Dulcie in the Rain

Rain on the windshield. There’s a distance to dash from the car to the boat, not to mention the cable to plug in, the locks to unlatch, the boards to slide away. Oh well. If I wanted to stay dry, maybe I should have picked a different life.

I book it to the boat, rain pattering down all around, soft on the water. It’s a cool evening, dark and misty. I get there, and my little sloop, Dulcie, is askew. She’s been on her own for a few weeks, nothing like the regular four month stints I’m away. But there’s ceramic shards all over the cockpit, a broken line dangling in the water. Sigh. What have you been up to, boat? It’s only November, and we live in California. The storms shouldn’t have been that bad. I guess it wasn’t a great few weeks for you either.

I hunker down, tighten the remaining lines. It’s wet and cold, but I’m not going to bang against the dock all night. Inside the boat, more surprises wait. Mold on the throw pillows, water on the rug. Oh, the romance of the sea!

I put them aside, blast the heater, turn on some jazz. No one ever said living your dreams was easy, but it’s times like this that I wonder if maybe I make it hard on purpose.