Chapter 2

I arrived at my brothers place in Tacoma a couple of days later. I had to get some serious sleep, after that marathon drive from Billings. I went north up the coast highway and, eventually, I found a shady spot under some trees and pulled over and took a walk on the beach and then another nap for a few hours. Later that day, I kept going and got to Cape Flattery, I had been there once with my brother and our families. We had taken a weekend trip from his place in Tacoma to the Cape to spend some time camping and let the kids get to know each other.

I sat on a bench looking out over the blue Pacific Ocean as the waves crashed against the break water. Time is no friend of our family. My brother Jim's wife and kids were gone, moved out to live with her new lover a Doctor she met as she worked as a ER surgery nurse at Tacoma General Hospital. He came home from work one day to find out that they had up and move lock stock and barrel and not told him where they went. It took him several months and $1000's of dollars to find out only to receive a ration of shit about how he was an inadequate person and that her new boy friend filled all the right holes in her life. She and Dr boy friend had moved to some where in Montana up close to the Canadian border.

Here I sit with no family either any more. What a pair we are going to be. Our other brother who lives in Auburn has been single for the last 5 years after his less than sterling marriage went up in flames only a few months after he got out of the Navy. Seems his wife thought she had hooked a big one with her big tits, when she married a Naval Aviator in Coronado California. Problem was, she bet on the wrong horse. We were all raised to have the same mid west rural values. None of us were go getter business men, all we ever wanted was a family and friends and a calm life, after Viet Nam, we all wanted to just drop out of sight and live our lives quietly. That was not good enough for his wife. She wanted glitz and money and position and power that comes with a big job and bigger bucks. He wanted to work with people and plants, so he opened a Greenhouse and Nursery growing native and exotic plants and flowers. He was successful, just not to the level she wanted. I trucked on to Port Townsend and found a place to hold up for the night.

In the morning, I went in search for a friend from my Marine Corps days. He had gotten out after Viet Nam and come home to Port Townsend. I found him working on his beautiful wood 36' schooner. He had been living on his boat for the past dozen years or so. I hadn't seen him since the last time I was this way with my family and my brother. I hadn't called him, I had just taken a chance, that I might catch him home. I showed up at his boat with coffee and donuts.

"Hey you old Barnacle are you ever going to quit working on that darn boat? I said to his back as he swabbed the deck."

"Mikey me boy, don't you be dis respecting my lady here, it takes a mite -o- work to keep her beautiful." He growled at me. It was like we saw each other every day for coffee, he hopped over the side on to the dock and gave me a bear hug and grabbed one of the coffees and a couple of donuts and led me on board and down into the beautiful honeyed salon below decks. Everywhere you looked all you could see was polished brass and loving varnished wood. We settled our selves into the same seats that we had used the last time I had been there. We seemed to be in comfortable conversation with no hesitation. Ernie was the kind of guy who is always welcoming with a kind word or a soft touch if you needed anything. He was always willing to give the shirt off his back for a friend. As I told him my tale of woe. "Yep, I tried having me one of those full time women don't ya know. I thought those big old titties and wide hips would be a comfort in me old age. Problem was, she wanted me to sell Clair here, me girl. She wanted to get a real house on land an all. I just couldn'a abide it. So I bid her a fond ado. Only real problems is she took me cat Jarvis with her. He just loved to lay on her plump lap and get stroked all day ... She made him lazy. Before she came, he was me mate and kept the old girl free of rodents don't ya know. Nope no more women for me. Of course, every once in a while, I do go a calling on a widow or two that I know in a few of the sea port towns along the coast. Got me one who is always warm and welcoming over to Victoria, B.C. And there's another up ta Port Angles. Some times I go over to Oak Harbor and see a gal who lives on her boat too. Problem with her is she's just as cantankerous as me until ya get her drawers off and then. Sadie, bar the door, you's think you were trying ride out a Typhoon with only a 10 pound anchor, boy she'll turn you every which way but loose. I can only handle her about once a month any more than that, we get on each others nerves. But it is fun while yer a riding."

"So Mikey, what's next. Ya' know, you are always welcome here for as long or as short a visit as ya care to make."

"Thanks, Ernie. I really appreciate the offer. I just may take you up on that if my brother and I can't get along. Right now I am just going to keep going to Tacoma, I might give you a call in a couple of weeks and head over to may be go out with you on a sail across the straight. May be Victoria, how would that be?"

