"Part 32 Sunk" (all parts in order as written)

Chapter; Sunk 

As part of my plan to take back my time from Julie’s increasing demands, I returned to working for Bob. Being that Bob was a Gossipmonger; he could never resist a chance to capitalize on my trade skills. The fun part for him was that he got something new to talk about, AND my carpentry efforts that he called, “Amish Craftsmanship”. My ulterior motives were to put it in his face that I was in a two hundred fifty thousand dollar home, and that I was on my way to getting hands on the situation with my children, since he always deflected me as a bum and a piss-poor father.

Julie had made another impulse purchase, trying to keep me in her snare with another boat. This time it was a fourteen-foot Glastron with an eighty-five horsepower Yamaha outboard. It was a beautiful craft, metallic green and very fast. One morning, Bob volunteered to pick me up, jumping out of his red Savannah, rushing to the north side of my garage to urinate in the bushes, where most of the neighbors could have seen him if they were looking out their windows. I sensed something was wrong since he could have used the utility bathroom that was through the garage door to the house- a mere twelve steps away. Truth was Bob’s bladder and his conscience were both full. He had been up early, coming by before sun-up, and had been in the area drinking coffee while killing the extra time and concealing his deviance, which entailed using his Panasonic cordless drill and an eighth inch bit to put a hole in the bottom of my boat, just to the rear of the Captain’s seat. He immediately picked the drill up from the floor near his seat to show me his new purchase, bragging about the technology, while trying to compensate for his guilt with nervous chatter. The green material from the plastic and fiberglass was clinging to the fuselage with static electricity. It hadn’t dawned on me what it was that he had done.

 A day or two earlier I had mentioned that we were going to launch the boat in the Grand River. Our plans were to take it out, maybe to Grand Haven, and open her up, launching it off of Leonard, near Coopersville. We launched around noon on Saturday when the sun was high, and planning on drinking. The cooler was full of provisions, and we had fishing poles as well. If I was thinking about it, I would have known that it wasn’t good to be out drinking on the water when the sun’s high. Before long the heat adds up with the alcohol, taking a toll but I wasn’t able to get out of the trance I was in with the boat- just as Julie had hoped. We spent the day drinking in the sun and fishing, and everything seemed fine- except for the fact that we had Sandy with us.

As always with Sandy, screaming and fighting ensued, which really carries a long distance on the water. She worked subtly, at first, pushing my buttons in efforts to break up what I was working on. Things escalated when we got hung up in the mud, unable to get the motor up, so that we could free ourselves. Then she took the keys out of the boat, making me enraged. That’s when I blacked out.

Julie loved to spend her mother’s trust fund, and having me doing all of the work was a good opportunity to make it look like I was being rewarded. She took me to a couple concerts, one was Bob Dylan, and another was Leon Russell. Leon Russell was held at the new Intersection nightclub, located on the Westside of town, near the new Grand Rapids Area Transit Authority. On the main viewer/dance floor, to the right side, I glimpsed Sandy. She was wearing her bibbed overalls and had her hair braided- her signature style.

After warning Julie, her suggestion was to get the situation under control by meeting and greeting with her, so we didn’t have to spend the evening trying not to be noticed. My tiny and diversely distracted mind wasn’t capable of seeing that her motive may have been to get Sandy and I back together, so she could have a reason to kick me out in a way that would make me actually leave, eliminating the perspective of my observations. Maybe I understood what she was doing, and why she was doing it but she had no clue what I was truly interested in, which was building what looked like a family in order to re-stake my claim in my children’s lives. There was no way in hell I was going to walk back into a reality with Sandy, and as long as I had my leverage- taking care of Jean, in addition to holding the beans on Julie, like her so-called family, and drug use, there was no way she could get rid of me. She would have to come up with a better plan, which she eventually did.

In the meantime, on the river, we were trying to enjoy the weekend. The boat tilted to one side for a small stretch, which should have been an understanding that the boat was telling me we were in shallow water or sliding over a log. I had no idea we were taking on water at this point, making us sit lower in the water. We were dragging in the muddy bottom, even though the boat had a short-shafted motor. We had decided to get out of the sun, and that we were in a bit of trouble due to our drinking and inexperience but as we made way for the shore we found that we were stuck in the mud with the motor. The power had cut out because the battery became immersed in water. We had no idea that our inability to deal with the problems with the boat were from the water- or the alcohol. We had been trying to paddle to shore but weren’t getting nearer. Everyone became angry. We could not get the motor to pull up from the weight of the mud. Not one of us thought to get out of the boat to push the motor up. The women were not helping in any way, inebriated and bickering with me, while I struggled with the boat motor. Something snapped. In between all of the useless paddling, yelling, sun, heat, and drinking, I became very angry about the situation. Julie got smart and bailed out of the boat. The water was only less than three feet deep. She took the keys with her for fear that I would leave them there- a sort of mutiny for mutiny, I guess. Sandy had seized control of the alcohol, since it was of greater interest to her than trying to help with the boat. The whole thing was a fiasco, out on the water for everyone to hear, which at the moment was a group of young people around a campfire it the yard where we were trying to get out. All of my anger and frustration from several years of wasted effort with all the wrong people just blew right out of me like a volcano. There was a storm of negative energy between the three of us. How foolish of me to think I could drink with them. It only set the whole thing up for inevitable failure and misery. That’s the point when I blacked out.

