Another Round

So I've been shopping for a new pontoon boat lately.

First of all, I need to know something. WHERE IS EVERYONE GETTING ALL THIS MONEY???? Good lord, these boats are RIDICULOUSLY expensive! Who sets these prices? Somebody's gettin' rich and it ain't me! Point me in the direction of the

scratch-n-dent corner please.

I mean I'm merely trying to replace the existing family pontoon boat with a reasonably priced unit that is big enough and powerful enough to hold a group of people without sinking or capsizing. Also must be in reasonably good condition. I just want a fair deal on a good boat. Is this too much to ask? Am I seeking the impossible?

I know it's not too much to ask. But I might truly be seeking the impossible.

I do know that whatever I end up getting certainly won't replace our Eve. Allow me to introduce you to Eve.

Remember I wrote about Pegnolia's Special Friend who recently passed away? Well, during the 20+ years they were together, he had a pontoon boat and kept it in a slip in the boathouse at our family lake house. I say house loosely because it's really a mobile home. Now before you roll your eyes and snicker, let me clarify that it's a double-wide, not a single-wide mobile home, and we've tricked it out somewhat, so I consider it an upscale double-wide if that can be a thing. Let's just say that it can. You should see the garden tub in that master bathroom. Fan-ceee. I'll talk a lot about the family lake house in later entries. Maybe I'll post pictures of the double-wide if y'all promise to approach it with an open mind.

My happy place. My heart and soul. My jam.

So, back when Pegnolia's Special Friend was in the picture he would let us use his pontoon boat whenever we wanted to mostly. He got a free place to store his boat in exchange for letting us use it. It was an arrangement that worked just fine and we all enjoyed it. It was a good deal. But then the unthinkable happened. He up and left poor Pegnolia one day. It was swift and final just like the recent severing of my relationship. (ugh - still not over it.) Special Friend left and took his boat with him. And we were without.

We may have spent a summer or two after that having to bounce around the lake in Pegnolia's ancient 1984 ski boat. Actually, we still are spending summers bouncing around the lake in Pegnolia's ancient 1984 ski boat. It is NOT a good look. Oh, I suppose it gets us from point A to point B. It's reliable - cranks right up every time. Boat owners, you can appreciate that, right? But I swear it beats you to death! Any little wave makes your brain rattle inside your skull. I'm not lying. The upside is the lake police mostly leave us alone because people who drive the kind of boat we do are certainly not up to any foolishness. We don't attract the looks from the hipsters either. Well, we may get looks but they're not the good kind. We do get laughs.

Anyway, after a summer or two of rattling and bouncing, my sister and I decided we needed to buy a pontoon boat to replace the one Pegnolia's Special Friend so abruptly removed when he left us. A friend of mine had one for sale and we wanted to look at it. I'll never forget when we went to test drive it. My sister and I had our little money all ready, and we went to the marina where it was being stored. Took it out and cruised around for a minute and declared we had a deal. Never mind that it was over 20 years old. We had us a BOAT, y'all!!! WooHoo!!! First boat I ever bought. I had grabbed a bottle of champagne that had been buried in the ice machine for quite a while so we could "christen" our new water craft on her maiden voyage. It probably wasn't even real champagne but it would do.

We stopped in the middle of the lake, popped the cork, poured it up, and snapped a selfie. We were afraid to smash the bottle on the boat like is tradition because we didn't want to risk chipping off any more of the fiberglass. I guess you could say it was a little more than "gently used". As we toasted and then partook in the first sip of the bubbly, we realized it was probably as old as the boat. It tasted like rancid vinegar and was the actual color of rancid vinegar too. We got so tickled at ourselves!

Two old ladies just hanging around in the middle of the lake. Drinking rancid fake champagne on a 20-year-old new boat.

Sigh.

The scenario wasn't exactly as glamorous as I had envisioned, but that was okay because we had us a boat.

We named her Cool of the Evenin'. That's what my grandparents, D and Pappy, used to call their cocktails. An adult beverage was called a Cool of the Evenin'. Cool for short. I vividly remember when it got to be 5 o'clock on the dot, my Pappy would look at D and ask her if she was ready for a cool. I'm gonna talk about D and Pappy another time. And I'm gonna talk about our family's place on the lake another time too. Both very important subjects and part of what makes me who I am today.

Though our boat's formal name was Cool of the Evenin', we nicknamed her Eve. Our favorite activity was to take her out for sunset cruises at the end of the day - in the cool of the evening. Eve became part of the family. She brought us joy and she made us crazy. She was moody but could be really fun to be around. We really couldn't trust her. She brought me more life. She brought all of us more life and we loved her.

Sadly, Eve died last fall.

Girlfriend dropped dead right in the middle of the lake. We had to drag her back home. So undignified for her.

She had been showing signs of decline and we tried to fix her but nobody could really diagnose her illness. I wish I could have done more to bring her more life like she brought me. I tried.

Eve is currently hanging up in our boat house where Pegnolia's Special Friend kept his boat until he didn't keep it there anymore.

She just hangs there. Rode hard and put up wet, bless her heart. She had a good run.

Next to ol' Eve hangs Pegnolia's ancient ski boat from 1984 who is still bouncing and rattling brains. Both collecting spider webs, dirt dobber nests, goose poop, and whatever else lurks in boathouses. One resting up for another season and the other just resting. Two old ladies just hanging around in the middle of the boathouse.

Enjoying the cool of their evenin'.

Somebody bring me another round.

Mama Tries

A boat is the hardest thing I know of to put into perspective. It is so much like a human figure, there is something alive about it. - Barry S Strauss