New Year's Resolutions vs. New Year's Intentions

One facet of New Year’s Eve is thinking about the year ahead. Most people celebrate the Eve. It’s hard to know what the split is between those making merry for getting through the old year and those whooping it up for the fresh territory the upcoming 365 days present.

A common denominator for adults, however, is the recognition that the year ahead usually contains unknowns. Whether one is rich or poor, young or old, healthy or sick, in love or out, or seemingly in control of events vs. at their mercy, it’s rarely possible to verbalize what’s down the road accurately. So, resolutions are made as part of the New Year's ritual, mostly in an attempt to impose some appearance of order or control on the future. The resolution maker takes charge! “I resolve to…” lose weight, clean the garage, drink less, go to church, study harder, and so on. Unfortunately, there is no reliable data on the number of resolutions made, achieved, or discarded. So the actual value of the process to the resolver, if any, is unknown.

A substitute for resolutions are “intentions.” They are easier to prescribe for one’s self in that they are less absolute and demanding than resolutions. Experienced users say that intentions tend to be more doable and return a higher psychic income because the intender can gain satisfaction from smaller increments of progress. A resolution, “I will stop drinking chocolate milk this coming year” is different than, “I intend to ease back on my chocolate milk consumption in 2014.”

What’s the difference? It’s significant. A resolution is a declaration, a stake in the ground—a goal post. Either the resolver achieves it or not. It’s win or lose. In the other case, an intention is a gentler, maybe even a whimsical, leaning: “This is what I would like to do, but I acknowledge I am not in 100% control. To some extent I have to go with the flow.”

There is an old saying: “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” A more realistic saying for these complex times might be: “Intentions are the front porch on the house of action.” And, indeed, there is a rumor in D.C. about recent, geological research that has found that the road to hell has actually been repaved with broken resolutions. They provide a lot of traction for the downhill trip and last longer in the heat than do intentions, which although softer, don’t break so easily.

                                                           

©2013 by Steven C. Brandt. All rights reserved.

Great Spirit & the Painted Ridge

The Lover's Leap legend (posted January 10, 2013) was about Chief No-Name, his daughter, Cedar Heart, and her boy friend, a handsome young brave from beyond the mountains on the east side of Lake Tahoe. All three perished in the vicinity of what is today known as Tahoe’s Lover’s Leap, high above Highway 89 about half way between Tahoe City and Truckee. This legend tells the story of what happened next.

Following the deaths that warm, rainy, August afternoon long ago, the Qua people at Carnelian Bay went into deep mourning. The happiness they had long known drained from them, and life became somber in all respects.

In September the Quas packed up their tents, children, and possessions and quietly returned over the Sierra Crest to their winter home in the foothills near Auburn. They were without a chief and without hope.

The winter months passed slowly. By spring when the creeks were once again full, there were many unhappy factions within the Qua camp. Some people were simply lost without Chief No-Name. The memory of Cedar Heart and her brave gave much sorrow to others. One group felt the Quas should never return to their ancestral, summer home at Carnelian Bay. Another group wished to return as normal, build a fitting monument to the Chief, and get on with life, including the election of a new chief.

After countless evenings spent in earnest discussion around smokey campfires, the Qua elders decided to appeal to the Great Spirit for guidance. So a huge ceremony was held at sunrise on a clear, spring morning. During the elaborate proceedings, the Quas, in unison, chanted an ancient prayer in which they implored the higher power to send a signal that would give them direction from the stalemate into which they had fallen because of the triple tragedy at Lover’s Leap.

Nothing happened.

A second ceremony was held four days later. And then a third ceremony. Days rolled into weeks. Anguish spread. Still no word. Then on a misty, May evening toward sundown, a rainbow appeared in the dark sky above the Sierra Range, to the east. The Quas had never before seen a rainbow. Its brilliance and size humbled them. Surely, they reasoned, this was the omen for which they had prayed.

Late into the night, in hushed tones, the elders debated on the meaning of the huge, multi-colored arch in the sky. Slowly a consensus was reached. One end of the rainbow, the southern end, appeared to disappear behind the Sierra Crest. The elders speculated that the rainbow might be anchored in Lake Tahoe, or to one of the mountains that surround it. The other—northern—end seemed to come toward them. Indeed, as hope rose in their minds, they concluded that there was a chance the rainbow was actually a message from Chief No-Name, or Cedar Heart, or both. A thrill crept across the solemn camp—then a call to action.

As soon as the days became long, the Quas, as one people again, started the long, uphill trek toward the Crest on the trail that led them back to Carnelian Bay. Up, up they climbed—children, adults, elders, and animals—following the American River. At last they reached the Crest, crossed, and took the long descent into Squaw Valley to its welcoming meadow. There they rested.

