Sippizine - Volume 3: Running

Prose by Krista Allen

AFLOAT

If I built a boat today, I could sail it in my yard after so much rain. Plastic bottles from the town dump, caps glued on tightly and lashed together like Lego bricks. A mast fashioned of scratched pipe or painted molding from the barn. The sail a composite of colorful tapestries and bed sheets or perhaps that old shower curtain. I’d have to learn to sew.

Maybe it should be a multihull. Balancing between amas would run less risk of turtling. A hammock or the warped screen from the sliding door downstairs for the tramp. Repurpose the badminton stanchions and the ripped roof tarp for downwind running.

Supplies needn’t be complicated. Sunhat. A buoyant water bottle. Salty peanuts. Some fruit. A day trip boat, because it would take an entire day to get anywhere. Along the eastern edge of Gooseberry, accidentally running away to Cuttyhunk if the winds are favorable.

I’d need a paddle. One of those bunk bed steps we never assembled would suffice. Something to push the whole failing endeavor away from sharp rocks loitering near shore. Recycled parts rapidly disassembling in the Buzzards Bay breezes. The plastic will end up there one day anyway, ripped to bits, traveling down the rivers to the ocean. Outliving us all inside the guts of striped bass and corpses of herring drifting, tangled in a jumble of synthetic netting.

An absurd diversion, running with an idea to its unlikely conclusion. A forty-eight hour boat building challenge. Zero to Zille in a weekend with nothing but found objects. Here’s your pile of rubbish to revive into something useful. A social media post or a photo op for the conservation groups.

I could go for a swim instead. Seems like the more responsible option. Besides, I’ve got plenty of plastic inside to keep me afloat.

Photography by Krista Allen Beach