Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinuous and the Sea" (Part 2)

Our Man in Europe/dave delacroix/ "Antinuous and the Sea." (Part 2)



"It was a dark and stormy night, The Captain said, "Show us a light!" (Cigarette-thingy: ) The 1st. Mate said, "Alright." -as the ship went down."
-one of my father's - two Ports (Vino)  into da wind,  anecdotes.
But I digress?

Still alive on the 12-footer, good ship ARGONAUT (named after the Denver-Colorado Liquor store on East Colfax) - my recreation off South shore Sicily "trawling-thingy" hits a SNAG. My "trawl" net had caught something unwieldy and twixt the flowing (ebb?) tide and its (Da thingy caught in my trawl net) unwieldiness, initially causes a violent tug of war, almost to capsize the boat!
This lasts but, for about minute, something gives,  then I'm back in the Cyclops of the near shore cross-currents, the ones so feared by bathers; the RIP-TIDE.
No-worries. My lone sail worries the tide, the TIDE worries my near-onshore boat: We Argonauts are made of stern stuff especially when the boat - to all intents and purposes -  is a floating Cocktail Bar? And I had sufficiently recovered from the recent "jolt" to recline, relax at the helm, pour myself a fresh brewski and observe a large group of "Whale-Watchers" atop a nearby cliff with Cameras, Binoculars, Telescopes, and - could perceive -  that every Female within  that grouping had been surgically attached/en-joined with a Cell-phone at birth!...which postponed and distracted  my attention to my near oceanic  demise whilst, ah ah! -"Boating." Anyways? The ARGONAUTS ain't goin' no-place?" -I said to myself; "We're in the EYE of the bay?" -I put my Shades back on and reclined under the indolent flapping of my one lone sail and abstractly toyed with the  tiller/rudder-thingy.

Yet "something"  - within or without? - was stirring in my indolence: "Wad I catch with my Trawl? A rock?, a displaced chunk of coral, collided with a great white shark KNOWN to patrol these waters in search of fat, succulent Albacore? And as for my Trawl net ( €50!), it was - presumably? -  History!
(No refunds in Sicily, incidentally)... WHEN SUDDENLY (Tra-la!) This Negro/black-bronze- clenched fist, arm extended above a youth of  curl-frock ed head, literally FOUNTAINS UP from the depths in a hiss of sea spray, bangs against the boat and bobs up and down to the dynamic of the waves!
"DUDE!" -I exclaim, and rush to him as one who will save another from the cruel sea. But the sea jostles him away from the boat, his up stretched arm in some salute, his head and piercing eyes, directly upon me. Yet the sea urges him back to the boat and THIS time I can grasp his hand; a hand, ice cold, and of Bronze metal.


(Antinuous and the Sea, Part 3, next Sunday.)


c 2014/davedelacroix/ourmanineurope/piacenza-Italia.