The next day a heavy storm rushed across the valley from the west. In its wake, near sundown, once again, a rainbow appeared. The Quas were reverent in its presence. Every eye tracked the path of the rainbow across the sky. The northern end was much closer to the Quas this time, and it seemed to intersect with the land just beyond end of the valley.

Hurriedly the Quas formed a party of younger men and women who could rush eastward along Squaw Creek to see, perhaps, the end of the rainbow, its source. Maybe they could learn the meaning of this obvious sign from the Great Spirit.

The party, breathless, reached the river that bisects the Big Gorge—Truckee River today. It was swollen with spring run-off. There, where Squaw Creek enters the Truckee, the party stopped, every eye drawn upwards beyond the treetops. And arching across the sky was the rainbow with its end curving down into the gorge.

The rainbow touched the earth across the river from them, on the ridge that ran up from the river. The ridge disappeared in the trees as it continued in a gentle curve northward around to the ledge from which Cedar Heart and her suitor had jumped. The rainbow seemed anchored to the gnarly ridge just across the Truckee.

The party members stood transfixed; they were afraid to move for doing so might destroy the majestic scene before them.

Slowly and silently, the rainbow faded. But its colors remained embedded in the rocks of the ridge—perhaps a tribute to the love of Cedar Heart and her brave.

The party crossed the river to be closer to the sacred ridge. They hesitantly clamored upwards. As they worked their way through the colored granite and trees, off to the north the profile of Chief No-Name came clearly into view, just below Lover’s Leap. The connection between the painted ridge and the ridge suddenly became clear. The Quas now understood the message from the Great Spirit. The circle was complete: Big Chief, Lover's Leap, the Painted Ridge, and the Qua people were once more united. They had come home.

 Author’s Note: Painted Ridge remains today, a sign to all who come home to Squaw Valley and Lake Tahoe on Highway 89. Close by, down the river to the north, Chief No-Name continues his vigilance. High above Painted Ridge, to the east, is Painted Rock, which appears on modern topo maps of the North Tahoe area.

©Copyright 2013 by Steven C. Brandt

Short Story: Road Closed

It seemed like a good idea at the time. “Let’s go to Tahoe for New Years Eve.” So we made reservations at a big hotel on the South Shore and on the appointed day prepared for the road, which we would tackle in our shiny, red VW.

In those days there were two main ways to Tahoe from the San Francisco Bay Area—Highway 40 (now Interstate 80) and two-lane Highway 50. We took 50 because it goes over the Sierra Crest and down to the South Shore. The weather was unsettled as we cruised eastward across the Golden State in late December. Soon we were starting to climb toward Echo Summit at 7,377’, and it was snowing steadily. Being young, we nonchalantly put on chains and drove on up the mountain. As we went, traffic was increasing; after all, it was New Years Eve and South Shore was known as the party center with casinos and a wide range of entertainment.

Gradually the line of cars became bumper to bumper and slower and slower, and then we all stopped completely. The snow kept falling. We sat, motor running and heater on. Then we sat some more. An hour passed with no progress, and we noticed, too, that there were no cars coming downhill in the other lane. Behind us as far as we could see was a line of cars, packed busses, and trucks—all stopped, stuck, heading up the mountain. The hardest part was probably the lack of information. What was going on?

Another hour passed and finally a California Highway Patrol car drove slowly by headed downhill. I flagged the officer to stop and asked about the situation. He said a landslide had closed the road, both lanes, near the summit and it was unlikely the road would be re-opened tonight. Then he drove on. I didn’t see him stop again.

Volkswagen to the rescue. Given our size, it was possible to make a U-turn. We did so immediately and pointed downhill from whence we had come. I had the lights on as it was getting dark. As we crept along in the ever-deepening snow, almost every driver we passed opened his or her window to hear news. Judy pushed our sunroof open and stood up so her head and shoulders were out. Then she began her chant: “Road closed. Can’t get through tonight. Road closed, can’t get through tonight.” We passed along what we knew to our fellow travelers but kept moving.

This went on for mile after mile. We finally reached snowless pavement and then Highway 49 where we turned north to get over to Highway 40. I don’t remember where we stayed that night, but the next day the storm had passed and we drove to the North Shore of Lake Tahoe. We’ve had home their ever since.

The Ski Patrol band of Squaw Valley immortalized the experience in a song, “Road Closed.” The song was one of a group of fun snow songs that was put out on a 33 1/3 record. I believe all the material is now on a CD, including “Short Skis Suck,” “Rocks,” “Unwanted Binding Release,” and “Mellow Daddy Skier.”

