JUNE 13, 2021 – I want to be two things when I grow up: 1. Airline pilot; and 2. Sea captain. Meanwhile, I’m in training. My car works as an airplane, and I drive as if I’m a student pilot. This brings me pleasure at the same time it improves my concentration. On the water, our new pontoon works as a suitable substitute for a . . . cruise ship.
Thus far this summer I’ve taken 10 voyages aboard the pontoon, which, if it were mine and not my gift to my wife, I’d name Northern Comfort—a name she rejected without having supplied an alternative. In the meantime, it goes by WS 99973 ES. I love launching, cruising, and landing the good “ship,” named or numbered.
Our lake has 3,100 acres of surface area and 10.5 miles of shoreline. Its general shape is oval, with a few irregularities just to mix things up. In other words, Grindstone Lake works great as “Little Earth,” much as Como Park Golf Course—my skiing and hiking zone at home in the cities—works as “Little Switzerland.” The “United States” occupies the south shore, where a number of American flags flap away unabashedly atop tall poles. Our shoreline is northern Europe, where on occasion you’ll see Swedish and Norwegian flags flown . . . as symbols of resistance.
When I was a teenager, I’d sail (an actual sailboat) all around “Little Earth” . . . and beyond, meaning, I’d sail through the channel and into an adjoining lake, and tour the far side of the moon. Those voyages of discovery laid the groundwork—er, “waterwork”?—for today’s odysseys aboard the pontoon.
Pontoons are the vessel of choice on our lake—and other lakes across the region. Bigger than my sailboat, and longer than the runabout we used to own(with twice the horsepower than our pontoon engine), I skipper the pontoon at a quiet and leisurely pace, slightly over 2,000 rpms. My favorite maneuver, though: landing it—in a fierce cross-wind—squarely onto the solar-powered lift.
While my wife lounges on one of the spacious bench seats up front (what I call, the “verandah suite”), I stand at the wheel and scan the waters for other vessels. My wife has no idea how much I enjoy pretending that my hat with the wide floppy brim and chin strap is a snappy captain’s cap bearing the emblem of Holland America Lines; my loose “Bug-Off” brand shirt is a smart, blue coat with captain’s bars; my “lake shorts” are creased trousers. She thinks I’m “driving” a pontoon on Grindstone Lake. Little does she . . . or anyone else on the lake . . . realize that I’m “manning” the bridge of HAL’s largest ship in the fleet, the MS Nieuw Amsterdam.
“How do you like driving the boat?” asks my wife from her verandah suite.
“This is what I want to be when I grow up,” I say into the light evening breeze, as the sun makes silhouettes of the trees along the western shore.
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© 2021 by Eric Nilsson