By the time I regained consciousness it was dark. The evening sky gave me the idea it was around ten. A fire pit was blazing with a few kids sitting around it who were drinking. They were mimicking my tirade from earlier. Ignoring their comments, I began to search for the women, being told that Julie was sleeping on their porch, and that Sandy had wandered off to the store down the street. For some reason, I cared about her getting left behind, so I went to try to catch up to her. She had a habit of just stomping off, and my sense of guilt, feeling bad about the whole experience, I couldn’t leave her stranded, having to walk all the way back to Grand Rapids. All I thought about was how my decision to drink that day could have changed the whole outcome. Out of all the mistakes and bad situations that I had to deal with, the drinking was the only one that I couldn’t handle coping with. Up until then I had some control in the events and their outcome. Looking back now, I can’t believe I allowed myself to be so easily mislead in life.

 Memory of Danimal asking Julie why she hadn’t chosen to put a move on him just came to mind. She told him he was too smart. That’s what I get for letting money knock me off of my square. Julie had mentioned how guys were just after her for her money, and I jumped right on the bait. Well, with all of the drama and difficulty, and whatever else I can’t think of that starts with D, my torture was far from over. And as long as there was booze around, I could take it. It’s like the antigens a parasite uses, so that you don’t know it’s there, sucking the life out of you- like weed killer, only it’s used on society. How disgusting.  

When I arrived at the store, the clerk said she had just been there minutes ago. I walked the only way I could go there, and never saw her. She had ducked behind a tree when I was walking down the road to find her. When I got back to the fire pit, there she sat smiling with a triumphant innocence about her.

Early that morning, after I pulled the motor out of the mud, we piled back in and made way for the launch site. The boat had taken on a large amount of water. It wasn’t until I got it on the trailer that I saw it coming out of a small hole in the bottom. Had it not been for getting hung up in the mud, it may have sunk completely, especially since we were too busy fighting amongst ourselves to notice that we were taking on water or that we were a spectacle for seemingly innocent bystanders. How embarrassing. Thank God my name wasn’t on the side of the boat!

I just knew Bob was responsible for the hole in the boat; it fit’s his M.O.  He had told me about some of the dastardly things he does with his idle time, while his wife is at work as an x-ray technician in Grand Haven, harassing paroled CSC people by vandalizing their property. He scratches up their vehicles, slices tire, steals their mail, and who knows what else. It’s one of his favorite past-times to look up the sex-offenders list daily to see who is nearby to mess with. His exploits were impossible for him not to share with me, and provided him with something to talk about while we were driving to job sites. It was just a matter of time before I was again subjected to his little games he played. If it were not for the money I would never have kept re-opening the door I closed on him so many times before.

The incident with the boat was convenient, only in a single way. It got rid of Sandy. Had it not been for Julie having pot, she would have never been at the house with us, or so I think. Then again, if it hadn’t been for my drinking, I would never have been involved with Julie’s affairs or been so successful in failing to recognize my own self-worth.

Chapter

Our house backed up to the White Pine Trail. Originally a train route, it and others were part of an initiative to fight obesity and improve land value, driving up property taxes and home appraisals. And to use up some funds allocated for parks and recreation in order to remain eligible for yearly allocations of tax dollars, which means job security, basically. The trails were promoted as an instrumental leisure option, and as an alternative means of travel. The battle now, was getting people to set down their remotes long enough to get them outside for anything other than running to the mailbox or driving to the liquor store. Maybe that’s a bit cynical but it’s closer to the truth than anyone’s willing to take a moment to see.

It wasn’t long before I utilized it for everything I could: hiking, biking, walking the dog, going fishing, and as an express route to the Belmont Grocery store, which happened to be right next door to the Post office, where I had my P.O. box. I could sit in the hot tub, day or night, and see beautiful people enjoying the wonders of nature around, and in, my backyard.

In my nakedness, and smiling face, I waved from the bubbling jets while they strutted, jogged, and pedaled by saluting with smiles and sweat in the summer sun. This was my own little moment of paradise, somewhat of a consolation prize or a break from the madness and chaos that Julie, admittedly, loved so well. 

The money was a constant seductress but it was my earnestness in providing care to Jean, and faith that I was contributing something good to another seriously dysfunctional situation, that kept me going on.

To the south was a creek, a trickling flow that looked like it might have a trout in it or might have had, not so long ago. Tracing it up into the hills, away from the river, a small waterfall spoke it’s story in a sense of humor that’s only dry for a moment in August. It was in the backyard of what once was a farm, the house still being lived in. There was a small bridge big enough for a small garden tractor or for a couple to walk hand in hand.

After explaining the find to my mother, and that I now had a fenced in yard, I convinced her into bringing or letting me take, Dusty. Mom had a whole hatful of reasons why it wouldn’t work, chiefly, the reason being the Vet bills due to some kind of bladder infection that caused her to have a leaking problem, and her hip dysplasia. It was a long tug of war but Dusty was returned to me.

Since I had been given the dog by her when she was just weeks old, I felt Dusty truly belonged to me. She was my baby, and I was her dad. When I did get to see her, she could never get close enough. She was like a Spirit trying to climb into my soul. Dusty was now thirteen years old, one and one half years less than Cody, my only son. At this point, half of their lives were not shared with me. There were only pains in place of memories.

Dusty did have a leaking problem, and my hands were a bit full with that but I realized why. My mother had her own reasons for her understanding, so she was only giving Dusty half of the dose that the Vet prescribed. Since the medication was an antibiotic, it was now useless because the low dose had made her become totally immune to it. The meds are a bit expensive. My mom was only trying to use as little as possible in case of another problem when she may have needed the antibiotic because Vet care is expensive but the plan backfired because now she needed to be seen again, since the infection persisted, if not worsened. Finally, I broke down and took her to a Vet when I realized the problem just wasn’t going away, which did heal but now I had to replace the carpeting in the room she routinely laid in.

The pads that I had bought for her were inexpensive but the issue was putting them under her where she slept, which only helped a little because she would move around to a place that wasn’t wet when I was asleep. The trick was getting them under her without hurting her because of her hips.