Short Story: Easter Debacle

                                                                            Spirit

Everyone probably has had an embarrassing moment or two over the years. In my case, not so long ago I made a spectacle of myself in full view of a group of friends. Here’s the story.

Easter is often the seasonal turning point in the San Juan Archipelago that graces the sea between the US Mainland and Vancouver Island in British Columbia. On a specific Sunday about ten years ago, the sun was shining, the world around was green and fresh, and we boaters could at last do our thing after a long, gray winter. Around Friday Harbor, our thing was usually an Easter potluck in pristine, Parks Bay, a quiet, uninhabited notch in neighboring Shaw Island. The Bay was part of a nature preserve.

A dozen boats came to the party that Sunday. They rafted up side by side or tied to what was left of an old pier that floated on an anchor about 10 yards from the dense, south shore of the Bay. That Easter my wife and I took Spirit (picture above) and a recent addition to our tiny fleet, a new, wooden skiff that I had built over the winter. It was a lightweight, 14’ beauty with a touch of dark green trim and wonderful lines (picture below). We towed the skiff to the Bay behind Spirit, and we tied to the old pier even though I was a bit trepidatious about the water shallowness in so close to land. My cadre of old salts assured me “no problem” as they tied Spirit to the pier and admired the skiff. Food and wine magically appeared from the various boats, spring was toasted, and festivities commenced. It was a genial gathering of genuine friends.

                                                              Friend, Bill, rowing Skiff

About twenty minutes later another boat appeared at the entrance to the Bay and headed toward us. It was a relatively large, white boat with black trim named Fun. It had a large assortment of aerials, domes, and spotlights as well as a small, barking dog on the foredeck. So much for quiet, Parks Bay with its blue herons, eagles, and jumping fish. At the upper (flybridge) helm of Fun was the skipper in a gold-braided hat. He was known to a few people present to be a recent arrival to San Juan Island. The young lady in the bikini standing next to the old boy was an unknown. Arne, our harbormaster who had Danish saltwater for blood, whispered in an aside:

“That boat reminds me of a tennis shoe!”

The skipper of the boat signaled that he would like to raft up on the outside of Spirit. He had to signal with his hands as he had rock and roll music playing full blast on his flybridge and couldn’t be heard by us. I understood what he wanted, and I was not favorable to having him tied outside of me so I was pinned to the flimsy pier in shallow water with the tide starting to ebb. Besides, he might leave the music on.

I signaled back to him to go around in a circle and that I was leaving. He could have my place. With that, Judy and I boarded Spirit and I started the engines. A couple of the guys untied us from the pier. I could depart going straight ahead, so our little skiff just followed us along on its towline.

I made a slow circle out into deeper water and dropped my anchor in about 15’. Once the anchor was down, I started backing Spirit to set the anchor—make it dig in. I was backing toward the crowded pier in full view of everyone. Suddenly, one of my engine alarms started to scream and the engine stopped. Judy yelled from the rear deck:

“You’ve backed over the skiff!”

Friends were shouting something from the pier and waving their arms.

I shut down both engines completely and went to the rear deck to look over the transom where Judy was staring down. It was an awful sight. Only the back half of my skiff was visible above the water. The rest was under Spirit. I had backed over the skiff’s towline. The towline wound around one of my propellers and the propeller shaft until it stopped the engine—hence the alarm. And—as we would find out a bit later—as the towline wound, it pulled the bow of my hand-made skiff into the propeller, which chopped a huge hole in the shiny new skiff’s bow. I didn’t look up at the now-silent crowd of observers. The only sound was the rock and roll music from the tennis shoe.

The rest is anti-climatic. I was able to phone a diver in Friday Harbor and he was willing to come over to Parks Bay to cut away the towline and release the skiff with the hole in it as well as the propeller and shaft. He arrived an hour later in his workboat. Meanwhile, some friends rowed out to our anchored Spirit and talked Judy and I into coming back to the pier to join in the festivities. We weren’t feeling festive. Once on the pier with some wine, we heard several backing-over-towline stories from sympathetic friends. The old salts were all smiles in an attempt to cheer me up. The party went on. I did ask the gold-braided skipper to turn off his jarring music, which he did. After the diver completed his work, we eventually returned home in Spirit on our own power—with the holed skiff hoisted clear of the water.

For the next several years I was asked to provide the entertainment at the Easter potluck.

Copyright © 2013 by Steven C. Brandt

Short Story: Boys Night Out

We left Friday Harbor in a single file and went through the gap out into the channel. Nate led the way in Liz B. Arne was second in Husky. I was third in my Spirit, which was protocol as I was the youngest. It was four PM and there was plenty of summer daylight left, but the sky was a smudged gray in the distance. We gradually turned left in a big arc, our wakes intermingling.

