Chapter 4: Wonders to Behold

Sometimes a gas station is central to a small rural community. Instead the only business may be a roadhouse bar-restaurant advertising home cooked meals and barbecue. Perhaps only a stand selling fresh garden produce, and bee keeper’s home processed honey. The cluster of dwellings, silos and barns grouped together generally reflects a family building their homes near their farmer parents on gifts of family land. Turning away from direction of town leads you deeper into more and more remote and less frequent small oasis communities until eventually there are only unbroken vistas of woods and swamp extending beyond it appears forever.

Returning northward towards town, the narrow two lane asphalt road intersects a lonely tree lined gravel and tire rutted clay road, situated between sun browned fallow fields. There’s no signs of habitation nearby and no sign advertising where the raw road’s going. Locals know a mile down this way, brings you to a wide parking approach at the municipal landfill and it’s guarded gates.

The dump main gates bracket the weigh-master’s long narrow office. The first wonder I behold is a giant ball of string about three feet in diameter. It’s on display behind the office in the attached roofed pavilion that separates the in and out scales. Somebody had a lot of time on their hands, and considerable resources for string.

Next to the ball, is a box top table, a wide trough containing a jumble of small items. Spools of old yellowed monofilament fishing line in a shoe-box. A tin of big ugly coat buttons, no two the same. There is spools of wire, bare and insulated, spools of sewing thread in another shoe-box, small balls of jute twine and cotton string.

My heart races. I see skeins of new looking parachute cord rolled up like hangman nooses. My lucky day if they’re cheap. I just knew it! There are boxes and bigger spools under the table.

Next is some battered metal shelving loaded with partial cans of paint, and other volatile or toxic chemicals. Several five gallon cans set on the floor beside it. There is a pallet stacked with cardboard boxes filled with old crockery and place settings. Finally, an array of electric motors of all types and sizes spreads over at least a quarter of the cement slab floor at minimum.

Treasures too good to bury, all of them.

Across the scales road from the pavilion, in the open is a pile of junk car and truck batteries leaking acid. Next to that, a small mountain of tangled, broken, rusty, twisted bicycles and tricycles. Beyond that, drunken rows of old appliances, everything from fridges to washing machines.

On the other side of the two lane dirt road, is architectural salvage. Windows, doors, beams, joists, fancy panels, ginger-board, and trims.

Nothing resembling a boat in the entire place and I’m running out of the time I allotted myself.

“Mister? You don’t happen to have any old boats in here, do you?”

I hadn’t bothered to check in the landfill itself, just through the stuff kept out of it.

“What kind of boat are you looking for, kid?”

“I’m going in the trot line business.”

“Look up there on the bulletin board. There’ a notice by a fellow calls himself Moses, lives here in town or just outside. Paper is titled ‘Heirlooms Search and Rescue’. He’ s retired military and spends all his time going to auctions, estate sales, yard sales, flea markets, and such. Frequently comes around here. Buys and sells things with hidden value, he puts it. Now, if he don’t have a suitable boat for sale his-self, he might just know who does. Copy down his phone number. Call him up. I recommend him. He’s shrewd, drives a hard bargain, but he won’t cheat or fleece you. I’ll vouch for him.”

Who will vouch for you, who vouches for him? I never seen you before today, and I’m to take your word another fellow you recommend is honest? Sounds like a setup to me! I’m thinking.

“Read off that number, I’ll ring it. May be you’re lucky and will catch him in.”

Maybe I’m lucky, maybe not, because we got him on the second ring. Like he was just waiting by the phone for this call. I’m feeling suspicious and paranoid.

Mr Moses was pleasant enough to chat with and he does have an old boat for sale. A war hero. Relic? The boat itself, he claims, is a war hero.

I’m just curious enough to see how a boat can be thought as heroic anything, to drive around to his place. Not far, and on my way home.

“This boat took part in several heroic commando raids during the war. My friend kept it, and brought it home with him. He traveled far and wide with this boat, on planes, buses, and trains, just to go fishing after special fish. His widow sold it to me.

I think he would approve your having it, to carry on with more brave adventures. Like you going into business for yourself, takes courage and stamina.”

Great sales pitch. Lot’s of evocative buzz words. Problem is, I don’t see a boat. He’s talking about things only he sees in his head and I ain’t buying.

“Can I see the boat?”

Moses hands me a framed black and white photo of his friend wearing an Army officers cap and afloat in his boat. Looks like it might be a fast canoe. Needle shaped. A kayak sort of canoe with covered decks.

“Nice. I really would like to see the actual boat, before we discuss my buying it.”

I suspect Moses was on his way out the door when I arrived. He had three duffel bags setting in the middle of the floor, ready to go.

Now he’s tapping one with his foot, the second time I ask to see the boat,

“It’s in here, inside these three bags. Take a peek if you wish.”

The lightest but bulkiest bag is full of a stiff rubberized cloth folded up. The other two bags hold harp and heart shaped wooden parts. Each bag weighs about equal to a gallon jug of water, or a bit more. No muscle strain to carry. Strains my imagination, to accept this is a collapsed sixteen foot long ocean crossing capable boat! Moses claims it is.

“Can I see it assembled?”

“After you buy it and cart it home, you can assemble it.”

“And if I refuse to buy a pig in a poke without seeing it assembled?”

“Eventually the rightful new owner will come along. I hoped it was to be you. Guess I’m mistaken.”

Damned old Moses could sell ice-cream in the arctic winter, I’ll bet.

“Let me take it for a few days on trial, then I could decide.”

“Sorry. Can’t do that, lad, but you’re wise beyond your years to be so cautious. Anybody can see the WANT sticking out of you like quills on a porcupine. You’re a well self-disciplined young man.”

Moses is thoughtful.

“Does your truck have a trailer hitch?”

“There’s a hole in the rear bumper for it but no ball.”

“A bumper hitch is too flimsy for what I’m considering.”

“Nothing about the beast is flimsy, Mr Moses. Check her out.”

Moses upon inspection, allows the massive rear bumper welded to the equally massive truck frame is stout enough and no doubts. He asks if I can obey without question whenever he says slow, stop, or turn, and can I drive slowly and safely without undue bumps and jarring or growing impatient. I can follow these instructions, I assure him.