Friday, September 29, 2023

Here are some stories from Joe

 
Listening to Joe May's stories over the years I'm sure people wished he'd write a book. I encouraged him a couple of times and even offered to help but he would have none of it. However,  he did write shorter pieces at times and posted them on Facebook. Always with his permission I published several of them on my blog. Listed below are links to the ones I could locate in case anyone would like to spend a little time with Joe.

About the photo: Sandra and Charlie on steering watch somewhere in SE, Alaska probably Lisianski Strait, around 1990...in the rain. We traveled for ten years in an open cockpit boat with no overhead protection (because I didn't think it belonged on a Redningskoit , (a traditional Atkin pilot cutter) and my thought was "if you can't celebrate tradition honestly you might as well stay home". My oft declared contention was that boaters in stuffy cabins and beneath canvas covers suffered from severe environmental deprivation. Over parts of two oceans, the Gulf of Mexico, the Great Lakes, the Mississippi, Illinois, Tennessee Rivers, and the Erie Canal we never once suffered the effects of that defect. Rain, wind, sun, and even snow were daily companions. I thought I had gotten it right...some days or nights more right than others.
Until recently, upon returning jubilantly from an oncologists appointment to announce the latest scans pronounced the cancer dragon dead, dead, dead. The good news was accompanied by, "Gonna go out and find another old wooden boat...missed Galapagos and Cape Horn on the last trip...whopeee!!!".
A pregnant silence followed, "you will need to find a new cook and boat dog, Joe. You're 88, I'm 81. and Charlie died 15 years ago".
Maybe Cape Horn was asking too much.
Reality is sometimes hard.
Maybe Cape Horn was a stretch.

 The Ghosts of Candle's Fairhaven

To build a fire (with an apology to Jack London)

2 Marines took the Korean conflict to a whole new level

A baby named Israel

Memo from the creek — Christmas 1972

Warning, childhood memories ahead  Bear with me on this one, you have to wade through my memory before you get to Joe's.

Ramblings in a mental wilderness   This is another one where you have to wade through my stuff (or you can just scroll down a ways)

Up a creek

We will rebuild  we shared an earthquake in 2018

 Joe May Old cabins have a soul, and each its own character. With age they settle into the earth from whence they came. With temperature changes they creak and groan and shift,

seeking comfort, like duffers in rocking chairs.
Rehabilitation is a study in patience, frustration, and eventually...satisfaction. 

Crooked windows, crooked doors,
crooked walls and slanted floors.
Original builder unaware,
of plumb-bob and levels,
and framing square.
 
Here's a list of comments on the book we both participated in writing Iditarod, the first10 years
 
y, make it this one from my friend Joe May.

Joe May

 C deck: An essay by an old Marine.

More than six decades ago I was an overnight patient on “Consolation”, a Navy hospital ship anchored in Inchon harbor. The ship was full to capacity...the only available empty bunk was in the psycho ward three decks down. For a place to sleep for a single night I had to give up my boots, belt, and metal dog tags. I was sequestered in a locked compartment with an orderly and a dozen crazy guys, Marine and Army, half of them certifiably bonkers, and half of them faking it to get out of Korea. At mealtimes we were marched to the mess hall under guard—everyone we passed staring at the “crazies”. We slept with the lights on, someone watching...always...there were no lamp cords and the bathroom had no door. The memory of that 24 hours will be with me forever.
Years later, in a VA hospital in the middle of America, I found myself in the place where those who had been irreparably damaged in past wars were “stored”...human wreckage reaching back to WW11. Wheelchairs occupied by “empty” men in bath robes were pushed down long corridors by white-coated orderlies while others shuffled along in slippers, to the end of the corridor, and back again, and back again, and back again. I was there only a few days and on leaving felt I had just escaped from hell. Over subsequent decades, in other VA hospitals, I always imagined there was a similar corridor, hidden away somewhere to hide the detritus of war...so the rest of us wouldn't be discomfited or somehow feel guilty. In time, in subtle ways, I became as marked as the men in the corridors.
A VA representative recently offered me a seat on an “Honor” flight to D.C. for a tour of the monuments and memorials – a well-meaning gesture by a grateful nation intended to recognize “duffer vets”. I declined – I don't need a reminder of the past; it's never left me. It's reminder enough on national holidays to see the usual posse of narcissistic gray-beards on the evening news, on flag decked Harley's, “posturing” down Pennsylvania Ave; “LOOKIT ME!! LOOKIT ME!! LOOKIT ME!!
Some of us don't hang a flag on the side of our house, or wear military badges, buttons, or pointy caps, or march in parades, or belly-ache about the government, or denigrate our President – rather, we wear pride in self and service on the inside, salute the flag when it passes, quietly honor the memory of those who didn't come home...and still grieve for the guys on C deck..JM
 

