Back at Stretch Island Trish and I walked in the vineyard, admiring the ripening grapes.
“This is such a beautiful place” she said. “There’s something wonderful about food production.”
“I’d say so.”
“Where do you picture us going?” she asked, out of the blue.
“I like you” I replied. “I like you a lot. That’s all I can say.”
“So, we’ll be friends for some time in the future?”
“That would be my preference” I chuckled.
The next day we happened to be at a store looking at rings and I asked “Do you have a favorite?”
“Sure.”
“If I were you and I was going to get married I’d get a ring like that one there.”
“Yeah? What are you saying?”
“What do you think?”
“Sure. Let’s do it”.
Trish and I weren’t planning on having kids. We never even brought it up. As it turned out she was soon pregnant and less than a year later Myra was born. Then 14 months after that Jessie was born.
In the late 1980s Evergreen embarked on an additional project, restoring a 44’ Luders Yawl named the Resolute, which along with a sister ship named Flirt was purchased for a dollar in a government auction. They were part of a fleet of a dozen matching boats that served as training vessels at the Annapolis Naval Academy in the years during and following WWII.
Flirt was re-sold and Resolute spent a few years under a shed in the maintenance yard at Evergreen having some frames and decking replaced. For the first time an engine was installed, a 30 horsepower Perkins. The work was supervised by Don Fassett, a cantankerous, retired naval engineer and machinist. Don was full of truisms like “don’t hit it harder get a bigger hammer” or “a little putty a little paint will make the old girl what she ain’t” or more succinctly “it says here” which could serve as justification for anything under the sun. The original Kilroy, Don could fix an aircraft carrier at sea.
Don also owned a 40 foot William Garden designed sloop named Swirl II that he added to the fleet. Swirl II was not certified for commercial use so the number of paying passengers was limited to six.
The Resolute, certified to carry 13 paying passengers, was launched and joined the fleet in early 1990. With the addition of the Resolute, the total number students for day trips now stood at 31 — 12 for the Seawulff, 13 for the Resolute and 6 for Swirl II.
Summer excursions were now capable of comfortably carrying 18 paying passengers. By charging each passenger $250 for a week long trip we were able to pay captains and boats more than $100 per day each. Don’s cut including Swirl II came to $1200 per week.
Leisure Education paid the full amount to me, the expectation being that I would then donate half back to the Evergreen Foundation which would disburse payments for the boats’ maintenance. For three consecutive years the donation was enough to put me into the President’s Club and buy me a dinner with Joe Olander, the College President. Then someone noticed that not only did I donate nothing, I took half. Henceforth the school’s half was taken up front.
The Resolute came with an impressive pedigree, things like winning the Bermuda Yacht Race. She had been sailed by at least two presidents, JFK and Jimmy Carter. Rumor had it that Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe spent the night aboard in San Diego where the boat was kept for several years.
We entered the Resolute in a couple of races and kept pace with the fastest modern boats. We also scheduled weekend Leisure Ed classes around boat shows and other events in Seattle and Port Townsend where we handed out flyers for the upcoming summer trips.
Whatever else we were doing, we inevitably ended up teaching sailing as well. Having grown up sailing on my father’s boats I remember little of the learning process and am a terrible sailing instructor. I assume people know things they don’t and have little patience.
Don’s approach was simple: “Keep yourself in the boat. Keep the boat in the water. Keep the water out of the boat.” He was quick to remind people of things like the “left handed rule of thumb”. If you hold a line in your left hand so that it’s coming out from under your thumb and coil it with your right hand it will naturally coil clockwise like it should. If you pull the line to an arm’s length each time, each coil will be six feet in length. Counting the number of coils and multiplying by six gives you the total length. And so on. Hopefully some students learned a thing or two. Some people instinctively have a feel for it. Some people can take the wheel and immediately find the groove. Some people will never find it in a million years.
In 1990 Fred Tabbutt put together a year long program called Geology and Chemistry of Pollution. We went out once a week, ultimately collecting over 250 benthic samples and analyzing them for lead, cadmium, copper and some organic compounds. It was advanced work for an undergraduate undertaking. Students learned everything from basic chemistry to the operation of a gas chromatograph. They did so with great enthusiasm, having experienced the whole process from gathering the samples to presenting the results.
Fred had a doctorate in chemistry from Harvard University and was teaching chemistry at Reed College prior to coming to Evergreen as one of the initial faculty. While sailing to or from sampling sites Fred would go through work books solving equations. What’s torture for some is meditation for others.
We did day trips for Upward Bound, a non-profit getting inner city kids out of Tacoma into nature. On one trip the wind was flat when we left the dock. We put the sails up and motored out into Budd Inlet. A high school age girl was sitting on the aft cabin next to me. A very slight wind filled the sails and the boat healed half a degree. I noticed her fingernails dig into the teak as she spoke. “Why’s this muthafucka leanin?”
I replied “This muthafucka’s supposed to lean”. I went on to explain the basic principals and realized I had everyone’s complete attention. We sailed along in the gentle wind and I told stories all afternoon.
We did overnight trips through Olympia Parks and Recreation. On one of these a young man spent the entire weekend on the bow, watching the bow wake. When departing he stated “This has been the best experience of my life”. We taught a little sailing to those interested in learning. The life changing benefits may have been the invisible ones.

I enrolled in the Masters of Environmental Studies Program studying things like ecology and statistics, mostly for the pure fun of it.

We discouraged folks from imbibing in anything including booze, with a few exceptions. One retired couple boarded in Friday Harbor with a half gallon of Manhattans, a mix of bourbon and vermouth with some mint. They were a couple of happy people. I guess even booze works for some.

But I have to question whether refined drugs work for anybody. Opium perhaps. Heroin no. And moreso whether synthetic drugs work for any otherwise heathy person. Any synthetic opioid? Why do it? Because the real thing contains a euphoric and is grown by some farmer in Afghanistan and where’s a buck to be made in that? But moreover, why do any of it? There’s nothing like clarity.

During summers we continued to offer Leisure Ed trips in British Columbia for the general public. A few academic programs also ventured north. On one of these trips we were entering the US through Blaine with three boats and 22 students. I picked up a phone at the head of the dock.

“Hi we’d like to enter the US. I’m skippering the Seawulff on an educational trip for The Evergreen State College.”

“Get back aboard the boat. Don’t allow anyone off. We’re watching you. We’ll be down in a minute.”

