Of beards and boats
07/09/13 05:06
A few years ago I was reading through some of my blog posts and realized that I was writing about the antics of our cats a bit too often. It was fairly natural. Among the inspirations for the blog were the photographs that I had taken. The cats were ready subjects for the camera. In the midst of my busy life the cats seemed to always be available when I had time to take a picture. So I vowed to quit writing about the cats for a while.
A quick look through recent blogs indicates that I’ve about exhausted the subject of paddling. With the good weather that we are enjoying, paddling has been my main form of exercise and it is easy to grab a camera as I head out to the lake in the wee hours of the morning. Often when I sit down to write the blog the next day I find that the only pictures I have taken are of the lake, the sunrise and the bow of my canoe.
So it might be time to put some effort into other topics for a while. The problem is that I’m not sure what topics would be best. They say that a writer should write what one knows and I know Sheridan Lake, its creatures and the different moods of the water and weather.
There are plenty of things about which I know very little. Today’s election in Australia is making world news. Since it is already tomorrow in Australia, the results are in and Tony Abbott is set to become the new Prime Minister of Australia. The victory of the Coalition over Labor turned into a landslide, which was a wider margin that predicted by the pundits. But I don’t really know much about the dynamics of Australian politics. I do envy the Australians the relatively short election season. I’ve read a couple of columns about how Australians are weary after a campaign that lasted 35 days. Wow! They should come to the United States where presidential campaigns are multiple-year adventures. Kevin Rudd’s extensive use of social media didn’t garner him a win. With more than 1.3 million followers, he is one of the world’s most popular elected leaders on Twitter. But it wasn’t enough to garner him the 400,000-vote margin he predicted. I guess having a new youth health policy and the name “Rudd dog” on Reddit just wasn’t enough to win the election.
If I don’t blog about Australian politics, perhaps I should give some attention to World Beard Day. Held on the first Saturday of September each year, observances go back centuries. The Vikings in Denmark had a special day marking the glory of beards bas as far as 800 AD. I think the original celebrations included the ransacking of neighboring towns, villages and countries by large groups of heavily-armed and heavily-bearded men. In southern Spain, there is a tradition of a boxing match between a bearded man and a beardless boy. Somehow it doesn’t seem like a fair match to me. I guess I would be OK to visit the Swedish village of Donskborg, where anyone without a beard is banished from the town and forced to spend twenty-four hours in a nearby forest. On the other hand, I wouldn’t want to live there. I like my clean-shaved friends and wouldn’t like to see them banned from my town. One article I read stated that shaving on world beard day is seen as highly disrespectful. Since I wear a trimmed beard, I shave parts of my cheeks and neck almost every day, but I can take a day off from the razor in honor of the world celebration. On the other hand, even though I’ve not been clean-shaven for 40 years, I don’t think I’d win any beard competitions. Most of the winners seem to have more than a half-inch of fuzz on their chins. Caring for such a beard seems like more work than this lazy guy is in for.
So that leaves me the topic of boats. We have a wonderful older Subaru with more than 218,000 miles on it that is a very good car for hauling boats. When I have my wooden canoes on the car, it seems to look just right. Having the boats on a newer car might detract attention away from the boats. And the car is faithful and dependable and always ready for a trip to the lake. Since I have more boats than cars, it frequently sports different looks. At the moment it has two creek boats on the roof. The creek boats are the only boats I have that are not wooden and they are shapes that I couldn’t easily make from wood. Furthermore they are often paddled in places where there are lots of rocks. They show the marks of having rubbed on the rocks in shallow areas of rivers and creeks. They were designed to take a beating and I haven’t been gentle with them. They aren’t ideal boats for the lake. They are designed to turn quickly and be very responsive, but they don’t track well for long-distance paddles.
I have the creek boats on the car because I need to spend some time practicing the skills of paddling on edge, spinning, balancing while I’m leaned way forward or way backward, etc. The skills and the muscles used to control the boats in the creek disappear without practice and I don’t want to let the summer go by without some good workouts with the short boats. I rarely paddle in rivers or creeks alone, however. Safety demands partners and a reasonable rescue plan for that kind of paddling. But I can take the boats out on the lake and do a little water dance and go through warmup exercises. I’m sure it looks a little silly seeing me spinning and paddling backwards and forwards on the edge of the boat, but it feels good to know that I haven’t completely lost the skills of that kind of paddling.
