Chapter 10: SCOOT OVER

“How much will you pay me for this bucket of crabs Dad?”

I’m anxious to know how much my investments in gear and my labor is worth. Are going to be worth in the future.

“Don’ t you know you have to share your good fortune in a feast with family and friends? That’s our supper, boy!”

A bucket of crabs looks like a lot until you divide it up amongst a large family. I asked for and received permission to invite Milly, Jeanette, and Marshall to supper. They contributed that essential badminton racket to my initial success, and certainly are entitled to an equal share when the proceeds are enjoyed. Even if they hadn’t been included, nobody would have been satisfied with the few crabs per person the bucket actually contained. This ‘tradition’ of a feast on my first harvest is probably, upon reflection, a recent innovation. Dad is famous with us offspring, for devising object lessons for us.

Crustaceans like crabs and shrimp, are regulated and wholesaled by the bushel. Ten gallons or two buckets is a tiny fraction over a bushel. Shrimp baskets, sometimes called champagne baskets, or simply champagnes, hold one and a tenth bushels. The fishhouses use them to measure everything, and calls them a bushel measure.

There’s thirteen in a baker’s dozen, one in twelve. Nice to get, but when your catch is cheated by a ratio of one in ten? Not so nice! That’s called decimation. An army is decimated when they lose every tenth man, one in ten. Guess who’s drinking the champagne celebrating the sale after the fishhouse decimates the crabbers catch?

A champagne holds a fraction over ten gallons. Dad considers two buckets roughly equal to achampagne fishhouse basket. That’s how it works. Sorry if it doesn’t suit me. Don’t study the math too hard, it’s not good for my digestion. Two bucks a bucket or four and a quarter for a filled champagne. His offer price until further notice. Values and prices at the wholesaler fishhouse change daily.

The large basket the pirates were dumping our crab pot into, was a champagne. If I want one, the fishhouse sells used ones, but not cheap. I’ll stick with five gallon lard tins. Fifty cents apiece at the slaughter house. They nest and come with tight fitting press on lids. Four will fit in the center of the kayak, a pair in front of the spool strut and a pair aft of it. Lids on to keep out dirt and water, until the crabs fill them. If I can fill four buckets every day, six days a week, thats forty eight dollars a week. I’ll be a richman in no time flat!

Big dreams.

During supper, I was flanked by the two young black girls. They claimed a right to sit with me, because I invited them. I enjoyed their pleasure in being included and felt pity for them, because they really aren’t included. They’re the ‘others’ of Dad’s children.

After supper, a crabs in spicy brown gravy stew over rice. Everyone had all they could eat of the rice and gravy, Milly helped Mom clean up. Jeanette and Marshal wanted to walk around outside in the cool evening with me. Each hugged an arm so I couldn’t fly away, I think.

It’s an opportunity to get to know these unknown sisters. We talk about the upcoming school year, very little about last years. When asked about their ambitions for the future, THEY CORNER ME.

Both girls want to be more than sisters to me and I’m flattered by their adoration. They want to also be my girlfriends now. I don’t know how to respond to that and not dash their dreams or damage their self esteem. When both announce they intend to marry rich white men, I honestly, without believing at all in their chances, wish them the best of luck with those fantasies.

They firmly believe in their destinies. Wager their very beings upon happy outcomes. They’re doomed and I can’t tell them their aspirations are doomed. Even though if one were to miraculously realize her dream, it’s impossible for both to be successful. There is a conflict between them. The rich man they both expect to marry, is the same one. Me. GULP! What can I say? What can I do? Nothing?

None of my previous experience qualifies me for a delicate situation like this! I really don’t want to hurt them. They’re deprived of too much already. Unjust and unfair to deprive them of their dreams too.

There isn’t anyone I can approach for advice, either. And if I received any advice, it could probably be boiled down to this,

“DON’T WALK. RUN!”. That’s the advice I would give. Unfortunately, I can’t consciously take it.

An imagined vision of their huge shining adoring eyes, filling with dejected tears, left rejected in my wake as I flee, is too haunting.

Is it better to do nothing than do something stupid? What if the option of doing nothing isn’t an available option? What if only stupid options remain? I opt for stupid and two pre-teen girlfriends.

Jeanette and Marshall are ecstatic and shower me with kisses. I let them, trying to be stiff and feel remote. It’s ridiculous, but eight year old Marshall is the better kisser. Who teaches eight year olds how to kiss? Who does she practice with? I’m going to find out who has been messing around with my little sister, er, girlfriend, whatever.

Dad and I start building the new trot-line. Not the short competitor test line, but the Grand five hundred footer. Jeanette and Marshall are helping. They really help and it’s assembling fast. Clove hitches are simple, so they knot the line every eighteen inches around a bull lip. Dad and I come behind, and opposing each other, jerk the hitches very snug and tight. Dad praises, hugs and thanks the girls when it’s finished in two hours. I copy his lead. Two happier more fulfilled little girls you can’t imagine. Hugging two men they love, in a family they desperately wish to be part of, is heaven for them.