Three agents soon appeared at the head of the dock, accompanied by a medium sized black dog. First they had everyone line up on the dock with their personal belongings. The dog sniffed her way down the line. The agents pulled everything out of every cupboard, lifted up all the floorboards and made a general mess of all three boats. The dog went through everything. As they headed up the dock one agent could be overheard. “Must have been a false tip”.

In June of 1992 I got wind of a guest faculty hire named Gerardo Chin Leo. Although hired to teach Spanish, Gerardo had a PhD in oceanography., I found him in his office and talked him into doing an August class in Oceanography. We’d study primary production (Desolation Sound), a fjord (Princess Louisa Inlet), and estuary (the Fraser River) and marine environments (Juan de Fuca). We’d practice and learn chemistry, biology and ecology. We cleared it easily with the deans. I would skipper the Seawulff. Swirl II would be skippered by Don Fassett. The Resolute would be skippered by Sean Bethune, an acquaintance who grew up sailing with his parents and sister in the South Pacific.

On August 1st, 1992 we departed Olympia at 9:15 in zero wind under power. At 10:15 we passed Dofelmeyer Point and made our way through Dana’s Passage. We saw Bonepartes Gulls, a Marbled Murlette and seals. At 12:30 we passed McNeil Island Penitentiary. At 2:30 we cleared the narrows. At 4:00 we were in Colvos Passage. At 6:00 we were sailing in 10 knot winds off Seattle. At 8:15 they rafted up to swirl, anchored off the north end of Bainbridge Island.

We got underway at 6:16 on August 2nd and spent the morning dodging freighters. We passed Point Wilson at noon under power and began the journey across the Strait of Juan de Fuca. There was some question about the identity of a bird we were seeing, either an immature common murre or a marbled murrlette. San Juan Island slowly came into view through the haze ahead. Buff colored grassy slopes.

We passed through a pod of orcas. One passed underneath and surfaced with a loud “woosh” 50 feet away. Two black zodiacs and assorted other boats were pursuing them. We saw Dalls Porpoises and Harbor Porpoises.

Although a seemingly impossible distance, we had learned how to make the run from Bainbridge Island to Bedwell Harbour Canada in one day. We’d ride the outgoing tide past Point Wilson, cross the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and ride the incoming tide up Haro Strait. We arrived at Haro Strait at 3:00 PM a little later than we had hoped. By 7:00 the tide had changed and we pulled the Seawulff into Ried Harbor and anchored, Swirl and Resolute rafted alongside.
On August 3rd we departed Ried Harbor at 06:30 AM. At 08:30 we cleared Canadian Customs in Bedwell Harbor. At 9:15 we were underway again. Outside Bedwell Harbour we saw a couple of Harbor Porpoises and numerous seals. At noon we were motoring through Trincomali Passage. At 15:30 we passed tiny Tree Island to port with its small protected beach, picnic table and shade umbrella. At 17:15 we ran through Dodd Narrows with a strong current.
At 7:00 the three boats rafted together at the public dock in Nanaimo. I pitched my tent on the after deck and crawled in and tried to get warm. I had forgotten my sleeping bag. I spent a miserable night trying to sleep rolled up in a single blanket that I borrowed from Don, Sarah, one of the students and I went to a couple of thrift shops, finding bedding and other things. Sarah was undeniably attractive. She spoke with a slight British accent and had a great sense of humor.
On August 4th we moved to the fuel dock and took on fuel. At 11:40 we were underway again sailing in winds of 10 to 15 knots from the southwest. The Resolute in the hands of a master jockey like Sean was marching all over the Straight of Georgia. She ran east toward Vancouver then back west across Seawulff’s stern, passing on a broad reach. They then launched the spinnaker and were gone from sight in no time.
At 7:30 we anchored in Blind Bay in a hole behind Fox Island. At 11:00 some of us were still awake talking in the cockpit. We noticed glowing patterns in the water, around the anchor chain and trailing fish. Gerardo joked. “OK. Everyone overboard to explore the naked truth of bioluminescence.” We swam in water warmed by granite during the day, diving and swimming around and under the boats. Our hands, arms and legs left glowing phosphorescent tracers in the water. It was an underwater, surrealistic, psychedelic wonderland. Sarah was verging on irresistible.
We pulled anchor at 07:45 and at 08:30 were sailing in Malaspina Strait in 15 to 20 knot winds from the south. At 3:00 we passed Lund to starboard. At 4:00 we passed Sarah Point, named after George Vancouver’s daughter Sarah, because of its stunning beauty. Sarah sat on the bow laughing. It was her birthday. At 5:00 the boats rafted to Swirl II, at anchor in Tenidos. All went ashore to Unwin Lake. Sarah and I bathed in a pool at the base of a small waterfall near the outfall of the lake.
It rained hard during the night. On August 6th I awoke at 05:00 in a soaking wet bed. Water had soaked in under the foam mat. At 06:00 I emerged to a dismal scene. The crew had stretched the tarp over the cockpit and made some coffee. Windows and hatches, dry from the summer weather, had all leaked. Misery prevailed.
By noon the rain stopped. The sun peeped out here and there, now and then. We hung bedding, towels and other items throughout the rigging of the three boats where everything readily dried. I went ashore, alone, where I bathed at the base of the little waterfall. At 4:00 PM Gerardo called class.

At 7:50 I was alone, holding down the anchor. We moved to a more protected area behind a small island. The other boats had gone off to conduct night plankton tows targeting bioluminescence. The students also dove and swam through the bioluminescence watching tracers spin away from every movement. They observed phosphorescent tracers outlining fish that ran from the bows of the vessels.

At 11:30 the boats were still out exploring the night sea. There was an ominous whirring in the trees overhead. The wind in the bay was blowing in circles. Lightning was flashing but there was no thunder. The boats finally tied up together at 12:45.

