Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/2701
notes 46 Houseboatmagazine.com Stern notes from the In the wake of our existence are the stories of our lives. The boat yard was once a busy place before they built the new highway closer to the lake. Pete, the salty old mechanic who ran the marine repair shop for almost 30 years, passed away two summers ago. Since then, pokeweed and sassafras have grown tall through the rocky soil, and now range wildly among the broken hulks scattered across the hillside above the lake. Most of the old boats rest on blocks or beams or rusting metal braces, but a few lie directly on the stony ground, cant- ed at the angle of their crumbling hulls. No longer a busy re- pair shop, the place is now just another boat graveyard along a lonely country road, abandoned. The chain link fence, as tired and worn out as the forgotten fleet it encloses, sags to the ground in places, abused by the weather and ravaged by time. The only visitors are the insects and spiders, the birds and the snakes—nesting in the hulks, feeding on each other and fighting for survival. No one notices. No one cares. It is dawn, and quiet as the morning fog. Until… "Hey Chris! You awake?" The old cabin cruiser grumbles. "Boats don't sleep, you young pup. Even old ones like me." Retired in '78, the 1942 Chris Craft, heavily scavenged of parts and fittings, has little patience for the relatively young 1972 fiberglass runabout that occupies the space between him and the big, steel- hulled houseboat with the peeling paint. "What do you want?" "I want to hear a story," squeaks the little ski boat, proudly (if inappropriately) named Sea Queen by her third owner. The peeling decals on her transom suggest she is now only S a Quee. "Tell us about the time you pulled the President's nephew around the lake on a tractor inner tube." "You've heard that story a million times, Quee," Chris replies, annoyed by that relentless itch where a mahogany plank slowly decays at what used to be the waterline. "Let someone else tell a story for a change." "I once had a wedding on my deck," announces the house- boat proudly. "There was cake and champagne and flowers. There's still a red garter down in my engine compartment between the motor and the generator. It went through my scupper when the groom threw it. All that laughing and sing- ing and fun. Boy, those were the days!" "Remember when we were new?" reminisces Chris, the cabin cruiser. "Our owners were so proud. I can still remem- ber the smell of teak oil and chrome polish. I sure do miss that." Perhaps the soft sound that follows is a sigh. "Yeah, I remember," S a Quee chimes. "Everybody loved us. Owner used to wax me every weekend. I was bright yellow, not faded like now, and the family called me the banana boat. But what I miss most is cutting through the water and making fast turns and tossing water skiers into the lake. Glub glub. Dunking humans was just plain fun! I was so fast, and very brave, you know." "Know what I miss most?" asks the stately old houseboat, settled forever motionless on rows of rotting timbers. "I miss the sound of voices. The kids and grandkids, laughing and playing and jumping into the water from my deck. The grand- father arguing with my first owner about how long to grill the ribs. The oohs and ahhs when he'd show me off to his friends. And then there was that beautiful wedding. Mostly I miss the voices, the sounds of people having fun. I sure could make people happy. Probably never hear those sounds again." "Quiet," says the Chris Craft. "I think someone's coming!" "Here?" asks the houseboat. "Who would be coming here?" "Shhhhhhhhhh," cautions the cruiser again, and it sounds like the whispering wind. "The fence is down over here," says Tommy, at 13 the oldest of the trio of boys out on their bikes, exploring the world on this brightening summer morning. "We can get in." "What if we get caught?" asks his little brother, Billy. "Will we get in trouble?" "I don't think anyone cares," answers Rob, their best friend, "except maybe our parents. But they're not here, and I ain't askin'!" He jumps onto the rusted deck of the houseboat, while Billy clambers aboard the faded old cabin cruiser. "I'm Blackbeard!" Rob announces, "and you're Captain Kidd!" "Wow, just look at this!" says Tommy, peering across the grounded boneyard armada, his heart pounding with excite- ment, "I love these old boats!" "'Course you do," proclaims Rob, the dread buccaneer, from the bow of his houseboat flagship. "Everyone loves boats!" Under his feet the steel deck warms slightly and seems to rock a tiny bit, as if on an ocean swell. It must be due to the rising summer sun and the breeze from across the lake. Until next time, My Best from the Stern, Ted A. Thompson Ted A. Thompson is a freelance writer living in North Arkansas. He can be contacted at tedthompson@windstream.net. the Boneyard