IBE The Days Of WanderingAddendum Houston
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I slept fairly well. I realized that the outcome of this was not heavily weighing on my mind. Perhaps that was a sign of wellness. Whatever happened, I had Kelly and Cheryl. I had my family. I knew I could get my father to move to North Dakota. I’m sure he was very lonely in the world where he lived with my mother.
Over the course of the night Jenny had crept over to my side of the bed. We were spooned together lightly with her arm around me. It felt nice that she still trusted me when it came to her, at least subconsciously. The MS Rotterdam was a smooth sailing cruise ship and the motion of the water was more helpful to sleep than a hinderance.
We were already anchored off the cruise line’s private island, Half Moon Cay, also known as Little San Salvador Island. The line used 50 acres of the 2400 acre island for a beach resort for its cruise ships. It does not offer docking facilities for ships, so passengers are sent over to the island on tenders.
The island offers a variety of standard beach activities, boat rides of several sorts, plus some games and even horseback riding. It was likely to be a fun day for us, as there were lots of fun things I could do with the kids. I woke up Jenny, and she quickly jumped in the shower. I had showered just before bed, and just put on my swimsuit and a t-shirt and sandals I had bought in the ship’s shop.
She came out of the bathroom wearing a very nice tropical-print bikini that showed off her body quite well. For a 41 year old woman she was doing pretty well in the body department. She wore the bikini well, her breasts still not too saggy, her skin still mostly smooth and attractive. She had clearly been keeping up her strict fitness regime of running, for her body to look that good at her age. She quickly put on a coverup over her suit.
“Could you go wake up the kids?” She asked me.
“You sure you want me to do it?” I asked her.
“Of course,” she said, “If we are going to be a family, they need to see you as part of it, don’t they?”
I went across the hall and knocked on the door. After several attempts, there were no answers.
I went back to Jenny, and asked her what to do. She rolled her eyes and handed me her key to their room. I went in and found Suzie in Junior’s bed, his arms around her. Yep, it is certainly rare for brothers and sisters to be affectionate towards each other. I admit it requires a certain environment and circumstances for it to become a romantic connection, but if you think it is that weird that two people who live in each other’s pockets to become romantically entangled- anyway I digress.
I shook Junior awake, and he woke up and looked at me in shock.
“Your mother asked me to wake you up,” I told him, “Dress for the beach and be ready for breakfast as quick as you can.”
“Okay, sir.”
“I know its weird for you,” I said to him, “But I am technically your father. Do you think you can try for calling me dad?”
“I’ve only met you three times in my life,” he said, “It is very hard to think of you as my father.”
I sat down on the bed across from him. I looked at him blandly. He looked a lot like me at his age, almost the age I was when I met his mother. He sat and looked at me.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” He asked defensively.
“I was thinking about how you look so much like me when I was your age, and yet how totally different you are.”
“I can’t be anything like you,” he said even more defensively.
“You’re mostly right,” I said to him, “We have little in common now. But that wasn’t all that true when I met your mother. I had only been on the road barely four years then. I was still somewhat normal. It just makes me think about what could have been had I given up the life when your mother wanted me to. Sometimes I regret that.”
“Only sometimes?” He snarked, “Aren’t you supposed to tell me how not doing that was the greatest mistake of your life and how sorry you are that you abandoned me?”
“I am many things, Junior-”
“Call me John,” he said.
“Ok, if you call me dad,” I said, “I am many things, but I am not a liar. I’m not going to sit here and read you a Greek tragedy about how I screwed up and hurt you, and it is the most painful thing in my life. First of all, I wish that was the most difficult or painful thing that happened in my life. Secondly, you seem to be doing pretty good. To the extent allowed by the fact that I donated half your genes, I am proud of you.
“I am not going to claim I did more than that; your mother and you are the people responsible for who you became, but you are doing ok. Far better than I was doing at your age, believe me.”
“What were you doing exactly at my age?”
“You’re turning 21 in two months right?” I asked, and he nodded, “Well at twenty years and roughly ten months I was in Mattawa, Ontario. I had been working for an illegal logging operation up there with my partner Rachel.”
“You were involved in illegal logging?”
“I needed the money, and I wanted to be with Rachel,” I said, “We also killed this child molester, so I guess on balance we were ok.”
“You killed a child molester?”