A short from the road by Joe:
While on a road trip between Fairbanks and Whitehorse on a moonlit winter night in the long ago John Balzar, author of "Yukon Alone", was riding with me...two of us on some mission for the Quest. John was a writer for the LA Times and was both covering the race and gathering material for a book. The road that night was a riot of rabbits reveling in the moonlight, as they sometimes do. Somewhere around Haines Junction I commented that there were more road-killed rabbits on the Canadian side of the border than on the Alaska side. A pause and John dropped a pregnant, "why?", into the darkness of the truck cab. I don't remember exactly what I told him but the explanation was the highlight of a shameless career of “putting on” journalists from south of “fifty”. Over the next forty miles of potholes, frost-heaves, and flattened rabbits I convinced him that it was fact, that there was evidence proving that Canadian rabbits were slower than Alaskan rabbits...and he believed it. There's no moral to this story. It's just a cautionary tale.. .probably something to do with the veracity of salty old dog drivers. Tim Jones and Slim Randles would understand."  
 
Here's a comment from my friend Joe May who lives not too far from the East Pole: "Got two snowfalls of a foot each, a day apart. Blew up the old snow blower on the first one. Got to Wasilla for a replacement between falls. Now gone to 40 deg and I've got yogurt in the driveway. Ahhh, but the struggle continues – wouldn't have it any other way – the alternative is playing shuffleboard with old farts in Florida and that isn’t my game."
 
ON THE TRAP LINE: 
Joe May
Crossing open streams/rivers without a bridge: Excerpted from a Quest related piece I wrote for SDC. long ago.
"I once had a nasty overflow creek on a trapline. To cross it, on memorable occasions, I pre-gathered a pile of dry firewood, twigs, and bark atop the sled bag, tied my boots, pants, and long johns around my neck, stripped down to one pair of socks, grabbed the leaders neckline, and hauled ass for the far side, sometimes knee and once belly deep. That may sound extreme, but you see, for ten minutes of discomfort I had the creek behind me, dry clothes on, a hot fire, tea heating, and I was fit to go to work drying dogs and harness. Provided you're not in the water very long, even at -30F, it isn't threatening until you come out, with or without wet clothes. The trick is to plan ahead to avoid protracted wetting".
 
ONE MORE THING This is the last of Joe's writing I saved. I haven't published it until now because I couldn't understand the part at the end about building the mast. The whole piece was triggered when a woman became the first to win an  Around the world race, and Joe recognized a connection with her. Have fun:
 Last week amid the school shootings, political battles, jerk fired from Fox and all the other distressing news an event unfolded off the coast of France that served to remind us there is joy in the world too. It slipped past most of the talking heads of big-time television news, so if you missed it, here's the story.

April 27 South African sailor Kristen Neuscheafer sailed her boat across the finish line to win the 2023 Golden Globe world-rounding race alone. It took her about 235 days and she set a time record for the race in addition to being the first woman to win it.

The following was posted on facebook by a contributor who goes by the name goodthingsguy and followed the race is it unfolded.

From goodthingsguy

(Be sure to read down to the part where she went out of her way to rescue another racer.)

Kirsten Neuschäfer has become the first woman to win the Golden Globe Race — a solo, round-the-world yacht race!

