to program the devices a bit better than my neighbours. A lot better, actually. It is a skill that so far has proven elusive to the others. That is mostly because we are all post-60 and if some ‘local feller’ can do it in a minute, why vex yourself trying to figure out the instructions? So, they don’t.

Plus the instructions are in some weird kind of tachno-babble as interpreted poorly by a non-English speaker.

When the radios need reprogramming, they bring them here. We sit around and I press ‘menu’ and jump around prodding it this way and that while we have tea and cookies until, somehow, we have found the right channels again or deprogrammed the alarm or whatever. It is an annual neighbourhood ritual that bonds us.

The daily communication that goes on via walkie-talkie between our separate home sites is what sometimes passes for entertainment around here. It’s more interesting than watching the fire in the woodstove, and definitely more amusing.

The ringer-noise-bell goes ‘toodle-oodle, toodle-oodle’ and then there is silence. The just-arrived-for-the-season caller has forgotten the long established protocol; since we are all on the same channel, the caller must follow up the toodles with a name-call to a specific person. That is because there are 7 others on the ‘party line’ and we don’t want everyone disturbed, only the target audience. After a dozen or so unresponsive ‘toodles’ Anne, for example, will remember and then shout out: “Sally, Anne calling. Sally, Anne calling. Can you hear me?”

Because everyone seems to have to relearn the system on arrival every year, Anne might also leave her finger on the transmit button the first few times which prevents her receiving an answer so despite Sally trying to respond, we subsequently overhear, “Oh, I guess she isn’t in. I’ll just call later.”

I have often wondered to whom those words are spoken but I digress……….

Of course, we could hear all of that soliloquy(it is on transmit, after all) but couldn’t respond. And, because she didn’t get Sal, she immediately turns the radio off to save the battery and Sally is rarely quick enough to slip in with an “I am here! I am here!”

So, Sally gets on the ’emergency’ airhorn and bellows a few ‘aah-oogahh, aah-oogahs’ in the direction of Anne’s cabin a half mile away but, of course, Anne was calling from inside her house and doesn’t hear it. But Roger, who was outside, does.

Toodle-oodle, toodle-oodle! “Roger here. Anne can you hear me? Why is Sally using the airhorn?”

Sally: “It was me calling, Roger. Sally. Anne was trying to call me but left her finger on the transmit button. She couldn’t hear me.”

Roger is a bit hard of hearing himself and so he counters with, “Who is this? Couldn’t hear what? Are you alright? Is your walkie-talkie working?”

Sally: “Yes. Yes it is. We are talking on it now, actually. Roger………..Roger?”

Roger’s finger remains tightly on the transmit button (as is the custom in the Spring) and so, not hearing anything, he gets worried and rushes up to the house to check Anne’s unit. He is thinking that it may be just that his unit has a dead battery. When he gets there, he takes Anne’s unit and, in the process, he releases the button on his and Sally can get through. “Roger? Roger? Can you hear me now?”

“Yes, Yes, I can hear you now. My radio wasn’t working there for a bit. I can never figure out why that is.”

“Never mind. Anne was trying to reach me. Can you put her on?”

Roger passes the unit to Anne and asks, “Anne. Were you trying to reach Sally because of her airhorn going aah-oogah?”

“No. I didn’t hear any airhorn. What a coincidence that she was trying to reach me. I was trying to reach her. But now that she’s home, I’d like to talk to her.”

“Well, you should turn on your walkie-talkie then! I’m going back to work!”

Sally and Anne make another attempt at talking but working the transmit button has not, as yet, been habitualized for this season and confusion reigns. Finally, Anne decides to come over to have their radios looked at ‘by the expert’.

I pretend to fiddle with the radios while Roger, Anne, Sally and I have wine later that day and catch up on the news. In that way, we get our messages conveyed. All thanks to walkie-talkies, when you think about it. In their own indirect way, they facilitate communication by ensuring get-togethers. It’s a modern wonder!

After almost four months the boat is back in the water and running fine. Got the motor all hooked up today. Ran like a Deere.

I had no idea it was almost four months until Sal said, “You should get your boat going, you know. It’s been almost four months!”

“No way!”

“Think about it. We pulled it up around the first of December. It is past the idles of March.”

“Ides, sweetie. Ides. I-d-e-s.”

“Not with you, it isn’t! It is idles!”

She has such a way with words, that gal. And so it was that I was prompted to get on it and on it, I did. Once running, I zoomed about for a few minutes and appreciated the magic of having my own set of wheel (AKA ‘prop’) again.

It didn’t come easy.

Friday was the designated day to bolt on the motor and that was because the tides suited us. The lagoon dried around 10 and flooded back around noon – according to the book. It was a short tidal difference but enough. So we set the boat on the cradle and went to have breakfast and then returned to the lagoon with the water at the 8 inch level.

Perfect. It would just run out and we would have a couple of hours.

That was the theory, anyway. Either we miscalculated or the tide difference was even less than indicated. The eight inches we waded into was not us entering a receding tide but a flooding one. The water was coming in and it was already almost at boot height!

Damn.