The morning of August 6th I rowed ashore with some of the students for a short hike to a blanket of moss overlooking the boats at anchor. At 11:00 AM we were back aboard observing the previous night’s tows under the dissecting scope. Ceratium bucephalum was present along with impressive dinoflagellates. There were ubiquitous copepods. Peridinium claudicans. They also observed samples under the compound scope and found Thalassiora hyalina. Salinity around Desolation Sound ranged around 25-26 ppt or parts per thousand. The ocean is typically 32 ppt. Turbidity ranged between 10 and 17 Formazin Turbidity Units, FTUs.
The students noticed opaque swirls in the water’s surface near the mouth of the stream. Gerardo explained it as a blending of fresh and salt water, a mixing zone. The beginning of the food web. The preparation of the water for consumption by phytoplankton. The marine environment was looking more and more complex.
At 1:00 we departed Tenidos. At 14:30 we arrived at Prideaux Haven, peaceful coves surrounded by granite, moss and forest, a place of serene beauty, a world class destination with yachts jammed in like sardines.
The place where tides coming in from the north and the south around Vancouver Island meet is Desolation Sound. As a result, there is little tidal flow. Little exchange of water. The tide just goes up and down. The water is warmed by the sun shining on granite surfaces to an ambient near surface temperature of 70 degrees fahrenheit. In protected bays like Prideaux Haven it goes even higher.
Prideaux Haven is worth seeing but we didn’t stay around. Sean led the way past Melanie Cove and through a shallow rocky channel to Laura Cove. The rocky bottom was visible the whole way. Somehow we made it. At 6;30 we went shopping at the Squirrel Cove store. At 8:00 we moved out and rafted to the Swirl II anchored in inner Squirrel cove.
On August 8th we departed Squirrel Cove. The wind picked up from the south creating a lee shore situation, where the wind will blow you ashore if you lose headway. The Seawulff’s dinghy came untied but we retrieved it with barely enough water under the keel. In Baker passage we encountered gale winds and progressed under reefed main and staysail.
At 2:00 we encountered treacherous conditions off Sutil Point, steady winds of 35 knots and four foot breaking seas, building the entire length of the Strait of Georgia. There was rain coming sideways and spindrift coming off the water. Visibility was about a mile.
Nearing Sutil Point Swirl II lost steerage and drifted toward the rocks. They were in ten feet of water in breaking waves before they got things fixed. Resolute rounding the point ripped her mainsail completely in two. At 7:00 the three boats anchored separately in Gorge Harbor, each setting their own anchor. Everyone gathered below decks for the evening. As the sun set lightning struck several times nearby, followed shortly afterward by rolling thunder. As the evening progressed the time between flash and sound grew shorter.
A bright flash and loud boom hit simultaneously. Lightning had struck within Gorge Harbour, the sound bouncing from wall to wall. We prepared a makeshift cake out of some tortillas with one candle to celebrate Sarah’s birthday. The electrical storm continued well into the night, keeping everyone awake.
At 8:30 we departed Gorge Harbor, damp and dreary. A large immature bald eagle watched from a perch on a tree. At 10:00 we rounded Sutil Point in light rain and wind. Somehow, everyone remained in good humor, joking, reading, napping. One couldn’t ask for a better crew. At 7:00 we anchored in Ballet Bay, which is in Blind Bay. In Blind Bay we bought three coho salmon off a neighboring fishing boat.
We pulled anchor at 8:00 on August 10th. We passed an adult oyster catcher apparently feeding a youngster, a seal leaping from the water and three bald eagles perched in trees. At 10:00 we rounded Captain’s Island into Jervis Inlet. Resolute’s crew were busy on deck sewing a long patch in her mainsail. The weather was perfect. Weather on the 8th seemed like a bad dream.
At 1:00 we rounded Prince of Wales Reach, motoring up close to the cliffs, dotted with zones of lichens, moss and small trees. Fir trees grow out of places so steep they appear inverted. In places the cliffs shoot vertically strait up. Twenty feet away from shore the depth is 270 fathoms or 1620 feet. No anchoring here. In valleys in the distance clear cuts and logging roads are visible.
At 4:00 we arrived at Malibu Rapids and drove through with a five knot current and plenty of rocks, white water, whirlpools and Young Christians on shore watching and betting on the chances of a successful passage. One doesn’t often get to see three big boats running rapids. Patty, one of the crew, attended Malibu as a teenager. She claimed it was a “circus of pot-smoking, screwing and carryings-on of all sorts in the name of Jesus”. We saw some sleek gull-like birds scooping fish off the water’s surface in flight. Mew Gulls?
At 4:30 we tied alongside Swirl II, anchored near the base of Chatterbox Falls European style with a stern line tied to a tree ashore. I had by now anchored in the spot four times and was still dumbfounded by so much beauty. A kingfisher dove next to the boat and flew to a nearby limb with a small fish. That evening the class gathered around a fire ashore. After a meal of barbecued salmon we sat discussing oceanography.
At 10:00 on the 11th the Seawulff cast off from the other boats to perform sampling. Gerardo expected to find oceanographic parameters of a fjord, that is, sharp delineations going down to colder, saltier, heavier depths. The Seawulff’s cable and winch allowed us to take water samples from 700 feet down. It’s on these thermoclines and haloclines that nutrients and critters tend to reside. It wasn’t easy to get samples along these intervals because the depths were so great.
Gerardo talked frequently throughout the day about the marine environment. How much new organic plant material is being produced. How much of this is available to other organisms. Proteins to make tissue. Carbohydrates for energy. Animals need pre-formed organic matter. Plants use light from the sun for fuel. CO2+H20+Carbon = sugar.
That afternoon a student named Cory and I took the dinghy over to a small stream about a quarter of a mile toward Malibu on the north side of the inlet. The stream tumbles down steep granite faces collecting in pools, one above another, perhaps fifteen in total. The sun warms the water to a comfortable temperature. Some of the pools are chest deep. Cory walked ahead, up the steep granite face. We’d stop and soak a while then climb to the next pool, in the nude of course. The conversation turned to a young man in the class. “He really wants to get it on. And I don’t want to. I found out recently that my boyfriend might have exposed me to aids. I’m getting tested when we get back. I just wish there was some graceful way to get him to lay off. I mean, he’s cute as hell and if I didn’t have this problem…”