After almost 235 days at sea, the South African sailor from Gqeberha, South Africa, crossed the finish line off Les Sables d’Olonne in France at 9 p.m. on 27 April 2023 and became the first woman to win the round-the-world race.

This edition of the Golden Globe Race started on Sept. 4, 2022, with 16 competitors, all men, except for Kirsten. At the time of her finish, only three competitors (herself, Tomy, and Michael Guggenberger, who was still 1,800 miles to the finish) remained in the running. Two more (Simon Curwen and Jeremy Bagshaw - also a South African) were racing in the “Chichester class”, a class created for those disqualified for making a stop but who wanted to continue to the finish anyway.

But this incredible sailor didn’t just win the race; she also won our hearts.

Kirsten made headlines earlier in the race when she stopped to help a fellow competitor!

The kind South African diverted from her race route to rescue fellow entrant Tapio Lehtinen after his Gaia 36, Asteria, sank around 450 miles southeast of South Africa. Kirsten was the closest sailor to him, 95 miles away, and was able to reach him in fewer than 24 hours, taking him aboard her Minnehaha from his life raft and later transferring him to a merchant ship that had been diverted to the scene. She earned the 2022 Cruising Club of America’s Rod Stephens Seamanship Trophy for this rescue.

Good Things Guy has been following and reporting on Kirsten’s journey since the start of the race. And we couldn’t be prouder of the incredible South African and her fantastic win!

Yes, proudly South African… and PROUD of South Africa! ❤️🇿🇦

You can read her full story or more South African good things by visiting his web site at www.goodthingsguy.com.

 

But our story doesn't stop there. Joe May, a friend of mine who is no stranger to long-distance racing alone having won the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in 1980 and has sailed the big oceans too, wondered in a comment if there was any information about her boat That led me to her web page where I found the following:

From Kirsten's Web page

"Kirsten’s racing boat is Minnehaha. 

"Minnehaha is a Cape George 36, launched in 1988. She was built in the Cape George yard in Port Townsend, Washington. 

"This boat design was created by Cecil Lange, an esteemed boat builder. With the help of Ed Monk, a designer, the Cape George 36 is a fiberglass adaptation of the Tally Ho Major, Atkins 1930s boat. 

"Minnehaha is a fictional Native woman from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's 1855 poem "The Song of Hiawatha." She is the lover of the poem's primary character, Hiawatha. The name Minnehaha is said to mean "laughing water' in the poem. It more accurately translates to "waterfall'' in the Dakota Sioux language. "

I didn't feel right taking more than that from her site, so here is the link if you want to know more. Kirsten Neuschäfer  She also posted videos on YouTube that can be found by searching her name.

With the news about her boat's history, my friend Joe realized that he came close to crossing paths with Kirsten in Port Townsend as he was there in 1988 and that opens the flood gates. This is how Alaska legends grow.

From Joe May:

Amazing: I was in the Lange shop in Port Townsend summer of 88 while looking for my own boat. Friends worked there and likely worked on her boat. One was on the floor being laid up and we watched the work.

Atkin modified a Colin Archer Redningskoit design for this line of hulls, as he did my own. I recognized the cutter rig he used so often.

I'll bet she had whole front half stuffed with cheese whiz and crackers.

Metal work was undoubtedly from "New Found Metal" and the sticks of old growth spruce and Doug fir from the yard just out of town.

A New-Zealander who was a friend ran the yard crew and bought out Lange a year or two later. Small world.

All kinds of bells going off: I maybe bought mast wood from the same pile when we built a new one there a bit later.

Joe and friends load mast for trip to boat yard.

San (Joe's wife) and I fabricated a round, hollow mast (55 'L-7" dia) over a winter in a rented chicken house in Port Townsend around that time...from old growth
With a little help from friends

Sitka spruce, scarfed to length and gallons of epoxy. A professional wooden boat friend came up once a week to check on our work and offer opinions and advice.

I can still smell the glue and have been allergic to it ever since. Only counter measure was local fish & chips and Oly beer. Photo is friends loading finished mast for trip to the boat yard...6 AM through the middle of town.