You could have gagged me with a spoon. I should have gagged myself with a spoon. Too late.
“Yes,” I said, “he was a priest who was forcing preteen girls to have sex with him to atone for sins they told him about in confession. I didn’t intend to kill him, but he started strangling Rachel. I didn’t really have a choice.”
“What would you have done with him?” He asked. He actually seemed interested now.
“You can’t tell your mother about this, John,” I said, “I promise I will tell her about it before the end of our trip, but I need to tell her in my own time.”
“Why shouldn’t I tell her?”
“I need to tell her at the right time, or this cruise is going to be hell,” I said, “If she wants to get away from me, it would be best if we were back in the United States, and not in the middle of the ocean or Central America.”
“I get it, you better promise to tell her.”
“I do, I swear.”
“Now, what would you have done with him?” John asked me.
“I wasn’t in charge of the operation,” I said, “Rachel and I were investigating why a girl was acting so strange around him. We barged into his office and caught him. I think Rachel was planning on castrating him, but I don’t know. We never really talked about what we planned to do.”
“You don’t regret killing him?”
“Good god, no,” I said, “He was a child molester. He ended kids’ lives and then forced them to keep living afterward. His death was a gift to the world. What would you do if somebody molested your sister?”
“You knew the girl he was molesting?”
“Not at all,” I said, “But what difference does it make? He was hurting an innocent girl.”
“What did she think of you?”
“In a newspaper story I read about it some time later, she called me and Rachel ‘Angels in overalls’, so I think she thought pretty highly of us.”
“Do you regret not marrying mom?”
“Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I did,” I said, “But regret is something I try to avoid. The truth is, John, I have led an incredible life so far. I’ve seen so much of this country, its beauty. I have done so many things. I have sailed the seas, chopped down trees, worked in all kinds of stores and restaurants, built so many things, helped so many people, corrected so many wrongs. I have dined in some of the finest restaurants, stayed in so many of the finest hotels, drank some of the finest wines ever bottled.
“I have loved so many wonderful women over the years. Your mom being one of the best. I have held so many wonderful children I fathered, you included. All of the ones I know of, they are doing so very well. You graduated valedictorian, John. My next youngest son is a farmer, and he is so content. He’s dating this lovely teacher from Gardener, she’s like four years older than him but such a sweetheart. If I regret walking out on your mom, does that mean that I regret having him?
“I regret not being more a part of your life, not visiting more often,” I continued, “but how can I regret all the choices I’ve made when a lot of those choices resulted in things that were wonderful? I have realized that many of the choices I have made, in isolation, were not the best choices I could have made. I want to clean up some of the mess. I want to have the chance to be involved enough in your life that you would be willing to bestow upon me the honor of calling me dad.”
He looked at me thoughtfully. “I’m glad we have had this conversation,” he said, “And I will let you tell mom you killed a priest in your own time.”
“Thank you,” I said.
He shook little Susan awake, and I went back to my cabin.
This was so complicated. My life was hard to explain to people. I was sorry for some of the choices I’ve made vis a vis how they hurt people I cared about. But I was not going to issue hollow apologies about how I lived my life.
I remembered a night at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco with Rachel. We had just finished a wonderful dinner, a glorious bottle of Chateau Latour. In this fantastic suite, looking out over the city, I held her in my arms, her shuddering as somehow we managed to pleasure each other at almost the same time. Her smile, her lop-sided crooked-toothed Cheshire grin, beaming afterwards.
“I figured out what dey mean by paradise, okay, or what? Its yous and me and our adventures togethuh. Yuh know what I’m sayin’?” Then she bent down and kissed me, and I was in heaven. God Rachel, I miss you.
If I had stayed with Jenny, that wouldn’t have happened. Rachel and I would never have gone beyond that fun little trip in Toronto. How can I regret meeting my soulmate?
We went as a group to the buffet. The spread was fantastic, bacon and eggs, fresh fruit, everything, fantastic fruit juices. What a breakfast. We took the tender to Half Moon Cay, which was kind of fun in itself.
Jenny was interested in horseback riding; so was John. I was too big, and Susan too young. I sent them off on there way, and played with Susan in the sand of the beach. Eventually John and Jenny came back and we had some fun in the sea and sand. The sea foam green waters and the bleached white sand beaches were beautiful.
