Detour to the Past

After spending my birthday weekend back home at Plum Island, I drove back to Annapolis on Monday. Perhaps thanks to an overnight snowstorm (we had six inches or so on the island; 10 or so in town), traffic was light and I enjoyed one of the easier Newburyport-to-Annapolis drives I’ve ever had.

Given the quick time I was making, I opted to cross Connecticut on I-84 and then head south to Westchester County before crossing the Hudson River at the Tappan Zee Bridge. This monstrous engineering marvel was a prominent part of my youth and I wanted to see the new version that had opened recently.

And an impressive new marvel it is. If you’re at all into big projects, I encourage you to check this bridge out. Very, very cool.

Another reason for taking this detour was so I could once again swing through the old neighborhood in which I grew up. Yes, it’s true: a large chunk of my youth was spent in Orangeburg, N.Y., on the western shore of the Hudson and just south of the T.Z. Bridge.

My father had settled in the area after returning from World War II. At the time, it was known as Shanks Village, formerly Camp Shanks, through which he had both embarked for the European campaign and returned to the States. After graduating from Dartmouth, he went to Columbia Journalism School on the G.I. Bill and lived in Shanks Village with his first wife. Then he and a handful of other men in the area bought a bunch of land near Shanks Village at the base of Clausland Mountain, and that’s where they built the neighborhood where I spent the majority of the first 14 or so years of my life.

I drove up the hill I’d trudged up and down to and from the school bus for a lot of years and realized a few things. One, it really was a great sledding hill (back when the area had real winters). And two, the forest behind my house was a really great place to wander as a kid.

Anyway, I parked at the top of the hill (known to us as “The T”) and looked up at my old house — a house my father had built. It was the same shade of red, and it was surrounded by huge evergreens that had been Christmas trees that we then transplanted outside. One tree in particular was a good 70, 80 feet high, and I had helped plant it. That felt kinda cool.

And finally, the name on what had been our mailbox still says “Smith.” I don’t know if the the current residents share our all-too-common last name, but I thought it was pretty cool that in a neighborhood built by Gene Smith, along with the Gwilliams, the Thompsons, the Lunds, the Landreths, the Ulrichs and others, at least one original name remained.

On Impermanence

Christmas Day was a glorious day on Plum Island. A cloudless sky of powder blue, brisk northwest wind and chilly temperatures made it the consummate winter day in coastal northern New England. It was a perfect day for a walk on the beach.

While walking on the beach, I passed by a sand dune my family used to own. I still remember listening in on the phone call when I was 5 or 6 years old — it might be the oldest memory I have — when old Mr. Walton, the owner of the small hotel and cottages we used to rent each summer, called to tell my parents he was retiring and wanted to offer them the business. My parents, each of whom had successful careers going in New York City, were in no way going to become hoteliers on a decrepit little island in Massachusetts, but they were interested in the empty lot at the south end of Walton’s property.

Fast forward 40-plus years and there have been a lot of changes. Walton’s got sold to a couple named the Syrenes (I believe that’s how they spelled their names) who sold off the cottages and upgraded the hotel a bit. More in line with their probable motives for buying the place, they built themselves a huge house onto the south end of the hotel. Plum Island transformed over the years into a much more upscale place, with most of the cottages becoming big showpiece houses (a conflicting process, it must be admitted, my parents were one of the first to prompt) and the island itself becoming more of a destination.

The Syrenes later sold the hotel and the big-ass house to Jeanne Geiger and her husband (he of the Aeropostale brand and fortune). She was deep in the throes of her bid to remake Plum Island into some kind of “The Hamptons North,” so they turned the hotel into a boutique joint named “Blue,” complete with driveways full of those little blue, glass pebbles you put at the bottom of an aquarium, and bought damn near all of the other available commercial properties on the island.

Jeanne Geiger died in a tragic accident, I believe at the house, and over the ensuing years her husband sold off most, if not all, of their other properties on the island. The hotel went to a company in nearby Amesbury, Mass., that manages other high-end, boutique resorts in places like Cape Cod. Blue is now once again open for business and the prices are insane.

On the south side of the lot my parents bought was an asshole who over the years turned his house into some sort of suburban New Jersey mafioso’s home, complete with statuary, an all-encompassing lattice work surrounding the place and a gazebo on the dune in front. He also encroached onto our property at least a couple of times before, in a fit of supreme arrogance, he tried to take the lot by adverse possession. I am not shitting you.

