A Unit of Water, a Unit of Time by Douglas Whynott

Author:Douglas Whynott [Whynott, Douglas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-82034-1
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2012-06-13T00:00:00+00:00

It’s warmed suddenly, and a storm has brought a heavy rain that’s freezing when it hits the ground. Slush is piling up in the parking lot and around the buildings, and the rocks along the shore are covered with a layer of ice. The tide is coming in, and it’s a moon tide, a full-course tide.

Tim Horton arrives at six-thirty. He likes to get to the yard a half hour before work begins, and he tries to always be the first one there even though he drives in from Blue Hill, which is twelve miles away—and he’s first today even though it’s snowing in Blue Hill and icy all along the way. He waits in the lot for someone to come and open the door.

That’s Rick Clifton today. Inside the shop Tim gets a fire going in the woodstove, feeding it with scraps from the pile under the stairs. By six forty-five the fire is blazing. “It’s talkin’, isn’t it?” Tim says.

It’s three weeks after the solstice, and the sun is rising a minute earlier each day, but it’s still dark at seven. By then about sixteen men are gathered near the stove. Some are sitting on the benches and chairs, while others, Tim among them, stand off to the side. They’re all within hearing of Frank Hull, who is in front of the woodstove, looking down the length of the shop as the clock moves past seven. Frank is standing in—literally standing in—for Steve. Frank grew up on an island in Rhode Island, and took a ferry to school as a boy, and ran a sailboat rental business on Deer Isle before coming to the yard. His specialty is rigging. He’s got a thick brown beard, and eyes that pulse into shades of concern as he moves about the yard looking over the work. Though Steve often gives a little talk in the morning, Frank is not so comfortable. Instead, he’s a reminder that it’s time to get to work. He says, “No news today,” and they all go off to their jobs.

Tim Horton is working on the Fidelio keel. He knocks out some wedges from the centerboard slot that he and Paul Waring put in yesterday afternoon, after the copper sheathing was caulked and hammered into place. This is the job that culminated in a “discussion” with Paul Waring, as Tim put it, a discussion that had been building for days. Tim and Paul built the new frames for Fidelio, just the two of them until Pete Chase came on after launching the Trumpy. Paul is enthusiastic, but Tim, as he sees it, has experience, and in his eyes Tim has taken the initiative to make decisions too many times, including yesterday when they were building and sheathing the centerboard slot. Yesterday Tim had boiled over and told Paul that he’s been working on boats as long as Paul has been alive, which caught Paul by surprise. When Paul said, “Okay, if that’s how you want to do

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