The Homeless Millionaire

The light was much better the next day: it was sunny when I woke up. However, I felt so lazy I remained on the sofa for the best part of an hour, trying to fall asleep again. It was all that pot I'd smoked the previous day; I had a marijuana hangover.

I had been planning to draw and paint all day if the light was good, but I was feeling much too lazy for that. So I tried to get myself going by treating myself to a cold shower. I chickened out at the last moment, and had a hot one instead. I convinced myself that I deserved a reward for bringing home two full gas tanks, braving the waves and the elements and whatnot in the process.

I ate breakfast and washed up and I was still feeling incredibly lazy. So I gathered up all the pot I'd dried and it was really dry, it was crumbling in my fingers. I didn't have the right container to keep it in, so I ended up rolling four joints from all the pot that was in the pan. After a short hesitation I smoked one of those and I instantly felt better, energetic and motivated. But I still didn't feel like painting or drawing anything.

I tried to persuade myself with the argument that I should really create something brilliant for Harry's gallery-owning friend. But it was the wrong argument, because I knew for sure I wouldn't create anything brilliant that day. I was feeling quite contented and peaceful and that was the wrong feeling to have when attempting to create something good. At least that was how it worked in my case. Maybe there were some lucky guys who were capable of creating outstanding stuff when they were relaxed and happy. I wasn't one of them.

In the end, I decided I'd visit Lion's Bay. I was getting to be quite confident about handling the boat, so that wasn't the problem. But money was a problem. I knew that I'd end up spending some if I went. Worse, I actually felt like spending some. I felt like treating myself to a meal that I didn't have to cook and having a few drinks, that kind of stuff.

It was a stupid and irresponsible thing to do, so I did it. My final argument to myself was that I had to call Roch (thus spending even more money) to find out what was going on at his end.

I dressed and copied Roch's number onto a piece of paper and put it in my pocket along with cigarettes and my new Zippo lighter. Then I went down to the boat and spent fifteen minutes bailing out the rainwater that had accumulated inside. It was chilly outside and I attempted to persuade myself to stay, but I just grew more determined to leave. Nothing could keep me from sticking my head into the lion's mouth, and going to Lion's Bay.

I was there twenty minutes later, having made the trip without any misadventures. Amazingly, the sun was still shining brightly and everything looked beautiful and inviting, even the mountains. I moored the boat like a fucking professional and set out along the now-familiar route to the post office and general store. The store had a sort of small café operating where everything was quite expensive, but I just had my heart set on a meal and a drink.

I decided that I would eat and drink first, and call Roch after that: being outside was giving me an appetite, that was for sure. When I got there, I found the store was closed. So was the cafe. So was the post office. It was Sunday, an out-of-tourist-season Sunday.

There was a payphone outside the post office, but I had no change except for a nickel and some pennies. I was fucked. I wondered what to do next, and nothing made sense.

In the end I just spent some time wandering around Lion's Bay. The whole place consisted of half a dozen residential streets lined with free-standing houses and lush gardens. All the activity I saw consisted of people raking dead leaves off their lawns. I remembered that the shop at the marina had been open when I came in, so I went down there and found that they'd closed up in the meantime.

I smoked another couple of cigarettes standing near the pier and admiring the view—it really was something to admire, in the sunlight. There were some weekend sailors around: I saw a couple working on their boats. There wasn't a single sailboat out in the bay, maybe because there was next to no wind, just a feeble breeze.

I got into my own boat and cast off and had a hell of a lot of trouble starting the engine. It just wouldn't fire. Finally it dawned on me that I'd been priming the carburetor like a maniac, and that I'd likely flooded the engine.

There was no toolbox on the boat; the only option was to shout for help from the weekend sailors, and I couldn't bring myself to do that. So I just sat in the boat and smoked a cigarette while drifting out into the bay.

By the time I'd finished smoking I was a couple of hundred yards away from shore, and the weather was changing. Dark clouds were racing in over the mountains, and I felt a twinge of fear. I had a go at the engine and it still refused to start. The feeble breeze was growing muscles, too.

I grabbed the paddle and steered towards the shore but that was against the wind, and I made very little headway. After five minutes of frenzied paddling, I still was at least a hundred yards from the shore. By then, the breeze had turned into an offshore wind that actually pushed the boat backward whenever I stopped paddling for a few seconds.

I tried to reach the shore with a diagonal approach, but the wind kept pushing the boat sideways into the bay. I got really paranoid about getting swept out into the fucking Pacific. I started paddling as hard as I could on a northern course, with the wind pushing me a yard sideways to every two that I moved forward.

I still held on to a faint hope I'd be able to hit the small peninsula that jutted out of the mainland near Brunswick Beach, but by the time I reached it the wind had blown me another hundred yards out. By then, clouds had completely filled the sky and I heard the rumble of faraway thunder.

I kept going, trying to stick to a northern course. The palms of my hands developed blisters that quickly burst, and paddling became very painful business. Visibility was poor and getting worse and I got a shock when all of a sudden I saw a clump of rocks sticking out of the water right in the middle of the fucking bay, dead ahead on my wind-adjusted course.

There was no way I could pass them and they looked like they could do a lot of damage. So I just stopped paddling and drifted west, passing no more than twenty yards away from them.

The boat actually hit the tip of a submerged rock with its bow, but it scraped free with an ugly sound that made my heart go right up to my throat. If I'd hit that hidden rock while going at speed, it would have knocked a hole in the hull.

By then I became confident that at worst I'd drift onto the shore of the big island west of mine, and I wasn't feeling so scared. It started raining, a fine drizzle that felt like sand when it hit my face.

I had lifted the engine out of the water to make paddling easier, but I hadn't properly locked it in position and now it fell back into the water with a splash. I grabbed its handle instinctively and something inspired me to grab the starter line, and give it a pull.

The engine fired up. I whooped with joy: the rain was getting heavier, it wasn't a drizzle any more, and lightning flashed in the clouds over the bay. It really was high time to go home.

I wasn't far from the southern shore of my island by then, so I just followed the coast to Harry's pier. I misjudged the moment to cut the engine, and hit the pier with a bump that nearly made me fall into the water. I spent several very long minutes making the boat secure: tying a proper knot with the wet rope was a real bastard. It was raining like hell by the time I was done, and I was wet through when I finally made it inside the house.

I was hungry and cold to the bone. I got a fire going in the fireplace and drank several beers while cooking an enormous dinner of fried sausage and potatoes and baked beans. By the time I ate it, I was close to falling asleep on my feet.

All my fears and anxieties were gone. Overcoming danger was great therapy. It didn't make sense to dodge danger, because then it continued to have an effect as long as you lived.. I was feeling fucking invincible when I fell asleep.