Doll Overboard! Mishap at Sea!

I recently finished one of the most wonderful books by Annie Proulx,  The Shipping News, which also mentions dolls and toys here and there.  Along with her story Broke Back Mountain, Proulx works her magic and makes setting and the natural landscape characters in her work.  Reading her is like reading a prose poem, and this story of the sea and Newfoundland with its boats, fishing, and shipwrecks is as much a miracle as the side stories of a man and a bird coming back to life after they were given up dead.  Even the crooked house on the rock that slides into the sea, so like the wonderful house in A Series of Unfortunate Events, is a triumph.  You feel the sea wind and smell the salt air; it's just terrific.

The boat wrecks Proulx describes are epic,  Yet, even a minor water mishap can have its issues.  We are no stranger to these things where I live on the banks of a great river.  Lincoln tried a case here when The Effie Afton hit the first railroad bridge across our river, and I once had to research the Seaman's Act and Grotius' The Law of the Sea after a sailor was hurt on a barge that sailed the middle  river.  We are often caught on our mechanical bridge when the stately American Queen sails by, and we even have our share of vampire stories, as retold in the novel, Fevre Dream.

The little riverboat captain above originally came from one of our riverboat casinos.  He sat on a shelf in my nautical themed bathroom, along with mermaids, shells, and other sea-related dolls.  I even have a big ceramic mermaid sitting in the tub.  I thought it would be a good idea to rinse out the tub, so I started to fill it.  About the same time I did this, my little captain plunged in head first!  "O Captain, O Captain!" cried I.  Thoughts of  The Rime of the Ancient Mariner went through my head, "I fear thee Ancient Mariner!!  I did a mental check of where my toy albatrosses were.

Luckily, I fished him out I time.  He now has a new home, albeit not water themed, but he won't be drenched.  The little captain very nearly went down with the ship.  I've had him about 25 years, and am glad all's well that ends well. Home is the Sailor.