“Hey Cory. I’m having the same problem, sort of. In my case I’ve got a wife and two babies at home. I don’t need to be screwing around”. That night when we all sitting around the campfire I gave Cory a very affectionate massage which though it may have appeared otherwise was going nowhere.
On August 12th at 09:00 we departed Princess Louisa Inlet and ran once again through Malibu Rapids with the full force of the tide. Underway in Jervis Inlet Gerardo talked at length about oceanographic tools and methods. How we measure the amount of O2 in a light bottle and a dark bottle as a measure of photosynthesis…. that most plants are smaller than 100 microns and how life on earth begins and is regulated at a microscopic level. We sampled at depth intervals where activity was detected on the fathometer. We observed the same sleek gulls we’d seen on the way in and were once again unable to determine what they were. They have a light colored head and bands on the ends of their wings.
At 2:30 we rounded Captains Island and entered Agamemnon Channel. At 5:00 we entered Pender Harbor and anchored first in Gerrands Bay, then in Maderia Bay where we went shopping for food and ultimately the three boats ended up in Garden Bay, rafted together on the Seawulff’s anchor.
The Seawulff had a large CQR or plow anchor and 100 feet of heavy chain and a mechanical windlass. Boats that cruise in BC are all set up like this. In a calm, protected place like Garden Bay, we might put out 60 feet of chain in 30 feet of water. Our radius might be as little as 15 or 20 feet. This can be important in anchorages that are crowded by rocks and other boats. Unlike a traditional or danforth type anchor a plow anchor will reset itself. This is important in places where the current changes direction with the tide. A plow anchor on 100 feet of chain will always hold.
Ashore we found the restaurant and store had become expensive and not particularly friendly. The Seattle and Vancouver Yacht Clubs had purchased the docks. Garden Bay had become a rude, ritzy place compared to only a few years before. Some of the crew took over the bar, got stinking drunk and had a pretty good time throwing up all over the bay and the deck of the Resolute. The poor girl was taking a beating. We decided that henceforth we’d anchor in Madiera Bay with the locals and leave beautiful Garden Bay for the yacht clubbers.
At 6:15 AM on August 13th we departed Pender Harbour. By 8:30 we were in Welcome Passage. At 10:00 the three boats raised their spinnakers in fifteen knots of wind from the north and began a memorable day of sailing. It was Saturday and opera played on radio BBC. Students read and talked quietly. The Resolute ran away like a thoroughbred with the Seawulff not far behind and Swirl II off to the east.
At 2:00 we were approaching Porlier Pass. The plan had been to pass through with the tide but we were well ahead of schedule and would have had to buck an impossible current so we continued on, maintaining radio contact between the three boats. We continued on to Active Pass where we passed through, still bucking a 3 knots current, being so far ahead of schedule. At 7:00 we anchored in Bedwell Harbor, well ahead of where we all went ashore for karaoke night at the local tavern. The crew put my name in the hat to sing Madonna’s Like a Virgin. I’d say I nailed it.
On August 14th we departed Bedwell Harbor at 9:00 AM. We encountered Harbor Porpoises and diving ducks. Surf Scoters, White Winged Scoters and Western Grebes were plentiful throughout the trip. A few hours later we cleared US Customs in Friday Harbor and moved over by the University of Washington Marine Lab to anchor. Gerardo lectured about the journals ,encouraging students to take a “systems approach”, to think in terms of three distinct ecosystems and the different dominant processes evident in phytoplankton distribution and growth. Does transect data support the model in Desolation Sound? Is O2 higher in enclosed or open areas? Does salinity increase at depth in Princess Louisa? Top to bottom? Were changes abrupt? Why? And what could we expect to find in the San Juans?
That night all paddled ashore to Friday Harbor where we ended up dancing in a bar. Cory and I made quite a couple. While rowing back to the boats we decided to stop for a while and just lay there looking up at the stars. Some of the students coming along a short time later recognized the dinghy and saw our feet sticking over the rail. They snuck along side and threw a bucket of water on us like dogs.
August 15th we departed Friday Harbor after taking on water. Swirl II put her anchor down at Jones Island, first on the south side, then on the north side and everyone got aboard the Resolute and Seawulff. In West Sound, Orcas Island, we towed the otter trawl. We had a permit to drag in US waters but not Canadian so this was the first try. The net came up full of an assortment of nektonic fish, crabs, shrimps, algae and other things. We bought a 20 pound King Salmon through Thish’s aunt who lives on Orcas Island.
At 6:00 we were back at Jones Island rafted to Swirl II. Everyone rowed ashore where Don cut the fish in half longitudinally, stuffed it with onions, garlic and parsley, wrapped it in tin foil and slow cooked it over a fire for forty minutes, turning it several times. It was delicious.
The last two days, in San Juan Channel, we were repeatedly hit by wakes from large power cruisers that rolled us violently, often by surprise, sending cameras, microscopes and food and utensils flying. There was a lot of cursing. Now the same boats were anchored at Jones Island. On one cruiser two men and their wives and kids were screaming at each other through the afternoon, drinking beer and eating hot links. Boats vying for a spot at the small dock repeatedly cut each other off. As evening descended, a large Seayray was running its generator. The blue light of a TV screen was visible within. Why would a person spend a quarter million dollars on a boat that burns 25 gallons of fuel per hour to come to a crowded anchorage with too many people with a similar disinterest in what was all around them and watch TV? We moved further out and anchored separately in deeper water. In the morning the cruisers in the bay were tangled up in their anchor rodes.
We got underway at 10:00 on August 16th and performed more otter trawls bringing up flounder, rockfish, crabs, shrimp, seaweed and the ever ubiquitous slime gobs and slime balls. South of Cattle Point we caught a beautiful rat fish. We performed drags in water as shallow as 10 feet and as deep as 100 feet and keyed out all the things we could. We also performed more plankton tows and found mostly diatoms, Ditylum, Thalassiosira and Chaetoceros.
We had now accomplished all the goals of the class. The three boats headed south across the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Half way across we encountered a Minke Whale.
 We anchored in Port Townsend the evening of the 17th and from there split up and went our separate ways, Resolute taking some students to Seattle, Swirl II heading for Boston Harbor and Seawulff heading back to Olympia. It was an excellent trip but so were many others.

