First-world problems and a bumblebee

I’ve always liked bumblebees, but that Sunday morning my mind was elsewhere when I spied one on deck, upside down and caught under the jib sheet. I wasn’t in a compassionate mood, as my broken engine diagnostic process was reaching the end of the line and yielding nothing. My departure date for my treasured trip to Maine was fast approaching. Since way back at the end of last season, I’d followed the logical trail to find the problem with my engine and arrived nowhere. Problem: loss of power at 2,000 rpm and above, accompanied by a sound not unlike a person being choked to death. So I replaced both fuel filters, replaced the air cleaner, replaced the exhaust elbow, adjusted valve clearance, put in clean fuel, blew out the fuel pick-up tube, and finally, asked the advice of several mechanics. “It’s the injectors . . . . It’s the injectors . . . . It’s the injectors,” they said.

“You seem obsessed and a bit depressed,” my wife said one Saturday night. “Maybe the injectors really are the problem.”

That Sunday morning I rowed out with my completely rebuilt injectors and installed them. But before I started the engine, I had a little heart-to-heart (valve-to-valve?) talk to 2QM, my old Yanmar diesel. I knelt on a cushion in a praying posture before the silent block of steel.

“QM,” I said, “You and I have been together a long time, and you’ve never let me down. Well, rarely. I know there was that one time with your transmission. But that was really my fault. Anyway, I think I’ve cared for you as best I could over the years. So what’s the deal? Are you telling me you’re just exhausted and old? Well, me too. But we’ve both got a few quarts of oil left in us, so what do you say?”

I pushed the button. QM roared to life, though I expected that much. I had to put QM under load to see if the problem was eliminated, so I cast off, put it in gear and, looking ahead but mostly to heaven, I advanced the throttle. Same problem. The strangler was still on the loose. I limped back, put things away, and started to climb into the dinghy to head for shore.

About now you’re probably wondering about the bumblebee.

That’s when I noticed him again. He was still upside down, wiggling, and stuck under the jib sheet. “Good luck, dude,” I said as I climbed over the lifelines into the dinghy. I was in no mood to help him. Oh, I might have jumped to his assistance if at that time I’d known more about bumblebees: that they use a combination of color and spatial relationships to learn from which flowers to forage; that around one third of human food requires bee pollination; that in Native American symbolism the bumblebee represents honesty, pure thinking, willingness and drive. But I grabbed the toe rail by him with plans to leave. I did glance at him, though; it seemed as if the little guy was looking at me. I flashed on a book on compassion that I’d been reading, how science was proving that compassionate people were happier people. So I reached out and flicked the bumblebee out from his trapped position under the jib sheet. He stuck like glue to my finger as I did so; my immediate reaction was to shake him off. He shot up in the air and landed in the water behind me. I shook my head, pushed off, and started rowing for the dock, looking back at him. He was upside down again, trying to turn over, but his little wings weren’t up to the task. A few strokes later I stopped. “You know, you’re not much of a human,” I thought to myself. “You’ve got a first-world problem, Dave. Your yacht’s motor won’t run right. Poor Dave. But this guy’s DROWNING. And you’re rowing away.”

So I turned around, scooped up the bumblebee with the blade of my oar, and slid him off onto the cushion on the stern seat. As I rowed to shore I watched him shake himself, dry in the sun and then use his wings to finally turn himself over. I rowed another 50 yards, watching him watch me as he continued to dry off on the cushion.

And then he flew off, headed to shore.

But not before turning back my way, coming down low over my head, so close I could hear that buzz. Or was it a buzz? To me it sounded like a wise directive: “Check the compression,” was the buzz I heard.

We’ll see.

Dave Roper’s new novel, “Rounding the Bend: The Life and Times of Big Red,”is available from Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.