“Husky, Husky, this is Spirit.”

“Go ahead Spirit.” Arne was always quick to answer the VHF radio. The cabin on his thirty-foot boat was compact; he could reach everything from his helm seat. Husky had a long, open cockpit behind the cabin for stacking stuff—crab traps, diesel generators, or whatever. Arne was the harbormaster and had Danish saltwater for blood. Quiet Arne was granted the final word on any issue concerning boats.

“What is your read on the weather, Husky?” I was the worrier in the group. Today was one of the few times I had joined in for a boys night out on their boats. Usually the trip was a fifthteen-minute run just across the channel to Parks Bay on neighboring Shaw Island. Not today.

“Weather should be O.K. Maybe a little wind.” Arne would say it was O.K. even if a hurricane was brewing.

“Nate, how about you?” I asked. On VHF everyone on a given channel hears everything said over that channel. We were using 39. I knew Nate was listening in. It’s what we all did when cruising together.

“I’m O.K. There’s plenty of sunlight ahead.” Nate, our most senior guy at 70, probably hadn’t even listened to the weather forecast. I had. It was a little iffy.

We rearranged ourselves from single file so we were running abreast up the mile-wide channel. We aimed almost due west toward a Canadian island, Saturna, twelve miles away. It was standing tall up to the brooding clouds. Our plan was to stop on Stuart Island, the last, tiny piece of the U.S. before Haro Strait, the international boundary line, Canadian waters, and Saturna.

With a small boost from the tide, we were making a speed of nine knots over the ground, according to my GPS. That was the best any of us were going to do against the light, headwind.

By the time we passed Yellow Island (see picture) to starboard about fifteen minutes later, my sense was that the wind had picked up a bit. From time to time spray would curl over my bow and onto my windows. I would flip my wipers on, then off again.

“Spirit, Spirit, this is Liz B.”

“Spirit here.”

“What you got to eat tonight? I‘m getting hungry.” His voice was flat, matter of fact. Laconic Nate had been an expert on de-fusing nuclear bombs in his earlier life. Even so, his were the funniest jokes around the boatyard. Quite a contrast.

“All I brought was wine,” I kidded, “red wine, of course.” Neither of the guys would touch Chardonnay.

My diesel engines hummed in unison.

I fingered my microphone button. After about ten minutes, I broke the silence: “Say, you two, I think the wind is picking up.” I had the wipers on full time now. The wind was coming straight at us, slowing us. Our speed over the ground had dropped to eight knots.

There was no reply. My guess was that Arne was checking the weather on channel 4 and that Nate was chewing on a toothpick, as he often did. We motored on. Little Flattop Island was crisp and flat just ahead about a mile. To the left of it was Stuart Island, four miles away. Our plan was to go into Prevost harbor on the west side of Stuart where we would anchor together, banter, and watch the sun set over Canada, wine glasses in hand.

“Spirit, Spirit, Husky here.”

“Go ahead Arne,” I said.

“How you doing?” Arne, who was the same age as me, tended to father me a bit since I was a relative greenhorn in boating matters. I had the biggest boat and the least experience.

“Seems to me the weather is not getting better.”

Nate piped in. “This is standard, afternoon stuff.”

Arne continued: “Nate, maybe we should drop down along Spiden (Island) and overnight in Reid Harbor.” Reid was on the east side of Stuart and, for the moment at least, out of the path of the wind.

My thought popped out and onto the airway: “I have a motto, fellows. Don’t drive into bad weather.” No one replied to my advice. We plowed on. The wave tops reached higher. I could see Liz B. hobby-horsing, bow up…then bow down, splash. She was the smallest of our three boats.

“If we are going to run down along Spiden, we gotta make a turn inside ten minutes,” I said, dispensing with using the boat names. Things were getting serious as far as I was concerned. This was to be a fun night out.

I checked around 360 degrees. My eyesight agreed with my radar. No other boats were in the channel.

After a few minutes, I depressed the button on the side of my microphone. “O.K. guys. What do you old salts think?” I was just the Captain of my boat, not the party leader.

“I think we’ll be O.K. shortly, but let’s try Reid Harbor, Arne,” said Nate. At last the authorities conferred.

Arne: “I am alright with that. How about you, Steve?"

I fiddled with my mike button and took one more look around before depressing the button and speaking slowly: “I’m going back to Friday Harbor, fellows. Anyone want to join me?” No response.