SEEKING ANSWER Started life as a pile of 2 x 6 x 16' Sitka old growth spruce planks. The pile about equal to the same size pile of $50 bills.

Evolved into a 55" tapered box gusseted on the inside corners to accommodate later rounding.

Joe's wife San checks the clamps  on the mast.

Evolved into 8 sided, 16 sided, and finally to 32 sided, after which it was planed and sanded to final shape. Round, 7" dia. at the base, 8" dia where it broached the deck (keel stepped) and 4" at the mast head. Much tricky (nervous) gluing as open time for our epoxy was about 45 minutes. An error would have resulted in a lot of very expensive firewood. Winter in an unheated building and the mix had to also be adjusted for ambient temperature. Took two months and a truck load of Oly beer to complete.

On completion my wife Sandra said, "once in a lifetime...never, ever, ever again."

To which I replied, "I've noticed she says that a lot.

                                                     Crossing the finish line.  
 
 
All right one more and this ones even more personal and maybe selfish, but Joe once heaped the greatest praise I have ever received on something I wrote. 
First his comments:
One: Really nicely written, Tim. Almost lost my breakfast just reading it.
Put me into a very similar situation sailing through a tropical depression in the Gulf of Mexico on my own boat many years ago. Most lasting memory of that night: My wife Sandra sat on the opposite side of the open cockpit of our 35 foot Colin Archer helping me hold the 8 foot monster tiller against the force of a quartering sea. A breaking wave reared up behind her and crashed on her head filling her boots and pockets. We were making for a lee behind an island as you were. Out of the froth and darkness came her normally understated English drawl, "if there's a G.. D..... ferry from this island to the mainland, I'M on it". Thanks for posting this, Tim. Made the day for this old sailor.
 
Two: I've read about everything by Hiscock, Tristan Jones, et al and I've never read anything better about the last place I wish to be on a dark and stormy night.
I had loran C and the first comment on it was right on. Especially in Alaskan waters. Uptown in Ketchikan or on a mountain top.
In the Gulf of Mexico storm a white egret landed on deck and stayed with us all night. I guess he was just tired of flying in the wind. When daylight came left us. He even hopped over the hatch splash sill and went below for awhile. We were strapped in and unable to stop him.
When I got a clean cancer report recently I told San I was going to look for another old wooden boat. She said, "you will need a new deckhand, Joe".
 
 
Now if you aren't tired out yet here's that story: Singin' them songs about them storms at sea 
 

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Best headlines ever

Naked pair fed LSD gummy worm to dog

Owners of a Noah's Ark replica file a lawsuit over rain damage

In Southcentral Alaska earthquake, damage originated in the ground, engineers say

A headline that could only be written in Alaska: At state cross country, Glacier Bears and Grizzlies sweep, Lynx repeat, Wolverines make history — and a black bear crosses the trail

Man kills self before shooting wife and daughter

Alabama governor candidate caught in lesbian sperm donation scandal

Sister hits moose on way to visit sister who hit moose.

Man caught driving stolen car filled with radioactive uranium, rattlesnake, whiskey

Man loses his testicles after attempting to smoke weed through a SCUBA tank

Church Mutual Insurance won't cover Church's flood damage because it's 'an act of God'

Homicide victims rarely talk to police

Meerkat Expert Attacked Monkey Handler Over Love Affair with Llama Keeper

GOP congressman opposes gun control because gay marriage leads to bestiality

Owner of killer bear chokes to death on sex toy

Support for legalizing pot hits all-time high

Give me all your money or my penguin will explode

How zombie worms have sex in whale bones

Crocodile steals zoo worker's lawn mower

Woman shot by oven while trying to cook waffles

Nude beach blowjob jet ski fight leads to wife's death

Woman stabs husband with squirrel for not buying beer Christmas Eve

GOPer files complaint against Democrat for telling the truth about Big Lie social posts

Man shot dead on Syracuse Street for 2nd time in 2 days

Alaska woman punches bear in face, saves dog

Johnny Rotten suffers flea bite on his penis after rescuing squirrel

Memorable quotations

The best way to know you are having an adventure is when you wish you were home talking about it." — a mechanic on the Alaska State Ferry System. Or as in my own case planning how I will be writing it on this blog.