In these situations being the brunt of jokes is inevitable, at least for the vulnerable among us. A group of students called on the radio to tell me that the resort ashore said we couldn’t anchor where we were anchored. I in an animated way declared that we most certainly could along with a few other things and the students asked me what date it was. Answer, April 1st. We spent a restful night at anchor. When I got up at 5 AM to pull the anchor there was a beer and a cigarette by the wheel.

An inside source indicated that the administration was hearing from some other source that I was too friendly with the students. I can’t say this wasn’t the case. Maybe the person in charge shouldn’t be having so much fun.

Founding faculty continued to retire and new hires had different ideas. Dean Olsen, a recent hire took an interest in the program. But Dean was an economist and it wasn’t easy finding use for the boats in the study of business and economics. The students didn’t seem to have the same level of interest. Meanwhile, facilities managers at the college regularly invoked biblical expletives in reference to the boats. Lawyers wrung their hands.
On one occasion I was awakened in the middle of the night by some noise on deck and emerged to find a student in the water. It took all the strength three people to get him aboard. Two empty bottles of vodka on the table, brought aboard in their luggage, told the story.
There are all kinds of potential problems with the toilet on a boat, let alone one that’s shared by eight people, half of whom are men. As a result there was a little sign at eye level on the wall behind the toilet: In a rolling sea, do like your sister. Sit down on the seat, when you piss mister. And of course, people who drink a lot of beer, pee a lot. Say no more.
After unloading the crew in Port Angeles I decided to give the boat a thorough cleaning which is how I came upon a note to the following week’s crew tucked in a pre-arranged spot under a mattress. It read: “Your skipper Harry may be a nice guy but if you push him even slightly too far he’ll turn into the world’s biggest asshole.” I returned the note to its hiding place. The following week’s crew were as timid and cooperative as could be.
The College tried high priced day trips on the Resolute and Leisure Ed classes were terminated. A per day lab fee was added for academic programs. Use of the boats dropped along with funds. There were no regular academic offerings. Science fell off the plate.
From its inception the program had its problems. It was the work of men… a waning societal legacy. There were women available. Sarah Peterson, a librarian at Evergreen, was a licensed captain who would have been perfect for the job. Unfortunately, that job never came to be.
Inquisitive minds recognized shortcomings in academia and saw interdisciplinary studies as a way to address these shortcomings. For some the move to a State College was a step down. But the college was a new blank slate. Now, a few decades later, original faculty hires started retiring. Bob Sluss’s departure in particular left a vacuum.
It’s great being away at sea. There are no bills to pay, no phone calls. But these things continue to exist awaiting your return. Extended field trips can be a strain on families and friendships. It takes commitment. A lot of planning goes into a program like Exploration Discovery and Empire. It’s easier to teach the same class year after year and hand out grades.
Perhaps the biggest cause of the program’s demise was a lack of regulatory structure. There was no boating program per se. There was no inherent protection for the boats. Facilities managers for whom the boats were extra work lobbied from the beginning to get rid of them and when opportunity showed itself the end was quick and dirty. Liquidating the boats was a great loss for the college. Truly understanding natural science requires being out in nature.
A particular event punctuated the ending. On one of our earlier trips Don Fassett insisted we go into Port Ludlow. Port Ludlow is a simple bay surrounded by development on all sides. I doubted if there was even any place to anchor but Don insisted. We followed Swirl II past log booms seemingly heading to the mud when Don suddenly veered left into a beautiful bay full of birds, surrounded by overhanging trees on all sides. A serene perfect anchorage, the place became a frequent stopover.
On this last occasion I followed Don Fassett once again into Port Ludlow. Turning left into our favorite anchorage, we discovered the perimeter of the bay lined with new houses. The trees and birds were gone. The serenity of the place wasn’t even a memory. It was like we had pulled into the wrong bay. Our hearts sank.
The summer of 1995 I accepted a job working for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, driving a boat out of Neah Bay. NOAA had established the Sanctuaries and Reserves Division to administer Marine Sanctuaries. The Olympia Coast National Marine Sanctuary was just coming into existence. Marine reserves were the subject of my thesis. I could hardly not take the offer.
But what might have been…

Spring of 1995 I was invited to attend a three day planning session in Neah Bay, Washington, in the Northwest corner of the United States. The meeting, was put together by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Sanctuary and Reserve Division to discuss the new Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary. Five biologists and oceanographers stayed in a home belonging to a member of the Macaw Tribe of Indians for whom Neah Bay is home.

I was invited because I had just completed a masters thesis on marine reserves and I was a licensed captain. The thesis centers on the dominant paradigm of the time, called the maximum sustainable yield. The theory is that because growth slows at sexual maturity we can get the greatest pound of flesh out of a population by harvesting individuals when they reach this size.

The problem with the theory is that by harvesting fish at this stage we give earlier maturing fish the advantage which over time results in genetic drift toward earlier maturing smaller fish. A better system would be to establish a marine reserve where fishing is not allowed and fish the perimeter. Fish within the reserve grow to full size and maximum fecundity producing a great abundance of eggs.

The first night, over dinner, people shared what they’d like to accomplish in the way of research — everything from dissolved oxygen to sea otters. My contribution consisted of trying to impress upon everyone how challenging the conditions would be.