I slowed Spirit until my partners were ahead of me. I picked a trough, pushed both throttles to full ahead and made a quick, 180-degree turn. The boat rolled a little as we went broad-side to the wind. Then it was calm. I headed homewards, downwind and down waves.

“Have a good one,” said Arne.

“See you later.” Nate.

“Best to you, fellows.”

I turned my windshield wipers off.

Copyright© 2013 Steven C. Brandt

Uncle Ken Tale: Marbles & Tobacco Juice

“What did you do in Missouri as a young boy, Ken?” He pondered the question a few moments and eased into the story. “Well, mostly we worked. We were really out in the country, the hills, and we were a long way from anywhere in those days.

“The mountain people around Big Piney, Missouri were a rough & ready bunch. Most of them lived on tiny farms tucked away back among the hills. Big Piney—the main town—consisted of a general store, church, blacksmith shop, school, and four to five houses. Everyone put in long weeks, but on Sundays most everyone would walk or ride into town on a horse or in a wagon for a little socializing. Here’s what typically happened: The men played marbles and the women had tobacco-spitting contests! This is what went on.

“There was a level spot in the dirt road in front of the general store. The men would smooth it out with their feet, lay down on their stomachs, and spend the afternoon shooting marbles. Great fun. I remember the scene very well. At eight or nine, I was too young to be a player, but me and the other boys from the area still had a good time, watching and running around. And wait till you hear this.

“The women of the Big Piney area gathered down the road from the general store. They had their own Sunday contest. They would draw a line in the dirt and stand behind it. Then, one at a time, they would walk up to the line and, with great concentration, spit a shot of tobacco juice as far as they could! The winner was the lady who cold spit the farthest.”

“Was your mother ever a participant, Ken?”  "Never in this world," was his reply.

Boatyard Tale: Oval Shafts

Evening shadows crept on cats' paws across the bay and touched the two boats anchored off the outer dock. There was no wind. Faint strains of country music drifted over the water from the nearby pub and blended with night sounds coming from the forest on the backside of the boatyard. The disappearing sun sucked the remaining life out of the crab pots and old sheds that had hospitalized so many boats over the years.

It was a Friday and there was a small campfire in the dirt in front of the machine shop. The yard gang was gathered around swapping yarns as they were inclined to do when the weather was good. Everyone was seated on something—a five-gallon can, broken wheelbarrow, keel block, lawn chair, or whatever. Mudge, the main mechanic and a senior citizen of the bunch, was setting the pace for this particular session. Yan, in his T-shirt regardless of the temperature, egged him on. Mudge was easy to excite. And once started, he was hard to turn off. Diesel engines were his long suit, and he had jousted with the wooden-hull guys for as long as anyone could remember. "Diesels are the heart of cruising" was his complete philosophy of life.

There were lots of yarns to swap, and they tended to grow embellishments over time. More than once a year the subject of oval shafts would pop up, and this evening was one of those times.

Early in the season not so long ago, Lady Garbanzo stopped for fuel. She was a large plastic boat complete with a half-dozen aerials, two domes, endless windows, three-foot air horns, two barking dachshunds, twin spotlights, and a huge dinghy complete with dual outboards. The skipper prudently circled twice before finally edging toward the fueling station on the main dock. The sea was calm. After some bow thrusting and many forwards/reverses on each engine, Lady was finally sideways along the dock.

Fortunately Mudge was shuffling by at the time and he took a line from Lady passed to him by a diminutive woman wearing curlers under a kerchief. Even before the engines were shut down, a voice boomed over the boat's hailer: "Fill 'er up." The skipper was staring down from inside the enclosed fly-bridge. Mudge muttered, "peasant," to himself and acted as if he hadn't heard. He finished tying off the aft line and ambled away toward his original destination. In the meantime Yan and one of the yard's high school girls arrived to do fueling duties.

The little woman disappeared inside, yapping dogs in tow, as the captain descended from on high down to the dock. He was a small wiry man with a crew cut and gold chains around his neck; he jangled as he moved. "Fill her up, sweety," he said to the high-schooler who was standing midships, "Dieeesel, if you please."

Yan came back from tying off the forward line. "Can I help you?" he inquired of the skipper.

"Just wanted to fill 'er up. Here's my Visa." He flashed a quick, flat grin.

Yan accepted the card and gave his assistant a hand with the diesel nozzle. She was new on the job. Between them they got the fuel cap off and fueling started. In the meantime the boat’s skipper uncoiled the boatyard's fresh water hose along the dock and poked the nozzle into a deck spout located forward along the rail of Lady Garbanzo. Within two minutes the diesel pump on the dock shut off automatically signaling that the Lady's tank was full.

"Got another tank?" Yan asked up the dock, expectantly.

"No, that's it. The other one's full."

