The boatyard

I'm spending these mostly mild winter days living on a small sailboat docked in Virginia, accompanied by boy and dog. We are what's known as live-aboards. Here for just a few months, we glimpse a boatyard existence that parallels our own, if only for a moment. 


On this vessel, home is reduced to its absolute essence:  two long narrow bunks for storage and sitting, a cabin for sleeping, a tiny galley, a compact hand-pump operated toilet, an open-faced closet. One low stair and then a steep one lead back up to the unsheltered cockpit in the stern. 


In tying up to a boatyard dock, the freedom intrinsic in a wind and motor-powered existence  is diminished, and one grows accustomed to the amenities (showers, electricity, an internet signal) only offered at the boatyard.  Still, continuous fresh water and bathroom usage must be sought offboard, and everything within the living space must be constantly aired, cleaned and shuffled in the ongoing battle that pits marine-inclined human against the mold and mildew that adore a wooden boat. 


Let me make it clear from the very start, the boatyard where our sailboat is docked is nothing like a yacht club. A few fishermen come in to unload their catches in the late morning and late afternoon, and on the weekends, middle-aged couples wander about the yard, boat-gazing and taking snapshots of themselves by the water. But mostly, the life of the yard is that of the workmen. They haul out boats in the off-season, maintaining and restoring them. Their sanders, grinders and drills sound across the creek. It's a slow time of year for the yard, though, and more often than not it's the rhythmic creaking of the lines fastening our sailboat to the dock that punctuate my hours. 


There are several other boats with live-aboards here, scattered about the crooked, meandering piers. One guy goes mostly unseen, and I only know of his existence from the references people around here make to his boat. The deck is barren and the entrance, boarded up. He's suspected of inviting thieves into the yard, but no one is eager to track down and evict those already leading life way out in the margins. 


Dave, for one, thinks he should go. Dave lives on an old sportfisher with double rebel flags. "I'm gonna be a die-aboard," he announces with gruff, dark cheer, "'cause I ain't never gonna make it off that boat!" It's easier to make these proclamations at night, and this occasion was a rare gathering in the dusty parking area, with a bottle of Dominican rum making the rounds. 


Two boats away from our small vessel is a double-masted one, home to a staunchly forlorn couple. He, of the stiff, decrepit cowboy walk.  She, of the loose sweaters.  He edges by us in black like a Johnny Cash impersonator. She frowns briskly out of a Lucille Ball bouffant. When the tide's low, they leave their boat and head out to the grocery store. I am at my low tide vantage point. Through the portholes of my boat, they appear above me like an Atlantic City boardwalk mirage.


In the world of boats, extremes are not the exception, but the rule. I have spent time at the yacht club. In these winter months, the club members frequent the bar to drink scotch and soda backlit by the late afternoon glow off the marshes coming through expansive windows. After a couple drinks, club-goers indulge in a stroll around the docks, as the sky bruises and the light fades, they gaze fondly at their power boats.  


The day- to- day meanderings of those who populate the corners of working class boatyards are quite different. They bring the economic downturn back into focus as another Great American Depression.  They are the adventurous turned destitute: possibly foreclosed-upon, unwilling and unable to make rent, eyes wide open dreaming, embittered,  tobacco-stained,  quick to show the streak of shame gleaned from years of being poor, staunchly defiant, and hugely proud. For, the micro-world with its micro-climate of pure sanctity, of perfect refuge that a boat acquires when it becomes a home is truly an unadulterated source of pride.  
The live-aboards. As for me, I am proud to be counted among them.