My parents were a hell of a lot kinder than I would have been. Things went to court and they allowed the encroachments to stay (in exchange for a pittance in cash) and also negotiated that the asshole would have right of first refusal should the time ever come to sell.

And all through the years, that time apparently never came. My parents always held out the idea that someday they’d build on that lot. It would be a smaller place than our family home just up the street, and it would be right on the beach overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. Never mind that the lot was too damned small to ever really build on, or that the environmental laws were never going to allow construction on such a dune (although truth be told: if you grease the right palms in Newbury, you can build whatever you want wherever you want; zoning and environmental laws are really just suggestions in this town). And never mind that Dad was never going to leave the current house, even for one on the beach; the man was set in his ways, as many of you know.

Anyway, late in her life I used to bemoan to my mother the fact that she and my father had never really invested in the great stock market run-up of the ’90s –– despite the fact that Dad, a business reporter for the New York Times, was a peerless predictor of what the markets were going to do, and Mom, thanks to her business, had plenty of cash to spend. And Mom would always counter, “I know, but we invested in real estate.” To which I would always hold up this unbuildable lot on which they’d been paying taxes for decades and say, “Yes, badly.” (Yes, I realize I was being a bit of an asshole myself. I just thought they should have been able to live more easily than they did late in their lives, that’s all.) Mom always used to talk up investing in land, often citing Will Rogers’ dictum that “they weren’t makin’ any more of it.” I think she believed in the permanence of place, and I’m sure the events of 1929 were still very fresh in her and my father’s minds. The Great Depression was not an abstract notion to them but a very real event through which they lived. And it all started with a stock market crash. So she invested in land as a result.

All of this history lesson ran through my head as I passed by the dune on Christmas Day. My father sold the lot a year or two after my mother passed, and the current owners, like many of those whose properties are right on the beach, have piled up car-sized boulders at the front of the dune, an effort to bulwark the island against the Atlantic Ocean that has, since the winter of 2012-13, been ferociously nipping at homes along several stretches of beach.

The irony, of course, is that in the case of this lot, Mom was investing in a sand dune on a barrier-beach island –– the very definition of impermanence. And today’s current beachfront owners aren’t just tossing pebbles before a tsunami, they’re accelerating the everyday erosion that’s endangering other homes on the island.

Anyone who thought Plum Island was permanent was a fool. Barrier-beach islands are designed by Mother Nature to move. We get to enjoy our time, however long or short, as residents/caretakers of the island, and when the ocean comes to collect the rent, well, it’s time to go. Plum Island, my family’s dune, we ourselves…it’s all such a short stay.

I’m not being morbid, but that impermanence was front and center on Christmas Day as I saw the rocks the current owners had placed to protect the dune emerging from the sand. And impermanence in general has been front and center as I’ve wondered what will become of my family’s house (in which my brother is currently living), what will become of Further, and what will become of me. The walking-on-the-beach-on-Christmas-Day version of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” (by my father’s favorite poet, no less) I guess.

Still, it was a gorgeous, gorgeous day.

The Best Laid Plans

I mentioned at the end of my recap of the sail to Annapolis that I had some pondering to do regarding next steps. That may come as a surprise to those who read my recent post laying out my plans for this fall and winter. Namely: heading to Annapolis, then down the Chesapeake and then, in November, heading offshore with the Salty Dawg Rally to Antigua. “Life is now,” I wrote, and I was emphatic in my declaration(s).

Well, the journey south last week has given me pause, and I am now having some second thoughts about my plan to go offshore. It’s not that I don’t think Further can handle the trip. Quite the contrary: the boat is bomber, made to go offshore fast and in comfort. And it’s not that I don’t think I can handle the trip, though I will say that I have more faith in the boat than I do in myself. But last week’s trips shed some light on certain aspects of both me and Further than have me, well, pondering.

As for Further, again, she’s solid. The hull and rig are made to go, even in the lousy conditions we endured last week. But some of the auxiliary aspects on board the boat are a concern.

For instance: the dodger, the canvas “windshield” that sits at the front of the cockpit keep that area relatively dry is a shambles. That’s not a big deal—Magellan and Capt. Cook circled the globe without a dodger—but not having a dry spot from which to handle the boat is a drag and can be a safety factor when it comes to fatigue over time. I’ve looked into replacing it since last spring but canvas workers both here in Annapolis and back home in Newburyport were too swamped to take on the job and they still are.

