AN EXTRAORDNARY ADVENTURE OF THE SEA
by James Parsons

The morning of August the 16th in the first year of the third millenium was full of bluster on the banks and beaches of the Eastern Shore in the former colony of Queen Mary's Land, and the three living generations of the Parsons lineage met the turn in the weather with a sharp breath of anticipation. The humid stillness of the week was at last supplanted by a crisp if inconsistent westerly wind, a roll and chop to the waves, and a rising tide that had at long last brought the depth soundings in the harbor to a sufficient reading that keeled boats might safely approach the landing. The sun was hardly obscured by the diffuse haze that rode high on the air's currents, and no serious clouds threatened with dark bellies to bring nature's interference into the affairs of the men who might venture out upon the waters.

Preparations for this day had begun in earnest a full five days prior, when the youngest Parsons in the company, Master James, took in company with his cousin Jesse Thomas of the State of Indiana to repair and fit the family's good sailing vessel, lain aside in dry dock for nigh on one full year. [Though he might well have claimed a mature title, such as Mister or Sir at any point in the last decade since his 18th year found him more or less permanently following his own lead in the world, James had as yet to take on a family or a homestead of his own, and in the presence of his elders and betters he fell quickly and easily into the role of the Son of his Father, and partook of the pleasurable dalliances of the young squire Jamie, his not-too-distant former self.] The boat was a 16-foot sloop, of the modern fiberglass technology. Originally outfitted with a smartly polished wooden tiller and centerboard, the latter had been replaced with a fiberglass piece when the original was washed away by an overnight gale in the anchorage. There was no interior cabin, simply a single piece molded deck, bench seats along both gunwales, and small cubbies recessed on either side of the mast mounting for the storage of an anchor, an oar, and the occasional odd and end that might be desired on a day's pleasure sail. Low and wide and possessing a nearly indefatigable buoyancy, the boat was easily skippered by two, quite manageable even with a crew of one, though decidedly crowded with more than four or five hands aboard. Though it had never been tried in truly hazardous waters, it was certainly well used and enjoyed in a variety of conditions on lakes, internal seas, and of course this very Chesapeake Bay. At some point in its voyages the summer before, the ship had run afoul of some underwater hazard and begun to take on water into its inner hull. Never threatened with sinking, the leak was still a nuisance to the boat's captain as the added weight of the bilge made the performance sluggish and unresponsive to the helm.

The two young men had followed close as James's father instructed them first to inspect the underside of the boat while it was set up in its trailer, and then once the wound was located to patch it with the tools and materials of the shipwright's shop. James laid out a tarpaulin to the fore and rear of the trailer's axle. He wriggled under the center of the boat and shone his torch along the length of the hull. It was obvious at once what was wrong. A jagged gash, approximately the diameter of a silver dollar, had opened up at the rear joint of the centerboard's well. Whether a half-submerged tree or some other obstacle had caused it, the impact was not so forceful as to have completely compromised the thickness of the fiberglass. Still, it had broken skin. Enough to bleed, like a scraped knuckle that at first seems simply a burn, but left unattended eventually lets loose an unexpectedly copious amount of blood. Though here, of course, the fluid was crossing the membrane in the opposite direction to that of blood escaping the body, the vessel's future health would still require a bandage.

Wheeling the trailer out of the boathouse, James and Jesse deposited the boat onto the grass which would become their workbench. They rolled the boat, with the help of all the available family, until it rested inverted on a discarded rail from the property's fence line. The undercarriage exposed to the light of day, a second, smaller hole was found in the centerboard itself, no doubt the precursor by a second or less to the much more vital injury to the aft. Jesse mixed a concoction of epoxy resin, into which James dipped a square cut of cloth woven of glass fibers. The sea-green tinted glop was not as noxious as might have been feared, but it was absolutely fixed on its sole purpose of adhering to any and every surface, regardless of the intention of the craftsman to use it in such and such a place alone. Eventually enough of the sticky material was laid over the hole and overlapping the good surface of the hull to smooth the patch out and consider the chore well finished. After many hours in the sun the bandage had dried into a cast, water and air tight, and ready for the test of the open sea.