Yan clenched his teeth and proceeded with the Visa card ritual. The total fuel bill came to $8.75. In the meantime the fresh water filling operation continued. And continued. After an extended wait for a phone approval from Visa, Yan took the payment slip to the skipper who was just topping off his water tank. "Here you go," said Yan, trading the Visa card and slip for the water hose.

As Yan coiled the hose, Lady's leader scribbled his name and asked, "Say, you guys got any tricks for getting more speed out of this boat?" He handed the white copy to Yan.

Yan paused in his coiling routine, his mind quick-stepping through several scenarios. "You ever see steam rising behind your boat as you go along?" he finally dead-panned, looking down at his coils.

"Yea. Now that you mention it, I do. What does it mean?"

Yan ignored the question. "Do you ever have any vibration when you are running the engines over 2,000 RPM?" he shouted innocently over his shoulder as he was returning the coiled hose to its place under the hand-lettered sign: CONSERVE WATER. SHORT SUPPLY.

"Yea, it seems like I do sometimes when I'm driving from inside." Worry flickered at the corners of the skipper’s mouth.

"Let's ask Mudge about it," Yan returned. He'd noticed Mudge coming back their way looking semi-official in his diesel-dirty coveralls.

"Say, Mudge," he said, "this fellow's seeing some steam aft and feeling some vibrations. Wants to know if it could be hurtin' his speed."

Mudge coasted to a stop and shoved his oily hands into his stained pockets. He looked up at the sky for inspiration. "Well, let me ask ya," and he tilted his big head down to the skipper, now dwarfed by the pair. "Does yur boat sit around in a marina, unused?"

"Well…" there was a pause. "Yea, most of the time," he admitted. "But I'm planning to give her a lot of time this year from now on," he continued a little defensively.

"Hmmmm." Mudge screwed up his bearded face. "Sounds to me like ya could have a case of oval shafts," he observed dryly. "And they can slow ya right down. When a boat’s too long sitting, its steel engine shafts get out round, they sag like an old face." Neither Mudge nor Yan looked at each other.

"Oval shafts? Never heard of such a thing! Impossible anyway," but there was a trace of doubt in his tone. The skipper was pressurizing now. "And besides, I had the boat hauled and looked at two weeks ago."

Mudge shrugged his shoulders and turned to go. Yan, a smile cracking his face, was pivoting the other way to exit the scene.

"Wait!" exclaimed the skipper. "What would sitting around have to do with the shafts?" He was torn between departing in a huff and facing the music.

Mudge unturned himself. "When shafts sit too long in one position, the weight settles in the middle and the shafts get outta round," he said slowly so the words could penetrate. "They teardrop. Get oval. Gravity, ya know.

"Once that happens, ya start getting an oscillyation, an up and down motion as the shaft turns. This causes two problems. Seen it many times. One," and he raised a blackened thumb, "the prop wobbles a bit in the water and heats up. Friction, ya know. This causes steam, the kind you see behind your boat. And two," an equally black index finger took a position perpendicular to the thumb (Mudge was European), "the oscillyation sometimes makes yur stuffing box jitter-and that gives ya the vibration you mentioned. End result, ya lose horsepower and eat up more fuel at the same time."

"Too bad," he trailed off, and once more he turned to go. Meanwhile, Yan had eased to a position about six feet away where he stood with his back to the pair looking across the bay, blue-gray eyes twinkling.

Lady's skipper looked anxious. "What does it take to fix?" he asked hurriedly, glancing at his pride and joy.

Once again Mudge unturned himself. "Well" and he scratched the side of his face through the salt & pepper grizzle, "Ya got two choices. One takes time; the other, money."

"Go on," ordered the skipper, jangling a little as he shifted from foot to foot.

"Ya can rotate the shafts so they are opposite the way ya had them when the boat was sitting so long. Leave 'em there for the same length of time and they will sag back to round." He paused, searching his soul. "The other thing ya can do is put in new shafts. And if ya do," he went on hastily," be sure and get ones with at least a ten-year, no sag guarantee. 'Decade Shafts,' we call 'em. That's all I ever use."

The skipper returned to his boat and with Yan's help walked it along the dock by hand to free up the fuel pumps. Lady's leader then disappeared aboard, hidden from view by the tinted windows. Two hours later he emerged and found his way through the yard of faded dreams to the machine shop to get more information about what Decade Shafts could do for Lady Garbanzo.

Copyright © 2013 Steven C. Brandt

Short Story: Brother Quid, Part II

(Scroll down main page for Part I.)  The ferry eased into the jaws of its landing slip. Once tied to shore, it disgorged its foot passengers. They surged up the car ramp to waiting friends, relatives, or emptiness. Friday Harbor is as far west as one can go in the USA, the end of the line. Only Canada remained and the ferry doesn’t go there in winter.

