Connie’s Boat
By Gene Aronowitz
We were up at Connie Fenton’s place on Schroon Lake in the Adirondacks for the 4th of July weekend a while ago and Connie wanted to go out on her motorboat. I don’t think Connie had been out on the boat since Eric, her husband died about a year before. Eric was the captain of the ship and Connie didn’t know how to get the boat going. Linda, Carol Broderick, Connie, and I wanted to get to the middle of the lake where we would have a great view of the fireworks.
Connie has a neighbor who knew all about boating. We were all sitting in the boat ready to be instructed. Now picture this: there were three women, Connie, Carol, and Linda and then there was me. Who do you think he chose to explain things to? Obviously.
He taught me to start the boat and how to steer. Chest all puffed out, I took command of the ship. We traveled across the lake to the area where the fireworks were to be set off.
After the show, I started the boat and pointed it in the general direction of Connie’s dock. It was scary, first because it was dark and second because half of the people out there were drunk. There were several close calls on our way back.
We finally got to the dock area. Getting in there required a definite deftness. There were a lot of rocks in our path and I had to make a couple of very sharp turns, the last of which was in the direction of the boat’s birth. As we were heading straight for it, I realized that I had no idea how to stop the boat. I instinctively tried to press the brake, as one would do in a car. I freaked. I kept trying to find the break but it was dark and, of course, there was no brake pedal. It occurred to me that I could throw the engine into reverse but I had the sense that that would screw up everything. I was genuinely panicked when Carol calmly leaned over and turned the key to “off.” The motor stopped and the boat glided into its place.
The guy never taught me to stop. If he did, I could have done it.
Really.