I’m sure that my neighbors, if they notice at all, are struck by the extravagance of one who owns more boats than any one person could possibly need. But then, again, I am struck by the extravagance of neighbors who trade cars way more often than seems reasonable and are always driving new and fancy vehicles. I can’t quite catch the desire for the motorcycles, jet skis, four-wheelers and snowmobiles that clutter the garages and storage units of my neighbors. I’m sure they don’t understand all of my boats.
Unlike the folks who chase the beardless ones from town on International Beard Day, I prefer to live among people who are different from me. I think it would be boring if all of my neighbors were as obsessed with boats as I.
I guess I’ll take my beard and boats to the lake.
So it might be time to put some effort into other topics for a while. The problem is that I’m not sure what topics would be best. They say that a writer should write what one knows and I know Sheridan Lake, its creatures and the different moods of the water and weather.
There are plenty of things about which I know very little. Today’s election in Australia is making world news. Since it is already tomorrow in Australia, the results are in and Tony Abbott is set to become the new Prime Minister of Australia. The victory of the Coalition over Labor turned into a landslide, which was a wider margin that predicted by the pundits. But I don’t really know much about the dynamics of Australian politics. I do envy the Australians the relatively short election season. I’ve read a couple of columns about how Australians are weary after a campaign that lasted 35 days. Wow! They should come to the United States where presidential campaigns are multiple-year adventures. Kevin Rudd’s extensive use of social media didn’t garner him a win. With more than 1.3 million followers, he is one of the world’s most popular elected leaders on Twitter. But it wasn’t enough to garner him the 400,000-vote margin he predicted. I guess having a new youth health policy and the name “Rudd dog” on Reddit just wasn’t enough to win the election.
If I don’t blog about Australian politics, perhaps I should give some attention to World Beard Day. Held on the first Saturday of September each year, observances go back centuries. The Vikings in Denmark had a special day marking the glory of beards bas as far as 800 AD. I think the original celebrations included the ransacking of neighboring towns, villages and countries by large groups of heavily-armed and heavily-bearded men. In southern Spain, there is a tradition of a boxing match between a bearded man and a beardless boy. Somehow it doesn’t seem like a fair match to me. I guess I would be OK to visit the Swedish village of Donskborg, where anyone without a beard is banished from the town and forced to spend twenty-four hours in a nearby forest. On the other hand, I wouldn’t want to live there. I like my clean-shaved friends and wouldn’t like to see them banned from my town. One article I read stated that shaving on world beard day is seen as highly disrespectful. Since I wear a trimmed beard, I shave parts of my cheeks and neck almost every day, but I can take a day off from the razor in honor of the world celebration. On the other hand, even though I’ve not been clean-shaven for 40 years, I don’t think I’d win any beard competitions. Most of the winners seem to have more than a half-inch of fuzz on their chins. Caring for such a beard seems like more work than this lazy guy is in for.
I have the creek boats on the car because I need to spend some time practicing the skills of paddling on edge, spinning, balancing while I’m leaned way forward or way backward, etc. The skills and the muscles used to control the boats in the creek disappear without practice and I don’t want to let the summer go by without some good workouts with the short boats. I rarely paddle in rivers or creeks alone, however. Safety demands partners and a reasonable rescue plan for that kind of paddling. But I can take the boats out on the lake and do a little water dance and go through warmup exercises. I’m sure it looks a little silly seeing me spinning and paddling backwards and forwards on the edge of the boat, but it feels good to know that I haven’t completely lost the skills of that kind of paddling.
I’m sure that my neighbors, if they notice at all, are struck by the extravagance of one who owns more boats than any one person could possibly need. But then, again, I am struck by the extravagance of neighbors who trade cars way more often than seems reasonable and are always driving new and fancy vehicles. I can’t quite catch the desire for the motorcycles, jet skis, four-wheelers and snowmobiles that clutter the garages and storage units of my neighbors. I’m sure they don’t understand all of my boats.
Unlike the folks who chase the beardless ones from town on International Beard Day, I prefer to live among people who are different from me. I think it would be boring if all of my neighbors were as obsessed with boats as I.