"May hap, I jest might be able to make that work, ya ken, the lady over there has a nice looking room mate with big soft titties and an ass to die fer. O course, I ha not sampled it yet, but its has been on my to do list fer awhile. May be we can go over there and give the old girls a run fer the money. Wat ja say?"

"Sounds good, give me a couple of weeks to get settled in and know what's what on the home front. Who knows SWAMBO may have gotten her head out of her ass. Of course she may not even know that I am no longer at her beck and call. I told my boys where I was going, but never told her. I swore them to secrecy but you know how persuasive Moms can be. I only turned my phone twice on the way out and both times there were no messages, Well, I'm gona hit the road like a horse turd and get on down ta Tacoma."

"See ya' Ernie."

"Be sure ya be a coomin back now ya hear, Mikey."

"I will."

I gave Ernie a wave as I went around the corner of the wharf side warehouse. It would only take me another 3-4 hours to drive to Tacoma, a little less if I took a ferry over to Everett. I decided to take the scenic route and drive down to the Tacoma Narrows bridge and cross there. I was in no real hurry. What was there to do. My brother most likely was at work and wouldn't be home till after 5. I had most of the day to get there. As I crossed the narrows bridge, it was just after noon time. I decided to go on down to the water and get a nice seafood lunch at one of the small seafood shops close to Tacoma Bay. I had my lunch of Octopus salad and a couple of dozen oysters on the half shell. I was well fortified for my next task which was to sit on a bench looking over the water and feel sorry for myself. I know the old saying is true "Shit Happens." but even knowing that, why does it have to happen to me? I know, I know, buck up reach down grab your balls, pull your self up, dust your self off and start all over again and go on with your life. It's all well and good when you are the one spouting the platitudes, it is not well and good if you are on the receiving end. Right at that moment, I just wanted to find a hole and crawl in it.

Oh' well, just keep puttin one foot in front of the other and eventually, you will get some where. I headed for Jim's place. Now you have to realize that his place was something special. He and his wife had moved out from Colorado and bought almost the only standing growth of old timber in the entire Tacoma area, it was over on the east side of the Bay up on top of the hill. It was about 3 acres of tall, tall Douglas Fir and Spruce trees. It was completely surrounded by housing and you had to get back to it by driving along an alley and turning into it on it's own long lane. They bought it for $80,000 back in the early 80's. Now with all the people bailing out of California and moving with all there capitol gains in cash from selling their over price real estate and getting out while the getting was good. They were driving the price of everything through the roof. I didn't know it at the time, and he probably was only mildly aware of it, but his property was tripling in value almost every year and sometimes more than that. Several years later when he re married and moved to California, he sold it for a cool couple of million.

I pulled in, he wasn't home yet. I got out and wandered around, my other brother the one with the Nursery had gotten Jim interested in Roses. Between the two of them, they had planted about an acre of the open yard in rose beds. Not just any roses mind you. These were the Nurseryman's prized hybrid cultivars that he was working with to try and get a new Patented variety. As a teenager, he had gotten patents on a Black Gladiola. This guy was a serious grower. Now I know when most folks think about rose beds, they think about short stubby little plants with a few spindly twigs and a sorry blossom or two. That was not what I was seeing. This bed looked like an acre of Iowa Corn. Only much much prettier. Most of the plants were approaching 6' tall or better. The blossoms were spectacular. Some of the blossoms that were a few days old were almost as big as a soccer ball. It was while I was walking through this profusion of color and scent that Jim came home and found me out in the middle of the garden.

"Hey big brother." He hollered at me. We walked toward each other, as he walked, he dead headed a few blossoms. When we got close, he gave me a big hug and put his arm around my shoulder and we walked around the garden while he told me all about this collection his and our other brother.

"Sam will be over for supper as soon as he locks the Nursery up. We eat together a lot of evenings." He told me.

We went in the house and he grabbed us a couple of beers and we went up to the second floor of his house and through his bedroom out on to an elevated deck looking south east. There in the bright orange and blue and yellow of the setting sun stood Mount Rainier in all her shining glory. What a spectacular sight. We sat there in companionable silence and watched Mother Nature do her best to WOW us and she did in spectacular fashion. We were sitting in the shade as the Sun tried to bounce as many colors as there are off the Snow Crowned top of Mount Rainier. We had a couple more beers and we heard the growl of Sam's big diesel Ford F-350 coming down the lane.

We went to the door to meet him. He came bounding up the stairs and through the glass patio door to the deck with a cooler of Olympic Gold cool ones for us.