At first we tried to ‘beat the tide’ but, of course, that never works. The tide always wins. Ask King Canute. So then we just settled in to working the bolts as the water crept up. We finished with the lagoon at crotch height.

Grand.

That was my second time that morning getting soaked through although the first time, I dressed for the occasion by wearing very little. When I put the boat on the cradle around 9:00 I had to do it when the lagoon water was high enough to get the boat on. That’s about 3.5 feet. So, in swimming trunks and flip flops I waded into it and placed the boat on the cradle including tying it on so that it didn’t float away.

By the time I was done, about half an hour had passed with me in the water and Sally clucking repeatedly that I was going to ‘catch my death’. Numb hands and feet made for awkward climbing as I left the lagoon and ascended the rocky slope heading for home, breakfast and the warmth of the fire.

You’d think after all this time messing about in boats we’d have this thing worked out, wouldn’t ya? And, in some weird kinda incompetent way, we did. I just had to get soaked twice and Sally had to get soaked with me.

It’s a great system.

Once again I am driven to make a political comment. Forgive me. It separates us, I know. But honestly, that is not the intention. The intention is to have integrity, to tell the truth. “For evil to be done, good men only have to do nothing”.

I will rant again covering the most pressing matters right now. Be assured – new matters come daily and I try mightily not to burden you as a rule. BUT OH-MY-GAWD!

Our Foreign Affairs department finally drafted a plan for evacuating Canadians from northern Japan. I quote from the CBC broadcast: “They will be allowed to board buses already chartered by Germany, New Zealand and Australia which will take them to Tokyo where they are free to go wherever they choose!”

Wow! Allowed to board buses. And that is different from taking a bus into Tokyo on your own – how?

Reminds me of the Dept. of Foreign Affairs rescuing our citizens in Egypt. “Well, the first plane went in and left because there were no Canadians there at the airport!”

Turns out the airport was blockaded (duh) and so we left with an empty plane. Didn’t occur to us to wait.

Later, when we were embarrassed by the world into returning, we went back, chartered some buses and brought the Canadians to the airport but not without charging them airfare first. Then the Egyptians extorted another $200 from each of them. Our govt. didn’t step in there, either. As long as all the costs were covered, our government came through.

It is absurd! This is a country that has recently decided to spend $35 billion dollars on new fighter jets! But we can’t afford to charter a bus in Japan? Or our own planes in Egypt? We can’t afford to replace aging, rusting, failing ferries carrying our own people in our own country but we can afford to buy fighter jets!

For those of you who don’t travel internationally, you will be surprised to know that most Canadians seek help (if they need it) from the British Consulate when abroad. Why? Because the British Consulate will do what it takes to fix the problem even if you are Canadian. The Canadian consulate never does anything.

I distinctly recall reading that our Canadian peacekeeping troops in Malta or Cyprus or, perhaps, Somalia were expected to do their patrols without ammunition for their rifles at one time. Seems we couldn’t afford the bullets. My nephew trained in the Canadian Forces in Cold Lake Alberta under the same conditions. Bullets were deemed too expensive.

US fighter jets, on the other hand are indispensable. And we can afford them! You know why? Because the Americans are getting Tar Sands oil in payment, that’s why? And water. And a lot of other things. We have sold out our heritage for, amongst other things, useless-to-us fighter jets.

Think about it: for battling whom would fighter jets come in handy for Canada? Norway? Greenland? Russia?

Yeah, right!

Our Coast Guard flies helicopters that crash with alarming regularity but we are going to get fighter jets! We can’t afford to man the lighthouses!!! We can’t afford ice-breakers, we can’t afford coastguard ships or even government wharves anymore! But we can afford fighter jets!

When was the last time Canada declared war on anyone other then themselves? We last declared martial law in Quebec, remember. Trudeau got ticked at the kidnapping of Pierre LaPorte. Or maybe the Indian uprising at OKA?

Fighter jets would not have helped.

Fighter jets help no one. They do harm, instead. It is in the nature of the beast. Harm with extreme prejudice is what they do. So, who benefits by this? Why the Americans, of course. They get $35B plus ongoing contracts for parts. Plus we are now in a position to help the US turn North America into Fortress North America. And, I suppose, we could use them in Afghanistan if the Americans gave us a lift over. And who wants that? Why the Americans of course. They are charging us $35B to protect their interests!

“Oh, Dave, you are getting carried away.” Yeah. I suppose so. So let me say something that Canadians seem to place a lot more value on – their own personal pocketbooks! Think about this, folks: 90% of US oil imports come from Canada NOT from Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, the North Sea or even Iraq and the gulf states. It comes from Canada. It comes from the governments that charges it’s own citizens 30%+ more than the Americans pay for exact the same oil.

Just another way your government has let you down. And the examples are myriad. Continuous. Constant. We are the 51st state without the benefits of even statehood.

This will make you laugh – you can buy a propane freezer here in Canada that is made in Canada for $2500. You can buy that exact same freezer (made in Canada) in Colorado for $1500.00. NAFTA will Shaft ya. We pay more for the product when we have an export market (lumber, apples, etc.) and we pay more when we import it (cars, boats, etc.).