We went on a quick hike through one of the shorter nature trails on the island. I wanted to take a boat ride, but Jenny had never really been boating before, so she was scared of Suzie being on the boat. We had lunch at the beach buffet BBQ with hot dogs, hamburgers, jerk chicken, shrimp, and other good food.
After lunch, we took a glass bottom boat tour, which Susan really enjoyed. Then Jenny and I sat and chatted at one of the bars while John took Susan to the kids play park. I was really amazed at how well they got along, given their age difference.
Finally, we got on the launch and went back to the ship. We needed to get changed for dinner; this was formal night, and black tie, while optional, was encouraged. The food was fantastic; I had lobster; Jenny had a steak. John had salmon and Susan had chicken fingers. I bought a bottle of wine, and Jenny let John have a glass. We talked about all the fun we had on the island, and then we went into a few life stories back and forth. They had cherries jubilee, prepared at table, for dessert.
After dinner, John offered to take Susan to some kids function, then hit the pool, and pick her up when it’s over, releasing us to have some talking time to ourselves. I was recognizing that I was not making huge progress getting to know John and Susan. But I think they were both more familiar with me, a bit more comfortable with me.
Jenny and I went back out to our balcony, and lounged on the chaises. The stars were really bright out, and it was quite beautiful. It reminded me of North Dakota ... or other times I was on the sea.
“Johnny,” Jenny asked, “Have you ever been out to sea before?”
“Many times,” I said, “I mean there was a cruise I took with my and Suzie’s family about a year before I ran away from home. But besides that the first time I went out to sea was in 1991. Rachel had gotten a job working on a Bangor-based fishing boat...”
I landed on the deck with Rachel on top of me. I wasn’t sure it was Rachel at first, because of the low light, but the fact that she tackle-hugged me as opposed to knocking me on the ground and beating me to pieces made who she was quite clear to me. I let my own arms wrap around her, and I kissed her.
“Ain’t yuh a sight fawh sawh eyes, or what?”
“You aren’t so bad yourself,” I replied, tearing a little.
We got up and she lead me into her cabin. It was a double berth cabin about the size of an Amtrak Bedroom. It was kind of dingy and dirty.
The boat was about 80 feet in length and was a pole-and-line fishing ship. Basically what the crew did during the day was, as the ship ran along, we fished with poles and were going after mainly tuna. They weren’t the kind of poles you use to catch bass. They were designed to catch giant bluefin tuna, an up to 1500 pound monster of a fish. The reason for using this method was minimizing bycatch.
They weren’t paying insane amounts of money for the work, but it included room and board for the entire week for four days worth of work. Rachel was convinced they would hire me to work with her. She had a hard time convincing the men running it to take a chance on her, but they decided to hire her on a lark.
As with many times before, the powerful muscles under that lanky, almost frail looking body took them for a loop, as she easily handled the mechanically assisted fishing poles, tossing several-hundred-pound tuna aboard with ease. I’m sure they wouldn’t worry about me, being a fairly muscular giant in most people’s opinions.
We laid together on the bottom bunk. The room had a door with a lock, so it was ok to be naked together. Rachel told me they were going out tomorrow, so I would need my rest. We snuggled together for a bit, though. It was a tight bunk. I climbed into the top bunk after a while and we went to sleep.
The next morning, Rachel woke me up and we got dressed and went into the ship’s galley. Rachel started making breakfast, and a few other men came in. One wore a skipper’s cap, and after breakfast, he told me to follow him to his office. The meal was a fairly basic bacon-and-eggs full American breakfast.
His “office” was a little desk in the back of the bridge. The crew consisted of him, four fishermen, two deck guys, a manager, and night watchmen. I would be one of the fishermen.
“Have ye ever done dis kind of work before?” He asked me, “I’m after people with experience.”
“No, sir,” I said, “But I am a quick learner, just like Rache.”
“I likes you, but I’m after hard work. Kids today dey bes lazy, b’y.”
“I like hard work,” I told the apparently Newfoundland-born skipper.
“Don’t be expecting to be havin’ a time,” he said, “But if you get on with me ducky, I’ll see how you get on, me son.”
“I told you, sir, I like working hard.”
“Call me skipper, b’y.”
“Yes, Skipper.”
“G’wan, b’y!”