One of the scientists presented a bottle of krill sauce that he had acquired in Antarctica of which he was very proud. The sauce made its way around the table. Everyone took a whiff, shrugged and passed it on. When the bottle reached me I held it near my nose, inhaled, and fell into retching convulsions, as it I had inhaled cyanide gas.
Work the first summer was limited. A single wide mobile home was moved onto an ideal setting next to the water at the Coast Guard base. Lieutenant Commander George Galasso ran the operation. George and Ed spent most of their time in Port Angeles seventy miles to the east leaving the mobile home and boat to me.
The boat, Tatoosh, was 40 feet long, aluminum and powered with twin 250 horsepower Volvos that were supercharged up to a thousand rpms when the turbos would kick in. It would go 31 knots on flat water. The boat had large unlocked hatches through which the engine room could be accessed. Unlike a sailboat the boat was not self righting. If she rolled she’d likely stay upside down and sink. A raft on the cabin top would theoretically inflate.
The spring of 1996 began with some minor projects to get things going. Between June 17 and the 21 we did a major oceanographic study, collecting data on chlorophyll and photosynthesis. The group was comprised of George, Ed and myself from NOAA and Carl, Ricardo and Alice from Oregon State University.
We motored out to the Pacific Ocean where we headed south from Cape Flattery, running at 2600 rpms through three foot waves. The autopilot steered while those of us with sea legs stood, knees bent, in a line down the center of the cabin holding onto overhead handrails. Those lacking sea legs, flopped on the deck violently seasick. It was a bone jarring ride but time was money. On this day only myself and Carl were doing well. Carl had circumnavigated the world in a small sailboat.
We stopped south of Destruction Island about 1000 yards off Kalaloch. Carl, using a tethered spectrophotometer, measured chlorophyl. Alice took water samples and stored them in a container of liquid nitrogen for later analysis. Our work was part of a bigger project, looking for correlations between intertidal and offshore biomass, pelagic activity and primary production. A ship, the MacArthur, sampled offshore at the same time and latitude intervals.
Scientists applied for opportunities to pursue research in the sanctuary. They got one shot and we did all we could to facilitate their work. A total of 85 stations, chosen at random, were sampled over the week. In some instances they were located close to shore among rocks, kelp and waves. The Tatoosh being shallow draft and powerful was perfect for this work. Even so some locations could not be safely reached in which case we got as close as we could.
By Wednesday the seas had subsided and fog set in reducing visibility to about five hundred feet. We ran at 3200 rpms making about 28 knots, watching ahead for floats marking crab traps.
The following day, seas were flat in the morning. We ran out between Tatoosh Island and Cape Flattery and south down the Pacific Coast. By late afternoon the wind and seas picked up for the drive home. Running north Tatoosh quartered waves off the stern and yawed heavily requiring that she be steered by hand rather than autopilot. We passed north of Tatoosh Island into the heart of the Strait of Juan de Fuca where we turned east. The wind and waves were now coming directly from astern.
Wind coming from astern at 25 knots and the boat traveling at the same 25 knots meant the apparent wind was zero. A calm, sunny bubble surrounded the boat as it roared dreamlike through whitecaps.
Tatoosh approached a wave from the back side and leapt off weightless and suspended in air, to the lower elevation in front of the wave, making a soft landing in foam. If we had lost power in either engine when coming off a wave the results would have been catastrophic.
On July 8, 1996, we were conducting VIP tours, ferrying federal and state bureaucrats and politicians out to the McArthur lying offshore. Gale warnings had been issued but as of mid-morning winds and seas were still moderate. We arrived alongside the McArthur and were thrown heavy nylon mooring lines, one from the ship’s bow and one from the stern. The lines were as long as possible, allowing Tatoosh to move with the waves. We bounced off soft fenders, measuring 2 1/2 by 4 feet, up against the ship and then away from it, stretching the mooring lines to the near breaking point. We were at one moment abreast of the ship’s deck and the next somewhere down and away.
At day’s end we returned to the McArthur to bring the VIPs back to shore. The wind and seas had picked up making the process even more challenging. As Tatoosh came up to the level of the ship’s deck, a VIP would hop from the ship to the boat. The last one, a State Senator of middle age, refused to jump.
“You have to do it,” the captain of the McArthur told her. “You can’t stay aboard. We need to move on.”
“I can’t,” she replied. “I just can’t”.
The MacArthur’s captain and first mate guided the woman to the edge of the ship and George told me to stand facing him in the center of Tatoosh’s main deck. This was a drill that had been done before. When the decks of the two vessels were next to each other, the woman was essentially tossed from the McArthur to the Tatoosh where she landed half supported by George and myself. She laughed “Oh my God. Well, that wasn’t so bad”.
We did bird counts, following paths that were logged into the Differential GPS, a government version of the civilian GPS that at the time was exceptionally accurate, so accurate that yawing in waves appeared on the screen a half second later. Other groups performed biological and archeological studies. Everyone lived in the single wide mobile home from one to three weeks.
The Sea Otter catch and release project was most resourceful. The work was coordinated by Ron Jameson of Oregon State University. We’d head south to Ozette Island and follow GPS waypoints between rocks to a secure anchorage behind the island where we’d anchor for the day. I mostly lounged around reading. Sometimes I’d help wrangle an otter. In the water they’re cute. But they’re members of the Mustelidae family which includes wolverines and honey badgers and have a bone crushing bite.
Capturing the otters was quite a show. Two highly experienced divers used rebreathers instead of standard compressed air scuba. The rebreathers save exhaled air and treat it and add a little oxygen so that when re-inhaled it will sustain life. The systems require complicated daily maintenance to which the divers would attend every evening. This was all done so the otters wouldn’t smell them approaching behind their electric James Bond underwater scooters.
The divers would sneak up underneath the otters and push off from the bottom giving the scooter full acceleration. The scooter would come flying out of the water with a thrashing otter trapped in a net attached to the front. They’d move to a 20 foot Boston Whaler where the otter and net were stuffed into a plywood box with a sliding lid.
Aboard the Tatoosh, we’d slide the lid open, force the otter down into the box with a rolled up sleeping bag and the veterinarian would knock it out with an injection. They’d tag it if it hadn’t been tagged, weigh it and give it a medical checkup. The vet would give it another shot to wake it up and after a half hour or so the otter would be released overboard.
Occasionally the vet would install a radio transmitter in the otter’s body cavity. Other members of the team working ashore with radio direction finders would track where the otter spent its time. Reassuring bold letters on the side of the radio implants read “not for human implant”.
I sometimes felt that all this bothering of sea otters wasn’t doing them any good. But around the dinner table at night I learned enough to trust the experts. Sea otters had been hunted to the brink of extinction. To recover with such a small gene pool was a long shot. Some otters needed to be moved to create geographically separated local populations as soon a possible. The results were looking encouraging.
The last project I’ll mention is the benthic macroinvertebrate assessment in which divers lay a one meter square metal frame on the bottom and pluck every crustacean, polychaete, chiton and other living thing they can see from within the perimeter of the frame, placing them in a mesh bag. In the evening they’d lay them out on the kitchen table, naming each organism and weighing the total for each square meter. By quantifying the samples they could get a general idea of biomass which could be reassessed over time.
If there ever was a boat I never grew to trust, it would be Tatoosh. She ran fast when she ran right. But she was a dog when things went wrong and such a complicated boat that things often did go wrong. Running on one engine in a following sea, she wallowed and broached in every wave.
On one such occasion we had cell phone service and called the dealer in Seattle. The likely cause was inside a control box. The dealer advised us not to open the box as all we’d find is “kitty litter and tin foil”.
Nonetheless, the work and the coworkers were unexcelled. Astounding beauty abounds at Cape Flattery. Words can’t really describe the place. But I had a budding family in Olympia, a six hour drive south and my patience was wearing thin after being gone for weeks at a time.
One lazy afternoon I was loading waypoints into the GPS at the base in Neah Bay. A Coastie was working on a Rescue 44 across the dock. “Nice boat,” he said.
“It’s OK.”
“Fast. I see you guys out running like, what, about thirty knots?”
“Yeah, about thirty” I replied.
“I can’t do that. That’s great how the deck and the cabin are on the same level.”
“Yeah it’s a handy set up.”
“Uh hum,” he said. “You got a nice boat. Of course, my boat will run upside down.”
I laughed. “I’ll trade you.”
“No thanks.”
I talked a number of times with the visitor, a boatswain named David Bosley who had been repeatedly cited for bravery. He spent most of his time in La Push, a hole in the wall on the outer coast known for nasty weather, huge waves and rocks.
The following year a sailboat was in trouble near La Push. David and three other Coasties headed out in a winter storm to save them. The Rescue 44 was tossed end over end onto the rocks and all save one were lost. The conditions were just too extreme.
It was up to the Brass in Port Angeles to set some kind of threshold for wind and waves beyond which a rescue would not be attempted. Instead they claimed that the deceased David Bosley exercised poor judgment. Since when has a Coast Guard boatswain ever said, “I don’t think I’ll go out today, it’s too rough.” David Bosley was a hero.