"Hey Big Brother." As he wrapped a pair of Gorilla like arms around me. We stood there and hugged and then Jim got up and joined us. We made room for him. He's the runt of the litter. He's only around 6' tall and about 190. Sam on the other hand even makes me feel small. He's all of 6'6" and about 325 all of it muscle from humping those balled up trees and bags of fertilizer and landscape stone for the ladies.

"What's for supper tonight." Sam turned to ask Jim?

"Relax, tonight supper is on me. You guys get cleaned up, I need a shower too, and you can take me to your favorite restaurant and its all on me tonight." I told them.

"Sounds good, lets do it." Jim said.

By the time we got back, to the house, we were all up to speed regarding our relationship with our ex wives or soon to be ex wife. I only glossed over the story of Janey, after all it had not really been anything. Just one friend helping out another. They helped me unload my car and Sam went to his home for the night.

"Come by the Nursery tomorrow if you have time Mikey, Ga' nite"

"Have a good night Sam, I'll see you tomorrow."

Since I didn't have any pressing reason to look for work, I spent my days wandering around Puget Sound, mostly by the Marinas just looking at the Sailboats. Some times talking to an owner here and there. I was seriously thinking about doing what Ernie was doing. Get myself a nice boat and kick back and take it easy. Slip rent was not over whelming and day to day costs were pretty low once the boat was paid for.

Before I left home, I had taken most of the money out of the house hold account and moved my profits from the sale of the business into another account. Since my soon to be Ex was a teacher, she had her paycheck automatically deposited into the joint account and always had money for day to day expenses. She was never a heavy spender, I didn't figure that she would even know the money was gone until she went in to check or called the bank. I had always handled all the banking.

I had divided all the money in half and put her half into another account with her name on it and all she had to do was go into the bank and sign the paperwork and it would be hers. Of course, I didn't tell her about it just yet.

I signed a quit claim deed on the house and put it in to the safe deposit box for her to find when everything finally went to hell and the Lawyers which ever came first. It still left me with a pretty penny or two and I would not ever have to work again if I didn't want to, as long as I was frugal with my money.

After a couple of weeks, I called Ernie and we talked about going sailing.

"Hey Mikey, was wondering when I was going to hear from you. I'm over in Oak Harbor just getting done, getting my ashes cleaned out of the old pipes. Nother day or too should do it. Do you want to go sailing?"

"That's why I called. I was just going to head up to your berth and see if you were home, then I thought with all your gals in every port, Thought it might be smart to call."

"Well, why don't you come on up here. I'll meet you at the dock in Oak Harbor tomorrow morning as soon as you can get here."

"What's the best way to get there from here?" I asked.

"Tell you what, I got an old Marine buddy who has a Cessna 182 with floats on and may be I can get him to come down and pick you up there at the Sea Plane Dock in Tacoma. That way you'll miss all the fun of traffic and ferry boat riding. Let me give him a call. Darrell Becker is he name, I'll call him and call you right back."

"OK, talk to you soon." I told him.

He called back in an hour and it was all set. All I had to do was get my brother Jim to drop me off at the Sea Plane Dock in Tacoma on his way to work. He worked down in the shipping yards where all the containers were loaded and off loaded off the big ocean going vessels in the Tacoma dock yard.

Oak Harbor and beyond...

Next morning the sun was just peeping over the Cascades to the east of us when we rolled in to the dock. We were sitting there sipping coffee as we watched a pontoon mounted Cessna line up for final approach. He set her down on the glass smooth water and taxied over to the dock. We caught his wing tip and struts to keep him off the dock. He gently touched the dock and stepped out after shutting down the prop. He stepped to the dock and introduced him self to Jim and I.

"Hi Mike, Ernie told me you were a big guy, got any gear?" He asked.

"Just this one bag and I'll make a pit stop to get rid of the coffee."

"Me too."

Very soon we were in the plane and taxing out to run up and take off into the wind. I looked out the window and waved to Jim and off we went. I have to tell you that flying over Puget sound at a couple of thousand feet on a bright sunny morning was really beautiful. We had the sun bouncing off the peak tops to the east and over to the west the Snow Capped Olympic Peninsula was shining in the sun too. It was a good morning to be alive.

It didn't take very long to get up to Oak Harbor. Ernie had told me and Darrell that he was going to put out to sea to meet us south of the harbor while the tide was up so we didn't have to navigate the shoals at low tide.