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David Mitchell
The news about Mike, and Peggy's post reminded me of the changes we are preparing for at this stage of life.
I am (sort of) losing another friend:
Many of you will recall some photos I posted over a year ago about my Home Builder/Cobra Pilot friend's boat - a 44-foot long sailing Catamaran. A bunch of us helped him build it in his back yard over eight years.
He and his wife and another couple just sailed a few days ago for the Azores, off Portugal.
On a previous crossing in a 38 foot "Cutter" that he built and sailed years ago with one local friend, he spent time and fell in love with the little island of Horta, with it's little colonial Portuguese city of about 15,000, with a slow paced life style and gorgeous climate.
They will be at sea about 15 to 20 days. I was not aware of the full implications of this journey until about a week before they left. Although the wife will fly back occasionally to manage her stained-glass business here, and visit her grandkids in Nashville, he will likely not return very often for years. They will sail on to Portugal next year, then around into the Mediterranean to Spain, then France, Italy, Croatia, Greece, and so on.
Though he may pop in for a few weeks at a time, the sudden realization of his absence has hit me pretty hard.
Roger and I are polar opposites in every way you can imagine, speech, attitudes, religion, politics - you name it. but we are surgically attached at the heart. Remeber, he flew above me as my "cover" in our "hunter-killer" teams in the Delta. And I spent a few days in his front seat up in a Cobra on a few "days off". More than that, we just clicked on all levels from the first meeting in Vinh Long. We were the second and third youngest piltos in our Troop. And he was a sort of a genius pilot among us. We were together a lot during free time on the ground. He challenged my thinking a lot. We had soem nasty arguments. And we read the same books - Michener, St. Exuperey and others. He even gave my father a ride in the front seat of a Cobra gunship when Dad came for his shocking suprize visti to see me in Vinh Long for one day. And later, he gave me the job with his homebuilding operation here for my first four years of the 19 years I have now lived here in Bluffton. He "rescued" me at a critical time in my life back in Columbus. We have had some nasty disagreements, but it has not broken the bond. I tell everyone he is my "foul-mouthed, irreverant, anti-everything, non-voting, left-wing, liberal, angry buddhist, best friend".
I never showed you the inside of the boat. Here are a few shots you have seen, and some you have not seen before.
Roger in the Starboard stairs from kitchen up into the "pilot house" (living, dinning, gathering and steering room). They since added a fixed dining table. If the bottom bottom shot were a bit to the left, you would see a small woodburing stove mounted on an insulated platform.
An older shot of the galley below during construction - and a recent shot of Laurel in her kitchen. The "Port" (left) side holds the bath and shower. Each side has a double bunk, plus narrow workshop, office and storage.
Another repeat shot (still in construction) - on a huge platform in the back yard and coverd by the single biggest piece of plastic commercially available. It took 8 of us to unbox it, roll it out, and fold it back up so we could carry it on our shoulders. Then pullies rigged to "slide" it over the frame. It was heated in the winter months, but barey cooled in the summer heat.
A (repeated) shot of the boat the day before launch into the cove in his back yard. The plastic and wood framed cosntruction roof took a couple days to remove.
The night of the launch - sitting on the two (greased) ramps, waiting for high tide. One of the most dramtic things I have ever witnessed!
Note the red stripe on the platform. when Roger and Laurel were actually married, they held the ceremony inside the (then covered) boat construction shed. We all lined along the two boat hulls as they walked between us, down a painted red "aisle" for a "wedding carpet".
Just after launch, docked on the May River, and without the mast. Mounting the mast was another incredilbe thing to watch. About 14 of us ""rolled" the 56 foot (400 pound) - hand made mast, through the town from Roger's house (about 4 quiet blocks) down to the town boat launch on a pair of very large cart weels, mounted to a sort of axle supporting some of the weight at the center. Then they used a crane to lift the mast and dangle it into place as Roger and about 6 guys guided it into place and fastened it.
God Speed, my friend.
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