Do a vehicle price comparison. Try boats. Food. Anything but medical care and even that is damn close if you have a good medical plan in the US. If you really want a good medical plan, go to Thailand or Japan.

Canadian taxpayer? Spell us S-T-U-P-I-D.

But seriously folks, back to BC – Christy Clark’s new economic adviser wants to sell Canadian water to the US. And they have the mechanism now in place with which to do that by way of the Run-of-river permits. Rich Coleman has been given the Energy portfolio and he was the one who gave away huge tracts West Coast land to developers.

Why do we vote this way? Why do we let these rapers and pillagers, these liars and crooks, these greedy, stupid, corporate puppets control our lives?

Why?

I read on the internet that all outboards made after 1970 and over 40 hp share the same transom bolt pattern. This being a 2002 Honda 50 and the previous one being a 1990 Evinrude 45, I assumed that I was all set.

Not so. It seems I may have stumbled on the one combination that doesn’t fit the rule. MY holes don’t align.

Damn.

I discovered this when I went down to the still-raging, storm-tossed dock and tried to get some of the getting-the-boat-actually-going work done. I was almost flipped into sea. Discretion won out and I came back and had lunch. Such is the pace of progress around here.

The lower holes are also under the water line. Seems counter intuitive, doesn’t it? But that is the way it is and so one has to be very careful to seal those bolt holes. And that can’t be done while the boat is in the water. So…………….here we go again…………the boat has to come out.

Damn.

The trouble with that is the tides. You place the boat over the small boat cradle we built in the lagoon (it is under water when the tide is up) and then wait a few hours for the water to drop leaving the boat high and dry. Simple.

But the tides don’t live by my schedule. I have to be there to put the boat on and take it off and I am not keen on getting up at three in the morning to do one or the other. If I wait til Friday (the tide schedule ‘moves’ every day by approximately 45 minutes to one hour), I can do it all at civilized times. Ergo – Friday is the new prediction for launch.

I have plenty to do in the meantime from re-rigging the fuel lines to reconnecting the electrics but even those simple chores are made near impossible when the seas are flipping your boat four feet up and down while it is tied to the dock.

Friday may be optimistic.

My friend and neighbour, John, is always ‘up’ for work and chores, the more wretched and miserable, the better. John is one of those guys who likes to keep busy, dirty and ‘pushed’ to the limits both physically and in testing one’s ingenuity. Add sweat, blood, tears and lots of grease and pithy expletives and it simply does not get any better for him. And so, yesterday’s getting of the outboard was something he had been looking forward to. John and Jorge joined us at the end-of-the-road.

Sometimes I am one with a person, but this is definitely not one of those times. John’s work/pleasure/interest ratio is in direct opposition to mine but, of course, I am willing to exploit the hell out of his when it suits my purpose. Mine is so off the charts, it is unexploitable.

The downside, you would think, is that it should cut both ways – when he wants help with something grim and horrible, I should be there. Hah! I’m not that stupid! It is a small peninsula but I know the nooks and crannies well. And, even when I am there (no avoiding some things), he still attacks the job so that I am usually just an appreciative bystander. More like a recording secretary now that I see how this is coming out.

Anyway, when the going gets really tough, John likes to go it alone. Mind you, when the going gets cushy and soft and there is plenty to eat and drink, I am happy to share so it is not all bad for him. He eats well here. But I’d prefer to keep my sweat where it is, thank you very much. And I have suffered enough blood loss working as little as I do. If I worked like John, I’d be dead.

It is pouring when we get there. John is happy with that. We get the boat to the beach but the tide is where the bottom shallows off and we can’t get in as close as I should like. No problem. John wades in and half lifts the boat closer. I jump out, get the truck and back it down the hill. We unload the shopping leaving the engine for last. Then, wiggling and jiggling, we get it out of the back of the truck and onto the transom. Things went pretty smoothly, actually.

Typically, when undertaking something simple like getting six, light two-by-fours off the roof of the SUV, we encounter a knot we can’t untie, or the boat motor just threw a prop or it happens to be the time we slip while loading and get fully immersed in the sea. There is no such thing as a simple job – they all have challenges and not all challenges can be met easily although, it seems, that they can all be met eventually – so far, anyway.

The motor came down on the transom nicely but the holes in the engine bracket did not align with the previously drilled holes for the old Evinrude. That meant that the motor had to be tied on with ropes. So, we did that. Then we hooked back up to the little boat and headed home.

And the sea was getting up. A big storm was coming in.

We got back to the dock before all hell broke loose and tied up. The boats started bucking and bronking against their tethers. But they would be fine. It was the tied-on motor that threatened to leap off it’s tentative perch and sink into the black hole that formed the magnet for all things non buoyant just off the dock. So, another few lashings were applied and we went in to get warm and dry.

I checked on things later. They were still there.

The point? There isn’t one, really. People often ask, “What do you do all day?”

“Nothing, really. Just ‘stuff’. Seems to take a lot of time, tho. You know, getting the shopping, checking on things, tying up boats………..I dunno……………just stuff. But we need John to help with most of it. ”