They pushed the rowboat off the sand, into the water.
"Step in the middle or it will tip over," he warned.
"Ooh," I can't believe I'm going sailing. I've wanted to go all summer." The anticipation she felt showed in her voice as she pushed the boat away and stepped into it.
"Watch out for the boom. You don't want to hit your head."
"What kind of boat is this?"
"It's an antique wooden boat."
"Does it have a name?"
"It's a Muskungus Bay Sloop. Sloop, meaning it has two sails, one 20-foot and see the little 16-foot in front?"
"OK, it has a twenty foot sail...wait till I tell them at the office," Debbie said.
"Don't tell them that. Tell them it's a 26-foot boat."
"Mus-ke-gus," she said.
"Muskungus. Like fungus," Rick said.
"Mus-kung-gus. Muskungus Bay Sloop. Wait till I tell them at work!" she crowed.
"Twenty foot sail."
"Tell them it's gaff-rigged." Rick instructed her.
"What's that?"
"See how the sails are crooked, like a square? It doesn't come to a point like other sails. That's why everyone's waving at us." Rick said.
Like a mini pirate ship, Debbie thought. She looked up at the ropes, the wooden boom, the square sails. She wondered how it looked, sailing across the waters as if on its own stormy seas of another century.
It had not been a talkative hour as they tugged the ropes, steered the antique sailboat, letting the ropes out and tugging them in again, ducking the boom as it swayed from side to side. They had the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, the apples and fig cookies that his mother had packed for them, and of course, the hard-boiled eggs.
"Have you ever heard of the Race?" Debbie naively asked.
"Yeah. We're going there," Rick said.
The Race they referred to was the race of water that rushed into Long Island Sound at a given time and then at another interval, rushed back into the Atlantic Ocean from the Sound. The Sound in this way was flushed once or twice daily, Debbie could not remember exactly from her college Oceanology class.
"It can be the worst place of the face of the Earth. You'll have to pour buckets of water out of the boat," Rick smiled.
"Do we have to go there?" Debbie asked faintly.
"You didn't realize you were going with Elizabeth's crazy friend. He seemed normal enough," Rick joked.
They passed Fisher's Island. Debbie wished they could stay right here and turn back. But there was no arguing with the seaworthy challenger, Rick Homesly. This she knew, so she kept quiet, hoping he would change his mind.
"Wait till you tell Elizabeth I took you to the Race. She's always begging me to take her there."
Maybe the Race wouldn't be so bad.
They neared Race Rock. The foghorn on the lighthouse echoed deeply. They sailed on sunny calm waters.
"See it boiling over there? That's the Race. It's not too bad today." They headed right for it.
Debbie closed her eyes. The foghorn moaned, in her ears. It echoed deeply as they passed it.
"Wow," Debbie giggled. "I always heard it from far away. Now it's blasting my ears. FOOM! Not foom," she echoed.
The Race was calm today and so were the waters as they sailed slowly back to the mainland. Debbie rested on the deck for a while as Rick steered. There was nothing to say, this hot lazy afternoon. Rick told her she had even fallen asleep, just for a minute.
As they glided back to shore in the sunset, an ominous noise echoed from the shore.
"Its the end of the world. Who cares?" Debbie giggled. She was on a boat.
She watched sadly as Rick pulled the ropes down with the sails their pirate ship.
"Bye, Muskungus," she said.
SUMMER 1989
DOC. 0711D
SAILING
Denise Hickey
(Note: The curiosity about the kind of boat? In Spring 1987, I worked a brief stint at the Hartford Courant, Classified Advertising, as a Telemarketing Sales Rep, taking incoming calls. This was in the interim from college graduation, ECSU and booking for NYC in May 1987. Callers often listed their cars and boats for sale.)