That had been on Sunday, and Grandmother Parsons seemed only too glad to have Mother Nature finally present on Friday a condition which might put her husband, her boy, and her grandson into that first mother's care instead of her own. Though Grandma never sailed herself, she looked forward to the expeditions almost as much as the men did so that she might expect a few hours of peace to focus on her own work or pleasure or lion taming or any other endeavor that might catch her whimsy and from which she would not want to be interrupted. The winds had abated so long that Jesse had returned to his university studies deep in the continental interior without even getting to launch the ship he had so diligently restored.

The week-long lull had nearly smothered the optimism for sailing that the Parsons normally enjoyed, and so it was well into midday before a consensus was reached that indeed it appeared the air would maintain its pace across the water. There seemed little chance of the sailors finding themselves becalmed in the middle of the channel, forced to either drift on the tide or paddle themselves back to the comforts of hearth and home. The rigging was assembled, the canvas unfurled, the lines secured, and Messrs. Jim, Jay, and James Parsons, sporting the lightweight attire of the casual beachcomber, released the mooring line and tacked for the farther shore.

Young James, at six feet-two the pinnacle of the line thus far, was tanned and fit, though many of the muscles which he had grown by means of near constant sporting activity in his schoolboy days had grown soft in the more recent years of intermittent dedication to heavy physical activity. His hair had faded similarly, no longer the ebony mane he had once coiffed, it was now a deep, dark brown mop, the forelocks twitching along the rim of his sunglasses. Though never an imposing figure, his enthusiasm and leverage had seen him through any trial he had met thus far. His father, known as Jim or Jay or even JP, had a cracked grin and an unruly shock of bright white on his crown, the pepper aspects of which were now, in his fifth decade, almost entirely gone. He had overcome what demons he faced by a steadfast determination that they were not demons at all. His confidence that whatever might come would be handled in its due time was borne out most recently by his just completed treatment for a cancerous "growth" which had threatened his vocal chords, but which had apparently been entirely eliminated with the most routine of cleansing procedures. The precautionary radiation had almost certainly been overkill, and even the potential side effects had limited themselves to a rough dryness of the throat and a bit of burnt skin, both of which were proving no more permanent then an over-indulged sun tan. Radiating from JP's eyes were the laugh lines and worry lines of a seasoned gentleman and father. Pop-pop, the grandfather, was fond of his pipe, in which he mixed a fruity gourmet tobacco with a hearty dime store blend when he relaxed on the porch or with an after dinner card game. He was nearly as spry and active now as he had been when he'd purchased the land for this family retreat for his young wife and children. It seemed likely he would still be crossing the country by land and sea keeping in touch with his ever expanding progeny (which in some quarters was into its fourth generation) into his 90s and even 100s, which it was hard to believe could be so close at hand. The family resemblance across the three faces was instant and unmistakable. When they had ensconced themselves into their positions on board the boat, it was a dashing portrait of proud and vital men, at home and bound in their mutual admiration.

