The poor kid never even had a chance

July 2006

By Tom Snyder

I have a true story that I probably shouldn’t tell you. Oh, don’t you love saying that to someone? It’s irresistible. Anyone you say that to will then tell you that they are very good at keeping secrets. Even women will say, “Your secret is safe with me.” I’m not kidding!

If I do tell you this story, I want to do whatever it takes to protect the anonymity of the young man about whom I should not be telling you. What I ask of you is to promise me you will not let whatever I say leave this room. We don’t want to get anyone in trouble.

Allow me set this story up (in the manner of the Jewish Philosophers) with a question: Why the hell do I choose every damn year to do all of my Maine cruising in the month of June? Why should I be all alone in very cold, wet, windy harbors, and then have to warm myself with enormous amounts of propane and red wine? And then the Coast Guard comes out to check on my anchored pleasure boat because it’s the only one for miles.

Oh, and there it is! That’s the story I shouldn’t tell — about this young man who comes screaming into my cove in a 20-foot Coast Guard inflatable. The fellow, one foot upon the inflatable prow, posed in his seriously intimidating outfit that took its stylistic marching orders from the Jodhpurs worn by police from the scarier wealthy suburbs. He was frowning. Behind him was another recruit steering at the center console. Behind him were two 250-horsepower Honda outboards. That’s 500 horsepower on a 20-foot inflatable. My friends from 1962 would have thought this was a physical impossibility.

At this point, I was standing under my bimini with a glass of wine in hand, quite intrigued with a question that may not fascinate the reader: Is it legal for one to be significantly inebriated in one’s own anchored boat? I still don’t know the answer, but I did experience the dreaded cop-in-the-rearview-mirror rush. I quickly practiced a few simple sentences to see if consonants were going to pose a problem.

The young man at the prow told his helmsman to pull along side. He asked me what were my reasons for being in these waters. I tried to say something charming about a solo coastal cruise. It came out like the shrill and defensive babbling of an insane person. My consonants were stacking up at the ends of phrases. The young man announced that he would be boarding my boat for a look around.

In an instant I managed to convince myself that I did not have a single official document aboard. I imagined that all of my fire extinguishers were out of date, that my flares were soggy, and that my bed was unmade. It became imperative that he neither join me on my boat nor get close enough to smell my breath.

I have read that people with prodigious survival instincts can assess their novel situation quickly and then improvise fluidly. In this respect I was lucky because of the quantity of fluid at my disposal. With only seconds to restructure the situation, I developed a strategy where I would use his youth to my advantage.

I proudly pointed out to him the interesting fact that we both had Honda outboards. Mine, on the dinghy, was a 2-horsepower engine. He assessed my Honda and let me know in no uncertain terms that his Hondas were orders of magnitude larger than mine. I was flooded with a sense of relief, for the battle was won. It was all over as long as I played a good, solid game.

Next, I used understatement. I posited aloud that his inflatable could probably move at speeds in excess of 20 knots. He was almost undone by this miscalculation and rushed to assure me that I was way off the mark. I suggested that he was clearly exaggerating and that, at any rate, he would need a lot of space to get her up to speed.

He walked aft and whispered something to his helmsman. His next comment to me was just too sweet. An unnecessary splash of victory. He said that I might want to get my camera ready and to set it to a very fast exposure. I did so.

Soon the inflatable was screaming in tight circles around my boat, leaning at an impossible angle. I would not be surprised to learn that he hit 50 knots. Anyway, he had reached a sort of physical and emotional escape velocity. There was nothing left but for him to describe a tangent and become a tiny spot on the horizon.

It was never a fair fight. Here was a 20-year-old with vast amounts of horsepower up against an older guy who could still remember what that feels like. My heart went out to him. I pictured him waking up at 2 a.m. next to his young wife, shaking her awake, and saying, “Honey, I may have made a little mistake today.”

Tom Snyder sails Blue Moon out of Peaks Island, Maine.