Quid was easy to spot. He stood out like a pimple, especially with the prison haircut. We bear-hugged at the top of the ramp. He is ten years my junior but more worldlier in terms of wine, women, and song. 

I take him to dinner at Downriggers, the only place open. After one beer, his first in at least a year, he jumps straight to the point. “I wanna learn how to win money at blackjack, lots of money.” Quid did not indulge in subtleties. “I’ve had enough of the odd-jobs bullshit.” He still had a Louisville twang in his voice, like a banjo.

“I already gave you the book on betting I co-authored after my stint at MIT.”

“I read it. Twice. But I need more help. I ain’t no whiz kid.” He looked down at the dinner remnants and I could no longer see the anchor tattoo on his Adam’s apple. I know it moves when he swallows.

Quid wants an easy route to understanding and beating casino-rules blackjack, an easy route to getting mildly rich. I had already explained, pre-jail time, that casinos were savvy about betting systems these days and it took a lot of patience to beat a casino in any significant way.

The next day he helped me with cottage chores. We ate a sandwich-and-soup lunch on my wooden boat, Spirit. He asked me to loan him $1,000 to buy a pickup. I said, I would even though it was about all the cash I had. I told him he could stay in my cottage for a few days—as long as he wanted to, really. The place is winterized. But he preferred to get moving. “This place is dead,” was his observation. "And I gotta get some sunshine. I'm going to Southern California." I invited him to visit me at home in Reno; he said he’d be there by the end of January. I left the next morning by floatplane to Seattle; then on to Reno on Southwest Air.

Quid arrived on schedule. I took him on a tour of my geology lab at UNR and out to a nightclub show. But at the end of the day, all he really wanted to do was play and learn blackjack.

I doubted he could, or would, ever discipline himself to memorize the maze of mathematical rules involved to beat a house at its own game. Even more I doubted he would be able to stop playing while he was ahead and able to exit a casino before he lost it all. And there was always the risk of the casino cops spotting him as a system player and tossing him out onto the street for “cheating,” as they termed. Regardless, I told him I would give him some training, starting tomorrow.

I did, and for four evenings straight after that—about three hours a day. Quid picked up the betting fundamentals. Next I gave him hints on how to conduct himself at the table so as to not draw attention. He had to come across as an amateur. It wouldn’t be much of a stretch for him.
Copyright © 2013 by Steven C. Brandt

Short Story: Brother Quid, Part I

I peek as the final shaft of sunlight cuts through the low clouds over the Strait of Juan de Fuca and scatters on the wave tops. Raindrops are sitting on the window of my battered Ford 150, nosed up to the edge of False Bay. The tide is out; the Bay looks like a mud pie. For the most part, I have my eyes closed and try to meditate. Daylight is almost gone and it is only four o’clock. Ahh, winter in the Northwest.

Inhale…exhale. Inhale…exhale. The events of the day intrude on my ritual. I can’t even get to six or seven complete breaths without recalling the phone call out of nowhere. Brother, Quid, had been granted parole and is on his way to our island “to get reacquainted.” I can guess what he has in mind. He and his girl friend, Melba, the Queen of Clean, had both been jailed for a long series of thefts on the island. She is still there. It is almost funny how they were caught.

Melba, as wide as she was tall, cleaned houses. Quid, a muscular guy, did odd jobs when he could find them. As it turned out, Melba’s cleaning work included stealing choice items from her wealthier, second-home clients’ homes, usually when the clients were “off island,” as being gone to the mainland is called by locals. Quid did his part by selling the stolen items in various ways, far and wide across the state. Their mistake was Melba’s putting a few items into the local, consignment shop one day while Quid was traveling. On a subsequent Saturday, an island resident noticed a nice painting on the wall as she was browsing through the shop, Funk & Junk. “That picture looks a lot like one I used to have,” she commented casually to the clerk, a teenager. The lady took a closer look. It was her picture, which had recently disappeared. The lady knew the sheriff, and the rest is history.

Quid had been a minor challenge to our family off and on for years. He served in the Navy and then twenty-five years in the Louisville fire department. He was often humorous; at the same time he had a mean streak in him and seemed to be a magnet for barroom brawls. His journey through time included a couple of marriages and a continuing series of girl friends. He discovered Melba when he visited me for a small family reunion I organized two years ago. “One woman is too much, and zero isn’t enough,” was a Quid original. It was, however, the mean streak that worried me.

