“Spindrift!” He Cried And Rushed Below Deck

by Kirk Hathaway

My younger son lives in Greece with his mother, and his first U.S. visit two years ago since he left his homeland at the age of one was exciting enough.  He had a chance to see new countryside and meet a lot of my friends and family.  He also had a chance it get a little closer to the above shrimp trawler than would be comfortable.

I had just boarded my friends and son onto my 27-foot Watkins: Taj and Lynn, their sons Devraj and Neel, and my younger son, Aris.  We would have been underway but I realized I had left my mask and snorkel back at the jetty where we had been swimming and snorkeling.  I turned my kayak around toward the shore, jumped out at the shallows, and ran down the beach and across the hook to see if my mask was still there.  It wouldn’t be.  A wave, I suspect, pulled it in, making it two now I have given to the sea.

If that wasn’t bad enough, when I got back to the beach, my sailing vessel was gone, too.  Well, I realized a moment later it wasn’t gone, just under power, doing circles in the Cape Lookout bay.  I expected that my best friend, Tajit, was taunting me and forcing me to paddle after my own craft.  You know, the typical game of cat and mouse life long friends might play with one another.  Only, even friends shouldn’t mess with a captain’s boat.  But really, it was all worse than that.

When I paddled out to my sailboat and made my way aboard my craft to take over the helm, I was informed that only ten minutes after they had boarded, Neel, concerned, had said that they were getting very close to the trawler.   Tajit, paternally adept in guiding his sons toward reason, pointed out that the shrimper more likely was underway and certainly had a knowledgeable captain aboard leaving them nothing to worry about.  What else would he say; he wasn’t a sailor himself and had no idea how to manage my craft.

Yet, within minutes it became apparent that the two vessels were getting dangerously close, and being close, they could see no one was at the helm.  It was obvious in the same glance that my vessel and not theirs was adrift.  Taji and Devraj began making noise to get the trawler’s attention. Aris, screamed “Spindrift!” and rushed below deck to hide in the V-birth crying out in broken English they were all going to die.  Neel went below to comfort Aris.  And Lynn went for life preservers. 

About that time, I was exhausted from my run, disappointed from my loss of a mask, sulking slowly back to my kayak, and making no rush to return to my boat.  Though, of course, I should have been.

Within a minute or so, the trawler crew was on deck with the captain yelling at Taj to start his engine.  Familiar with North Carolina slang, I’m sure the words were coming out with a little more flavor than that.  Taj was explaining back in his strong but amiable manner that it wasn’t even his boat and that he had no idea how to start the engine or put it in gear.  Devraj in his quick-witted teenage years was standing by ready to do something, anything.  But the boat was drifting quickly on an outgoing tide, and the mast and spreaders were coming on quickly toward the shrimper’s hauling booms.  At this point it was only a matter of watching.

In Classical Greek theatre, there is a convention called deus ex machina.  It means “God by Machine.”  It is the convention in Greek tragedy (comedy and farce) of that impossible moment in a plot where the main character’s demise is all by certain.  In current terms, we say, “when his goose is just about cooked.”  Well, with nothing but death or destruction awaiting the Greek’s tragically flawed central character, the “deus ex machina” was literally an actor lifted by a crane device from the back wall of the theatre and set down onto the stage to provide deliverance, salvation as a masked “god” rather than condemnation of an unfortunate character about to go over the edge by his own doing. 

In contemporary film, we see the same situation time and again.  The main character, as likely as not Nicholas Cage, is faced against unquestionable odds.  He will die in the next beat of the film.  But instead there is a deus ex machina, a god by machine, which may be a helicopter rescuing his sorry state, a military jet wiping out his enemy, or a trusty pen in his pocket that he suddenly recalls turns into a bomb to be used against his foe (okay, that’s 007 and Cage hasn’t play that role, yet).

In any case, this wasn’t a film, nobody had a pen to bomb machina, and it was unlikely I was going to be delivered over the dunes to my boat.  I was certainly no god.  I couldn’t even find my own mask (a double entandre for those who understand the original productions of Greek plays).  So, no deus ex machina.  But, then again, art, as they say, mimics life, and sometimes life reflects back upon itself the most amazing picture.

Seconds before my sailing vessel was converted to a motor vessel with its mast, spreaders, and stays coming down and possibly risking all aboard,  the anchor chain of my vessel drifted over theirs and a few chirping links later my anchor bit into their chain, my ship’s line went tight, and this sailing vessel lurched to a stop only seconds prior to thousands of dollars of damage and possible injury—deus ex machina if ever there was one.  Well, deus for a second, at least, because a moment after momentum stopped it from drifting further backwards, it began to swing sideway.

Of course, there is always something to be said for a good crew.  My crew was over to the colliding side of the craft in a second and holding, pushing our boat off the high bow of the trawler.  The trawler captain had the opportunity to teach my suddenly promoted First Mate how to start the engine and get underway.  The captain’s crew motored a dingy out to unhook the saving anchor.  And all this occurred before I would eventually come over the dunes by foot pouting at my misfortune only to be immediately ticked at my friend who appeared to have the poor manners of doing playful circles with my boat out in the middle Cape Lookout Bay—of course in my native Midwestern slang, my call out to him would hold a more familiar flavor as I shouted from the beach and jumped into my kayak, only to realize minutes later all the mistakes I had made.

The prime mistake, of course, was boarding passengers on a vessel without able crew.  The second was to understand that currents behind the bight are strong, which doesn’t only mean two anchors at night but also means that the bottom is nearly cement hard, any loose sand swept out daily. A bite of an anchor at the Bight has to be certain with plenty of rode for the rise of tide…or your craft is going on its own voyage.  The last lesson is to always appreciate the voice of truth in the young.  Neel correctly saw the danger, and Aris in struggling English called it “spindrift.” Spindrift is the spray pushed by the wind off the top of a wave, but the origin of the words contains a valuable irony. “Spindrift: early 17th cent. (originally Scots): variant of spoondrift, from archaic spoon [run before wind or sea] + the noun drift.”  In fact, it was spindrift and only moments away from spinning out of control.

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