"You can't promote principled anti-corruption without pissing off corrupt people." — George Kent

"If only the British had held on to the airports, the whole thing might have gone differently for us." — Mick Jagger

"You can do anything as long as you don't scare the horses." — a mother's favorite saying recalled by a friend

A poem is an egg with a horse inside” — anonymous fourth grader

“My children will likely turn my picture to the wall but what the hell, you only get old once." — Joe May

“Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut.” — Ernest Hemingway

When I write, I feel like an armless, legless man with a crayon in his mouth. Kurt Vonnegut

“If you wrote something for which someone sent you a cheque, if you cashed the cheque and it didn't bounce, and if you then paid the light bill with the money, I consider you talented.”Stephen King

The thing about ignorance is, you don't have to remain ignorant. — me again"

"It was like the aftermath of an orgasm with the wrong partner." – David Lagercrants “The Girl in the Spider’s Web.”

Why worry about dying, you aren't going to live to regret it.

Never debate with someone who gets ink by the barrel" — George Hayes, former Alaska Attorney General who died recently

My dear Mr. Frost: two roads never diverge in a yellow wood. Three roads meet there. — @Shakespeare on Twitter

Normal is how somebody else thinks you should act.

"The mark of a great shiphandler is never getting into situations that require great shiphandling," Adm. Ernest King, USN

Me: Does the restaurant have cute waitresses?

My friend Gail: All waitresses are cute when you're hungry.

I'm not a writer, but sometimes I push around words to see what happens. – Scott Berry

I realized today how many of my stories start out "years ago." What's next? Once upon a time?"

“The rivers of Alaska are strewn with the bones of men who made but one mistake” - Fred McGarry, a Nushagak Trapper

Many people hear voices when no one is there. Some of them are called mad and are shut up in rooms where they stared at walls all day. Others are called writers and they do pretty much the same thing. – Meg Chittenden

A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity. – Franz Kafka

We are all immortal until the one day we are not. – me again

If the muse is late, start without her – Peter S. Beagle

Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. ~Mark Twain Actually you could do the same thing with the word "really" as in "really cold."

If you are looking for an experience that will temper your vanity, this is it. There's no one to impress when you're alone on the trap line. – Michael Carey quoting his father's journal

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. – Benjamin Franklin

It’s nervous work. The state you need to write in is the state that others are paying large sums of money to get rid of. – Shirley Hazzard

So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence -- Bertrand Russell

You know that I always just wanted to have a small ship to take stuff from a place that had a lot of that stuff to a place that did not have a lot of that stuff and so prosper.—Jackie Faber, “The Wake of the Lorelei Lee”

If you attack the arguer instead of the argument, you lose both

If an insurance company won’t pay for damages caused by an “act of God,” shouldn’t it then have to prove the existence of God? – I said that

I used to think getting old was about vanity—but actually it’s about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial. – Eugene O’Neill

German General to Swiss General: “You have only 500,000 men in your army; what would you do if I invaded with 1 million men?”

Swiss General: “Well, I suppose every one of my soldiers would need to fire twice.”

Writing is the only thing that when I do it, I don’t feel I should be doing something else.—Gloria Steinem

Exceed your bandwidth—sign on the wall of the maintenance shop at the West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Center

One thing I do know, if you keep at it, you usually wind up getting something done.—Patricia Monaghan

Do you want to know what kind of person makes the best reporter? I’ll tell you. A borderline sociopath. Someone smart, inquisitive, stubborn, disorganized, chaotic, and in a perpetual state of simmering rage at the failings of the world.—Brett Arends

It is a very simple mind that only knows how to spell a word one way.—Andrew Jackson

3:30 is too late or too early to do anything—Rene Descartes

Everything is okay when it’s 50-below as long as everything is okay. – an Alaskan in Tom Walker’s “The Seventymile Kid”