********
Back in high school, Mr. Spano was lecturing the class about European History. “And then the French army retreated out of Russia, largely defeated by an unmerciful winter.”
After a moment’s pause Charles Jackson spoke from the back of the room. “Say you swear to God!”
“That’s another five points Charles”.
Another student spoke “He’s already in negative territory. How can you take points away?”
There was no reply. It got under people’s skin nonetheless. Charles was pushing Mr. Spano’s buttons alright but Mr. Spano wasn’t responding reasonably.
Charles had formed a James Brown cover band called Charlie Mashed Potatoes Brown and the Fabulous Torgues. He invited everyone to a show in Gilroy. At the show, Danny Mora was dancing with an attractive young woman. Her boyfriend showed up and told Danny to get lost. Danny challenged the brute for the hand of his girlfriend, got pushed, took a swing and wound up in a half nelson. Paul Z had temporarily saved the day. Between songs eight guys in trench coats lined up facing our unarmed group of four. Each displayed a knife, chain or some kind of weapon. At an opportune moment we ducked out a side door and made our getaway, all the way to San Jose at 120 miles per hour in Ron’s Oldsmobile Rocket 88.
Danny Mora became an actor, playing highly believable hot-head gangster and Mexican drug lord roles on television shows over five decades. All he had to do was act naturally.

GB formed a company that did specialty concrete work, patching the botched work of other contractors at among other places Federal Courthouse in Tacoma. He sold that business and started a plumbing contracting business. GB was making a lot of money.
But years of working concrete was taking a toll on his back. The once agile body now moved with apparent discomfort. He had surgery that didn’t improve it. He had surgery again that made it worse. He was prescribed oxycodone by his physicians. After two years the prescription was terminated leaving him in constant pain.
He began buying painkillers from an acquaintance in Tacoma. After several months the supply dried up, “I can’t get any right now” she explained. As the days passed, his pain increased and his mood decreased due to withdrawal from his addiction.
Then his supplier called. “I got a shipment. A big shipment. Why don’t you come up and buy a year’s supply. Then you won’t run out again.” GB did as she suggested and was promptly arrested. His supplier had been arrested but released, provided she would entice her customers into buying enough oxycodone to make it a federal crime.
Everything GB owned was immediately taken from him under a law called asset forfeiture. All the money he had in the bank. The tools and trucks from his business. His home. His real-estate investments. Everything. He was then appointed a pubic defender lawyer.
“You have to plead guilty”
“Of ‘intent to deliver’? I’m not guilty. I did not intend to sell any of it”.
“I’m just telling you what you need to do, not what’s right. You’ll get fifteen years if you fight this. I can get you off with seven.”
“But I’m not guilty”.
“This is the best I can do for you”.
“The best? No thanks”. He was given another public defender who told him the same. Then another. He decided to defend himself.
“I’m going to present to you the costco defense”.
“Objection”. The prosecutors were both young, straight out of law school.
“Sustained”
“I don’t buy toilet paper in individual rolls. I buy a year’s supply”
“Objection”
“Sustained”
“I was entrapped”.
“Objection and he wasn’t. He demonstrated a pre-disposition”.
“A what? Everyone who takes the bait is predisposed”.
“That’s the law”.
“You haven’t proven intent to deliver. How much I got talked into buying has nothing to do with what I intended to do with it”.
“Once again the defendant is being argumentative”.
The prosecuting attorneys were young. They proceeded with an air of self importance, excited to be putting years of schooling to work, passing papers back and forth, whispering, trying not to smile. A few friends came to watch GB get his justice. “Just Us” as GB termed it. Federal police were also present in force, ready to testify if needed. None of them could have fixed the cracks in the courthouse foundation like GB had done.
His closing arguments were simple and well stated. “The fifth amendment states that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process. I lost everything before even going to trial. The eighth amendment states that excessive bail shall not be required nor excessive fines imposed. As in everything a person owns? The sixth amendment states that every person is entitled to assistance of council for their defense, not in negotiating a guilty plea. That’s the law”.
“We’re not here to negotiate constitutional law”.
“I’m not negotiating. I’m trying to explain the constitution to you people”.
Nothing he said would have mattered. GB was convicted and sentenced to seven years in Federal Prison.
After two years I visited the federal prison in McMinville Oregon. “How’s it goin’?’”
“Not bad. A lot better than Tacoma. We got a higher class of convict here. White collar criminals. People caught gamin’ the system”.
Looking around the dining hall I said “Doesn’t really look like a bunch of criminals”.
“We have meetings every day. We’ve got a library here and I can order books from anyplace. I’m reading a lot”.
“I guess seclusion has its advantages. I read five books the summer I fished tuna. Do you guys meet and discuss books? We called them seminars at Evergreen”.
“Rap sessions” GB smiled. “The food’s okay. I’d work in the garden if my back would let me. The only thing missing is women”.