I start my engine and glance in the rear-view mirror. A few sheep munch grass in the empty field across the rutted, unpaved road. I back out and around and head for town and the ferry landing. The boat from the mainland is due in at five. I have to meet it and see him before I head back home for Reno on Thursday.

Copyright © 2013 by Steven C. Brandt 

Big Chief & Lovers Leap at Tahoe

Many places around the world have their own lover’s leap, but few are as dramatic as the one on the North Shore of Lake Tahoe. This legend is about how Big Chief came to be.

Long ago after the lake was formed the Qua people had spread throughout the High Sierra and beyond. One large group of Quas lived winters in the foothills near Auburn, CA and summers on tranquil Carnelian Bay near the center of the North Shore of the great lake in the sky. The Quas fished the lake; and they hunted the forested lands running north towards today’s Mt. Pluto and northwestward to what they called the Big Gorge, today’s Truckee Canyon.

The Carnelian Bay Quas were a happy people largely because of the wisdom and spirit of their chief. According to E.B. Scott in The Saga of Lake Tahoe, the chief was so proficient in his leadership abilities that words could not describe his abilities. So his people gave him the title of “No-Name.” However, like Achilles, Chief No-Name had one vulnerability: He was very, very protective of his one daughter, Cedar Heart.

Cedar Heart was fragile, beautiful, and quite intelligent. She traveled regularly with her father in both summer and winter, so she knew many people in the Tahoe Region. However, Chief No-Name scared away any potential suitors who attempted to connect with Cedar Heart in any way. At the same time the Chief, in his private moments, wanted his daughter to wed and carry on the tribal customs that he had nurtured for many years.

During the extra-warm days early one August at Tahoe, a handsome brave from just beyond the mountains to the east (the Carson Range) entered the picture. He met Cedar Heart by chance on the white-sand beach known today as Sand Harbor. Before the month was out, he had won her love.

When she reported the romance to her father one morning and asked if he would welcome the brave to the tent. The brave was waiting outside. In a heartbeat Chief No-Name flew into an uncharacteristic rage, and he called for the immediate death of the young man. At once there was screaming and yelling and great commotion among the Quas.

Simultaneously the couple fled the camp together and headed on foot into the forest toward Mt. Pluto to the north. The Chief and his main men quickly followed in hot pursuit. Cedar Heart and her lover-to-be cut through the saddle between Mts. Pluto and Watson in an attempt to circle down hill to the bottom of the Big Gorge. There they hoped to hurry along the Truckee River to Squaw Valley…and up the valley to the Sierra Crest. At that point they would cross over the top, follow the established trail down to the American River, and travel on west to the green valleys of central California where they could be united forever.

E.B. Scott reports that the Great Spirit, “moved by the plight of the terrified couple, instantly started a tremendous storm that swept the forest.” Thunder roared and rain poured thought the treetops. Huge clouds blocked the sun and darkened everything, and the faint trails here and there became obscure. The couple became disoriented. At the same time, the Chief and his warriors were closing the gap.

Suddenly, Cedar Heart and her brave found themselves out in the open on the upper edge of the Big Gorge. For hundreds of feet below them there were sheer cliffs with sharp, wet granite rocks protruding at all angles. And at the very bottom was the winding river they so wanted to reach and cross.

Chief No-Name came howling out of the trees with his spear in hand; his warriors fanned out left to right. There was no chance for the couple to escape. They embraced, locked their arms around each other’s wet bodies, looked west, and leapt into space, tumbling together, slowly at first, into the yawning gorge that even today opens to the sky.

The Chief ran to the edge, not believing what he had seen, aghast at what he had done. There was no sign of Cedar Heart on the dark rocks below. He was seized with grief and despair. His life was over.

Kneeling on the slanted, flat surface from which the couple had departed, he beat his hands into the granite until they bled. The rain continued to slash into him as minutes turned to hours. His warriors blended back into the forest, fearful of their own lives.

The Chief looked to the heavens to implore the Great Spirit for help, but only more rain and thunder came in return. Chief No-Name seemed frozen in place, his face contorted as he slowly looked down, then up, then down into the abyss again.

At long last he started to rise, but the Great Spirit had wedded him to the grayish-brown rock high above the gorge. The Chief let out a long wale of anguish and stared once more into the great, storm-cloud-filled sphere above him. Then, ever so gradually, he sank into the cool granite until only the profile of his face—regal forehead, determined nose, strict mouth—remained, looking into the heavens, as it does still today.

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The author is indebted to E.B. Scott for his details on the Truckee Canyon and Lover's Leap in his wonderful book, The Saga of Lake Tahoe.

Copyright (c) 2013 Steven C. Brandt

Carnelian Bay on Dwellable