I went back to the lounge and helped with cleaning up after breakfast. We set sail immediately, and after we got out into the open sea, Rachel showed me how to use the rod. I had wondered why the name of the boat was the Downeastern Newfie. Now I knew, though.
Once we got into the fish-heavy area, it was fast paced and hard work. The fish were huge. Even with the mechanically assisted rods, the fish were god’s own heavy. Sometimes I barely had my line back into the water before it seemed like I had bagged another one.
The proper action was to fling the fish onto the main deck. The deck workers would eventually knock it with a billy club and kill it, and then manhandle it into the tank. When the tank got full, we’d take a break while the skipper and deck boys emptied the tank into a holding freezer, with the help of a small crane. We’d get a moment to gulp down some coffee, and then it was back to work.
At the end of the first day, we had some kind of fish stew. It was ok. I was achey and tired. But I had worked the whole day through, which seemed to greatly impress the other fishermen. Rachel had told me that it paid $350 a week including room and board. It was a lot of work for that money, but it was four long days of work and then three full days off.
It was brutal, though. We stood on platforms off the side of her, wearing a harness to hold us on board. We manipulated the fishing pole manually until we caught something, then inserted it into the assistance device which helped with holding the pole in place while we reeled in the fish and then provided assistance levering the massive thing aboard. We needed that- once the fish was out of the water, it was almost impossible to handle.
We ran this operation underway. It was not warm out, and the water sprayed us constantly. We were wearing heavy pants and coats, and waterproof clothing on top of that. I felt drenched and dirty. My eyes were always in a constant squint; I was told goggles did not help, but I couldn’t imagine that to be true. I was used to hard work but this was hard even by my standards.
I was astonished how the crew of the Downeastern Newfie worked. There were four platforms for fishing, and four fisherpeople. Well, Rachel was the only woman. There were two people whose job was to handle the fish once they were tossed onto the deck; they usually managed to unhook themselves. Skipper ran the ship underway, there was a man who handled the below deck fish operations and managed the above deck operation, everyone called him “Bossman”. Finally there was a guy named Jerry, who slept for most of the day, and then piloted the ship during the evening hours.
His job was quite important. The chop could get quite severe for the small boat in the North Atlantic. He needed to make sure we were not running the water wrong, and to keep watch for other boats. We were not the only people out here, and sometimes other boats’ watchmen fell asleep.
When we first set out I was shocked that a boat could profitably operate with four fish hooks and a nine person crew. Then, of course, we started working and I was blown away by how many fish we caught and the ungodly size of these monsters. On average I caught about five fish an hour. So the boat caught twenty fish at an average catch weight of almost 250 pounds, or two tons an hour. At the end of the day we’d have fifteen to twenty tons of fish. The ship held fifty tons of cargo comfortably, hence the four day schedule.
Part of the underdeck operations was to cut off the head and fins of the fish, and then de-bone them, removing about thirty percent of the fish’s weight; the waste was tossed overboard. These were packed into gaylord style crates of about one ton each. The freezer held fifty such crates.
Apparently room and board included the almighty cheapest crappiest whiskey I’d ever tasted. The tradition after dinner was to sit around drinking until we were all falling down drunk. We’d all tell the world’s most increasingly absurd fish stories, and when we were sufficiently drunk to death, we’d all fall into bed. We’d wake up about an hour before sunrise, eat breakfast, and work until the light got too weak.
During work days Rachel and I had no energy for anything but sleep. It was really exciting work, though. The Newfie, as the crew called her, was always moving hard, and it felt good to keep fighting the sea to catch the fish. And fighting the monster fish. I had never before realized just how enormous tuna were. I had imagined them as being similar in size to fish we caught in rivers. They are absolutely terrifying. The largest fish I caught was almost six feet from mouth to tail and must have weighed 350 pounds. I caught a fish that was bigger than me!
The deck was always full of action. The huge fish thrashed around for a while before they became calm enough to get close to them and finish them off. It took two men just to push their slime-covered carcass into the holding tank.
Midway through the fourth day at sea, Bossman told us we had room for one more fish, and once it was caught a moment later, this run was over. We all helped packing up operations, and then the Newfie turned for shore. When we got in, just before dark, a couple of large trucks showed up, and the crates of fish were offloaded using the boat’s crane. We finished up around 10 PM.
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