So Close

From Fred:

I like the transom idea better than the clinker applique. But, if I can presume to mumble some comments through the echo chamber of an almost empty beer bottle, I might ramble a bit about the inherent elegance of simple, graceful, unadorned utility. Most every element of any boat is, at its core, integral. Paint, for instance, is, first and foremost, a protective coating; color is a mere bonus. A figurehead, necessarily, wards off the mysterious evils of the sea. With a measured allowance for artful folly notwithstanding, this boat is being built for the water, and it seems to be close to its first meeting. So later, perhaps, when you find yourself missing stays as you tack up into strong breeze, you might consider the possibility of a wholesale alteration of your boat's lines and trim, and add a transom and rudder. Until then, it strikes me as a needlessly cruel step when you have come so far.

If, on the other hand, the process of making the boat has gained ascendancy over using the boat, then chop it up. It is your boat.

That being said, if I were you, so close to having a floating hull, I would be positively frothing to put it and myself in the water.

That's an interesting point. I have been thinking about that a lot lately, as the Project has been getting ever nearer being a Boat.

I think a lot of this has been about the process of building the boat. All of my thoughts and energies have been directed to that: completing the basic hull, and all of the ancillary add-ons that are to come. I've given very little thought to being on the water, enjoying its Boat-ness.

But upcoming is a beautiful weekend. My sister-in-law and her girls are coming up, and it would be great to be able to take them out in the boat - to have something completed to show off. Then I can start the adding-on.

To that end, I panicked at the thought of lopping off the end before it's glassed together: what if, by cutting the endpost stem, the sidewalls were able to force themselves apart and split the boat? Then I would have nothing.

So, I'm staying home today for a big awards presentation at Charlie's school: he's getting something big - so big the school won't even tell us what it is. After that, I'm fiberglassing. By Friday I will have a seaworthy craft. This weekend - Sunday - she will be launched.