You can have your own opinion but you can’t have your own science.—commenter arguing on a story about polar bears and global warming

He looks at three ex wives as a good start—TV police drama

Talkeetna: A friendly little drinking town with a climbing problem.—a handmade bumper sticker

“You’re either into the wall or into the show”—Marco Andretti on giving it all to qualify last at the 2011 Indy 500

Makeup is not for the faint of heart—the makeup guerrilla

“I’m going to relax in a very adult manner.”—Danica Patrick after sweating it out and qualifying half an hour before Andretti

“Asking Congress to come back is like asking a mugger to come back because he forgot your wallet.”—a roundtable participant on Fox of all places

As Republicans go further back in the conception process to define when life actually begins, I am beginning to think the eventual definition will be life begins in the beer I was drinking when I met her.—me again

Hunting is a “critical element for the long-term conservation of wood bison.”—a state department of Fish and Game official explaining why the state would not go along with a federal plan to reintroduce wood bison in Alaska because the agreement did not specifically allow hunting

Each day do something that won’t compute – anon

I can’t belive I still have to protest this shit – a sign carriend by an elderly woman at an Occupy demonstration

Life should be a little nuts or else it’s just a bunch of Thursdays strung together—Kevin Costner as Beau Burroughs in “Rumor has it”

You’re just a wanker whipping up fear —Irish President Michael D. Higgins to a tea party radio announcer

Being president doesn’t change who you are; it reveals who you are—Michelle Obama

Sports malaprops

Commenting on an athlete with hearing impairment he said the player didn’t show any “uncomfortability.” “He's not doing things he can't do."

"… there's a fearlessment about him …"

"He's got to have the lead if he's going to win this race." "

"Kansas has always had the ability to score with the basketball."

"NFL to put computer chips in balls." Oh, that's gotta hurt.

"Now that you're in the finals you have to run the race that's going to get you on the podium."

"It's very important for both sides that they stay on their feet."

This is why you get to hate sportscasters. Kansas beats Texas for the first time since 1938. So the pundits open their segment with the question "let's talk about what went wrong." Wrong? Kansas WON a football game! That's what went RIGHT!

"I brought out the thermostat to show you how cold it is here." Points to a thermometer reading zero in Minneapolis.

"It's tough to win on the road when you turn the ball over." Oh, really? Like you can do all right if you turn the ball over playing at home?

Cliches so embedded in sportscasters' minds they can't help themselves: "Minnesota fell from the ranks of the undefeated today." What ranks? They were the only undefeated team left.

A good one: A 5'10" player went up and caught a pass off a defensive back over six feet tall. The quote? "He's got some hops."

Best homonym of the day so far: "It's all tied. Alabama 34, Kentucky 3." Oh, Tide.

"Steve Hooker commentates on his Olympic pole vault gold medal." When "comments" just won't do.

"He's certainly capable of the top ten, maybe even higher than that."

"Atlanta is capable of doing what they're doing."

"Biyombo, one of seven kids from the Republic of Congo." In the NBA? In America? In his whole country?

"You can't come out and be aggressive but you can't come out and be unaggressive."

"They're gonna be in every game they play!"

"First you have to get two strikes on the hitter before you get the strikeout."

"The game ended in the final seconds." You have to wonder when the others ended or are they still going on?

How is a team down by one touchdown before the half "totally demoralized?"

"If they score runs they will win."

"I think the matchup is what it is"

After a play a Houston defender was on his knees, his head on the ground and his hand underneath him appeared to clutch a very sensitive part of the male anatomy. He rolled onto his back and quickly removed his hand. (Remember the old Cosby routine "you cannot touch certain parts of your body?") Finally they helped the guy to the sideline and then the replay was shown. In it the guy clearly took a hard knee between his thighs. As this was being shown, one of the announcers says, "It looks like he hurt his shoulder." The other agrees and then they both talk about how serious a shoulder injury can be. Were we watching the same game?

"Somebody is going to be the quarterback or we're going to see a new quarterback."

"That was a playmaker making a play.”