Mrs. Denny was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and moved to assisted living. Family members appeared out of the woodwork trying to figure ways to acquire some of her considerable wealth and it was decided to place the estate into guardianship.
The guardian auctioned all the family’s possessions and sold Mrs. Denny’s historic home to the neighbor, Jeff Bezos, the owner of Amazon on-line retail, who demolished it and built a basketball court.
Dick, who had worked for the family business for years doing management and maintenance, was fired and reduced to poverty. He moved aboard my boat in Olympia and took up odd jobs to feed himself.
I took a job with a non-profit in Tacoma. Citizens for a Healthy Bay. Leslie, the Executive Director, sat across from me. She was on the phone much of the day, calling local businesses.
“It’s that time of year again. We’re asking for donations. Yes? Wonderful”. Then she’d ask me to write something nice about them for the quarterly newsletter and I‘d come up with a human interest puff piece. But if the answer was buzz off she’d tell me to get some dirt on them for the next edition. It was an extortion racket plain and simple. I didn’t really mind because those being extorted could use a little extorting. I got good at finding dirt. I brought all kinds of grief. I was golden.
But then one day I was asked to write something favorable about a proposal by the big paper mill on the point to fill an intertidal channel with toxic sediments. I told Leslie I couldn’t conjure up any such nonsense. The following day Ken, the company lawyer and Jim, the company chemist showed up at the office and led me into a back room. We had become friends, drinking beer and shooting pool but now the mood was not so friendly.
“It’s a win for all sides” Jim said.
“It’s a phony.” I replied. “You’re trying to manufacture a wetland in exchange for the last natural tide flats in the bay. There’s no parity.”
“You’ve got to be reasonable.”
“As in telling the truth?” “As in being a team player. Demonstrating that you don’t let personal opinions and beliefs interfere with what you’re expected to do.”
“You believe in fate?” I replied. “The three goddesses spinning and weaving and cutting you up for their own sadistic pleasure? I believe in Providence. The protective care of Nature. When we interfere with natural processes, we lessen Nature’s protective care.”
“I’ll tell you what’s a fool’s undertaking. All this self righteous crap is just going to take you out of the picture. Nobody wants a goodie two shoes.”
After holding me on the hot seat in a back room for two hours they left, looking toward Leslie as they walked out, shaking their heads slightly from side to side.

The next day I was fired for being late to an open house. Two years later the manufactured wetland was a gravel parking lot.

About that time Harvard and Cornell professor Carl Sagan summed it up: “If we continue to accumulate only power and not wisdom, we will surely destroy ourselves… It is, I think, only a matter of natural selection. If we become even slightly more violent, shortsighted, ignorant, and selfish than we are now, almost certainly we will have no future.”

I’ve provided standing in legal appeals, maintained a blog and attended countless meetings, speaking for an allotted 2 or 3 minutes. It would be easy to become cynical. Top scientists refer to the Department of Ecology as the Department of Apology and the Department of Natural Resources as the Department of Nothing Remaining. All power resides in corporations who exist with one goal in mind — to make money for their shareholders.

Intransigence began for me on Sunday, August 26th, 1963. Two months after graduating from high school and two months after registering for the Selective Service as required by law, I found myself walking, taking step after step toward an imaginary goal, somewhere beyond recurring teenaged troubles.
Starting from San Jose, the group’s ranks numbered several hundred. By the time we arrived in Palo Alto we were down to fifty. I walked next to different people and settled on a young woman about my age. “Diane” she said.
“Harry” I replied.
We sang as we walked. Which side are you on. We shall overcome. We shall not be moved. Go Tell it on the Mountain. We sang All My Trials and a couple of other songs made popular by Joan Baez. Diane knew them all well.
In a few places we briefly held up traffic. Some drivers honked their horns in anger. Any response from the group was met with a word from the leaders. “Silence people. Please”.
Other drivers honked and waved in support. Most onlookers just looked perplexed. “This is so exciting” Diane laughed. “We’re making history today.”
“Yeah” I agreed. We walked on, block after block, mile after mile. Our numbers had shrunk to fewer than fifty and we weren’t even out of the county. “Whatever happens, I’m not quitting” Diane declared. “Even if I’m the only one who makes it, I’m not quitting”. And so we walked and sang.
We camped in the basement of a church, sleeping on blankets laid out on the bare floor. Diane’s hair was a mess. We rolled from side to side trying to reduce our discomfort.
Nobody slept. The next morning we ate a hasty meal provided by the church. Several speakers encouraged the group. “Remember people. Love your neighbor. Every person is worthy of compassion, even a person who is so screwed up in their head that they yell insults at you. Those who would harm us are injured human beings. We will respond to all assaults against our bodies nonviolently and prevail in the end”.
We marched all day and again spent the night on a church floor, this time in South San Francisco.
Approaching San Francisco on day three, our ranks began to grow. People joined at every intersection eventually extending out of view in both directions, marching and singing with renewed energy. “Which side are you on. Which side are you on”. There were a thousand marchers. Then two thousand. By the time they arrived at Kezar Stadium in Golden Gate Park there were ten thousand people. “Damn” I said “Those of us who made the whole walk should be given some kind of elevated status.”
Diane laughed. “The reporters probably think all these thousands of people walked all that distance. It makes it compelling”. She continued a moment later. “It’s been nice walking with you. Maybe we can change the world. Think so?”
“Yeah, I can feel it in the air. Change is going to come. It’s going to happen.” I paused a moment. “We should stay in touch”.
Diane didn’t hear. She was looking across the enormous crowd. “Hey, there’s my mom” she said and went running off.
A crackling sound emanated from loudspeakers near a makeshift stage at one end of the stadium followed by a voice. “Welcome everyone. I’m going to dispense with any talk and go directly to the feed. We have a live feed from Washington DC where the largest demonstration of its kind, ever, is currently underway. So, welcome everyone…”
After a brief pause another voice began. “I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.”
The crowd was silent, everyone listening to the voice emanating from the loudspeakers. He talked about Lincoln and emancipation and a promise that was yet to be fulfilled.
“Tell ‘em about the dream Martin.”
“I have a dream…”
We believed that we could make a better world. We had such hope. Martin Luther King’s dream that day pertained to racial equality. He became a hero. When he turned his attention to poverty and the War in Vietnam he became public enemy number one. Malcolm X and Fred Hampton dreamed of a new world where peace and opportunity would prevail. They were all murdered.

The system is subtile and seductive. After visiting the new republic Alexis de Tocqueville theorized that Democracy would likely fail because people are shallow and materialistic. Perhaps Abbey Hoffman was right. If we haven’t changed the economic system, we haven’t accomplished anything.

Not to worry though. The forces of life are pervasive and self correcting. All around us is green, the color of photosynthesis, primary production, the origins of life. Water although covering 70% of the earth’s surface represents 1/1000th of the earth’s volume. From space the earth is blue; a tiny ball circling a mid sized star in a mid sized galaxy. As fast as light travels it’ll take four years to arrive from the nearest other star. It will take two and a half million years to arrive from the nearest galaxy. And we can see two trillion galaxies.

The earth’s atmosphere is a thin veil. Humans are a tiny speck. We touch, hear and taste it and even understand some of it. Do we have a purpose? Don Quixote goes from a delusional nut to a guy sitting and writing at a desk. What sets humans apart from other species, aside from our unfathomable destructive potential, is our ability to write. This may be journals written at the time, full of details. Or it may be what comes to mind. Memory is fleeting and memories of times when we were busy trying to survive are gone. Anarchists don’t make good archivists.