Day One, Monday – Leave Taking - KDM to Paris Landing

I’ve been lucky enough in my life to have spent extended time in many different places around the world most of which I cannot even remember how to pronounce.  I have come to the realization that all places have their geographic charms even the harshest of terrains.  The Rub’a‘khali desert in Saudi Arabia (also known as the Empty Quarter) boasted magnificent mountains of bleached sand and an unrelenting but glowing sun.  Southeast Asia’s vibrant green delta vista wrapped itself around one’s horizons until even the sky took on hues of green.  The barren rocks protruding from patches of snow and ice in Point Barrow, Alaska reminded me of monstrous grains of salt and pepper spilled willy-nilly across a table top.  I have left them all and had neither regrets nor hesitation.  Leaving a place is never difficult for me.  No, leaving a place is not the problem. The real problem is leaving people.  It is this aspect of leave-taking that causes one’s eyes to mist over while a sharp twinge grips the psyche.  I would like to think that it is mutual, this pain of separation.  I know it always affects me and it certainly did so when the Mike and Melanie Dillard left a year ago last October.  I still miss Mike’s warped sense of humor and horrendous jokes.  It serves to remind me that it IS a shared pain between the leave-er and the leave-ee.  A couple of years ago I left Marina del Rey in Los Angeles after having moored the AURORA there for over 25 years.  The morning I was scheduled to take the boat to the yard to be hauled and loaded onto a trailer, this note had mysteriously appeared taped to my salon window overnight so that I would see it first thing when I got up to make my morning cappuccino. 

Some take it harder than others...

         

The note writer, a woman with whom I have had many a contentious political and religious argument, was expressing her opinion regarding my leave taking.  Strangely enough, I had long assumed she would be the one most pleased to see me gone and thus, an end to my constant challenging of her philosophical positions.

 Leaving Kentucky Dam Marina would be no different.  I joke about the culture shock suffered after the move from LA to Kentucky but one constant stood out.  The folks we met in KY were kind, gracious, and eager to welcome us to their corner of the world, the boats around Slip 327.  In my experience, boaters have a sixth sense about befriending strangers.  The connection is made quickly or not at all.  Possibly the transient nature of our boating lives forces us to make rapid decisions because tomorrow they may have moved on.  And today, AURORA is moving on.

How does one grasp the importance and the relevance of certain people in our lives?  How does one value the expertise of a Big Jim Simpson and his son Cody who never were at a loss to explain or help whenever I was stumped?  My only payment to them?  Supplying them with chuckles and outright laughter as they watched my bumbling mechanical efforts.  Or Parvin, a retired engineer who not only schooled me about river travel, but invited us into his home to watch Wisconsin beat Kentucky in the NCAA semi-finals, ruining their perfect basketball season.  He was worried about us going to a bar and getting mugged with our red jerseys amidst a sea of Kentucky blue.  His wife, Darlene, graciously introduced us to the vibrant local crafts market. My immediate boat neighbor, Mel who greeted us with smiles every time we came to the boat, taught Kristine how to fish and when she unknowingly broke a bone in her foot, was the expert who diagnosed it and gave her a protective boot until she got back to MKE and her doctors.  And of course, Gus, our dock curmudgeon, who roamed up and down the pier on his three –wheeled electric cart.  Gus’s demeanor screamed cynic but his sharp wit and sly smile belied that harsh exterior.  

Me and Gus, Pier 3 curmudgeons 

Friends all, and it was they who would force that unwelcome twinge as the AURORA slid out of Slip 327 for the last time in Kentucky Dam Marina.  True to his generous heart, Gus got up from his cart and waved to us as we glided out of his milieu and into our new adventure.  Mel on the other hand later professed to having overslept.  I took that as BS since his comment to me when I told him of my moving-on plans was a quite succinct, "Traitor!" Mel does not like good byes.

Good Bye Gus & KDM from Roger Kay on Vimeo.

We crossed Kentucky Lake to the Tennessee River main channel and pointed AURORA south.  As a reminder that nothing is ever perfect, in spite of a month in the boatyard correcting long overdue maintenance issues the past summer, my tachometer refused to register engine RPMs and I was sure it was AURORA smugly laughing and saying, “Take that, Mr. Ready to Cruise.”   Our first planned stop was Paris Landing a short 43 miles up river (the Tennessee flows north into the Ohio river, so we were moving south but UP river) .  Along the way we caught up to and slowly (very slowly) passed two sailboats, Glass Slipper and Vela Narcosis with whom my personal theory of making friends quickly would again prove prophetic.