And my jib is showing signs of wear and tear. Do I really want to get down to the islands and have my jib explode? That would suck, to put it mildly. Now, I read about sailors down there making do with jury-rigged sails after they lose a mainsail or headsail and can’t afford a replacement, but is that really how I want to tour the Caribbean?

Similarly, after last week’s fun and games, I’m kinda thinking I’d like to have a smaller jib at the bow of my boat. It makes no sense to have a sail, as I do now, that is reefed 90 percent of the time you use it. Better to have a sail sized properly for the prevailing conditions—and be a little under-gunned at times, then to be putting undue stress on your primary driver. But getting a new sail made is not going to happen in the time frame I’m dealing with, never mind the fact that I don’t have the money for a new jib.

There are also a whole host of little items that, taken together, make things a pain in the ass when the going gets tough. I still can’t seal the windows in the cabin top so they leak a bit when taking on heavy water; the hatches on the foredeck also seep a bit; the one fridge is such an energy suck that I wonder if the electrical system could keep up its needs in the hot climate of the Caribbean (another fridge works fine) without having to run the engine (and thus burn diesel which costs money) all the time.

And then there’s the fact that I still only have a year under my belt with Further. What is there on board that is on the verge of giving up the ghost and, since I don’t have a lot of time with her, I won’t know it’s coming until I get out of the country? Maybe I need more time to really know her inside and out?

Again, at her core, Further is a beast. A fast, beautiful beast made to go to sea. But all those side items add up to make me nervous sometimes. Like, say, in the middle of last week’s tumult.

As for me, well, I’ve been offshore. Several times. And I’ve been in some bumpy water and relatively high winds. But I’ve always done so as crew, never as captain. And going offshore as captain is a whole other ballgame, as I learned last week. And what I learned is this: I can’t do it alone. And not just any crew will do. I need people on board I can trust and in whom I have complete confidence. Last week’s crew, Capt. Ed, is one such person. But as last week showed, two is not enough. At least not yet in my captaining experience, anyway. Someday, I hope to be just two on board: me and my significant other. And we’ll know each other—and the boat—so well that we can handle everything thrown our way. But until that time, I need a few experienced and/or game folks along for the ride (three other people would be optimal). And they’re hard to find.

I’m on a couple of crew-finding websites and several people have expressed interest. Some of them are experienced sailors and quite intriguing. But I don’t KNOW them, so I’m wondering about how much confidence and faith I can have in someone I don’t know, especially if we’re five days into a 10-day offshore passage and the weather turns to shit.

And then there’s the ongoing question in my mind, one I’ve raised before: namely, do I want to go on such an adventure alone? Let’s say I find decent crew for the rally south; once I’m there and they all head back to the mainland, I’m on my own. I’m sure I can handle the boat in that situation, but do I want to? As much of a hermit as I can be, that might be biting off more than even I can chew. Wouldn’t it be so much better to have someone along to share the fun? Even if I had several friends come visit over the course of the winter, wouldn’t it be better to have someone equally invested in and excited by such an adventure?

So this is what weighs on my mind in the wake of last week’s trip through the rinse cycle of a washing machine. And it is these things I will ponder in the coming days here in Annapolis.

Fortunately, there are alternatives available to me. Maybe Further and I will motor our way down the Intracoastal Waterway (after the water in the Carolinas clears up in the wake of hurricane Florence) and spend the winter in Florida. The Bahamas are an easy jaunt from there and I’ve long wanted to go back to the Florida Keys, a place I’ve not been to since I was a little kid. And I hear great things about places in between: places like Charleston and Savannah and such. I could spend some time exploring and adventuring in a place where there are resources readily available and not have to venture offshore for a week-plus.

Maybe I’ll stay in Annapolis another winter, only now that I know the area and the scene and the Chesapeake better, I can build more experience all winter long AND use the town’s yachting resources to address those items aboard Further I listed above. And, in fact, I mentioned in a post script in my “Life Is Now” column that there’s a job opportunity that very much intrigues me. Well, it’s in Washington, D.C., and if that should pan out, staying in Annapolis would be a great way to resume my career AND keep building up my boat-management chops AND be in a place that I very much enjoy and where I have friends and a good life. I’ll be exploring that possibility while I’m here; I’d appreciate it if you’d cross your fingers for me on that one.

So, yeah. There is much to ponder. It all seemed so clear a couple of weeks ago, but a tumultuous jaunt across a couple hundred miles of Atlantic Ocean last week jostled that clarity quite a bit. Stay tuned for the next installment…