One of the pleasures of a small craft is that it takes little effort by either the captain or the ocean to provide many of the sorts of thrills that only a veritable gale can induce on a voyage of grander scale. The ship may be easily brought onto a steep pitch by simply steering across the wind and hauling the boom in close, allowing the daring seamen to hike out over the high side and balance their weight against the force on the canvas. Great sensations of speed can be felt by the passengers as the whitecaps whisk by, under, and over the low bowsprit. The sweet spray dashes the brow, even mild waves may roll and toss, and the entire enterprise can be caught up on the plane of the surf and suddenly accelerate in absence of the turbulence and friction. These sports were enthusiastically pursued by first the middle Parsons at the tiller, and then in turn by the eldest. The crew targeted first the Turkey Point, then a distant buoy, back South toward the shallows light, then out again toward the channel marker, up the Bay towards the fishing waters of the Lake of the Grove Neck, and back out again on an intercept course for a close encounter with a passing Naval frigate. Some hours had passed since they had cast off, and as the crew came about and guaged the distance on this tack to the channel, it was noted by one or another of them that the skies had decidedly grayed, and that the previously gusty breezes had upgraded themselves to a purposeful wind. The western sky was far from dusky, rather it was at least partially obscured by an horizon-blurring sheet which bespoke of oncoming squalls. The first few drops they felt were indistinguishable from the splashes they'd become accustomed to, but soon it was obvious that a light drizzle had begun. They had plenty of time to make landfall before the lightning or the truly rough weather, indeed plenty of time even before dinner, which was much more in the forefronts of their thoughts then any trouble the weather might be bringing them. James's Pop asked him if he'd like to take his turn in command, as this tack home would certainly be the last of the season, but James declined, quite satisfied to keep his perch on the foredeck, his long legs straddling the mast, his hands ready at the jib. So they settled in, plotting their course by sight to the nearly indistinguishable landmarks that denoted their place on shore.

The ship turned smartly about, the frigate and the channel now to their stern, and Grandmother and dinner under a mile distant ahead. Had the rain kicked up? The wind or waves? Imperceptibly perhaps. Certainly the strongest bursts of force were stronger now then they had been, but the average seemed no heavier. And the vessel still rode high and light in the water, the repairs having passed their test with flying colors. No creaks or groans were heard in the structure or the rig, and nothing ominous was felt in the tugs on the sails and rudder. JP noticed that the third batten in the main sail was wiggling free and might soon be lost overboard.

James leaned back for a moment, planting his palms behind him on the deck and drawing his face back from the mast just before it happened, or he might have lost a jawbone, an eye, or certainly some teeth. As it was, when the mast tore its hardware from the deck it merely gouged him in the thigh before toppling leeward into the sea. The mast had been set free because an instant earlier a sharp crack and an out of tune whine signaled the snapping of the port-side stay, a twenty-foot length of high tension piano wire, which along with its mates on the starboard and the bow kept the mast rigidly upright and held firm against the force of the wind on the 150 square feet of main sail. The stay was held to the deck by an adjustable bracket mounted with two bolts which passed clear through the inch-thick fiberglass. Either bolt by itself should have been enough to hold the mast in the strongest winds that the boat would ever find itself sailing in, yet not one but both pieces of forged steel snapped simultaneously. They could not have sheared as there was only a tensile force acting on them; their interiors had simply pulled apart. Regardless of the cause, the razor sharp stay now ripped through the air like a bullwhip, tipped with a few ounces of creased-edge metal that at top speed would crack a skull or tear through flesh. The boom swung wildly as it toppled to the deck and then ricocheted over the side, threatening to render the old man unconscious should it strike him in its arc.

As quickly as it began, the immediate crisis was over. The top of the mast and all of the sails and lines were disappearing beneath the surface ripples. The mast seesawed uncertainly on the starboard gunwale, it's own bolts waving incongruously in the face of the young man they had struck. The deck was broken and sharp where the steel had been torn from it, the actual holes obscured by the debris. All hands were quickly accounted for, and self examinations revealed nothing more than some scrapes and bumps. The three sailors set about recovering their craft.

The mast and boom were hauled out of the water, and lashed to the deck with the mainsheet. The sails too were retrieved, and the combination of the jib sheet and James's sitting on them kept them from catching the wind again. The ship's lone oar was brought out of its storage; the tiller and rudder mount was double checked. Without the sails, the wind had almost no effect on the boat, and the waters seemed suddenly calm, as if the lesson having been taught, the stern schoolmaster had left the class unattended. The tide had shifted, and now the true question was, how far down toward the wide mouth of the bay into the North Atlantic would the drift take them before they could paddle canoe-style to a landfall.

In the end, the Parsons all made it back to Grandma and kin in one piece, just a few minutes ahead of a minor sou'wester that did strike at last. In the next day the boat was repaired again, and returned to dry storage. Today the Parsons men are all three still alive and relish the memories of their extraordinary adventure on the seas.