Does this rag smell like Chloroform?

 This goes back about 40 years ago when I had some time off and a friend's car. I had maybe 10 free days and a free shitbox to tool around in. The owner told me to leave it as I found it and if anything major died on it to just yank the plates and VIN tag and ditch it somewhere. He suggested pushing it off a cliff.

Yes, I really did live like that and had friends like that. It was during the tumultous decade after I got out of the army. 

The car was a real crap can that should have been in the boneyard a decade ago, but it ran and IIRC (If I Recall Correctly) I only had to adjust the points once in the 10 days I had it. When I was done with it I left it as I had found it, out of gas and the carburetor drained and unhooked the battery cables.

Anyway, I was doing pre sailboat buying recon and scouting around the marinas. I wanted to see what was out there and what I could buy with cash. I wanted some idea of what I was in for.

I had seen some interesting but not inspiring boats at Shilsole in Seattle buy nothing totally inspiring. I was headed out of Seattle because south of it was Tacoma and more city. I wanted to start looking for a place to hole up for the night as motels were expensive in the city. They were also free if I could find a remote spot because I had my sleeping bag with me and the (alleged) vehicle was a station wagon and I could crash out in back. I could catch as catch can a shower. Many if not most marinas had showers available to liveaboards. Generally, they charged a buck so every couple of days I could clean up.

It was getting kind of late in the day and on I-5 headed north. I was keeping my eyes peeled for a good place to park and sack out for the night.  It was still early.

I knew there were more than one marinas in Everett so I pulled off I-5 at the exit and stumbled around until I found one of them. It had a great view and there was a bar/restaurant so I figured I'd stump in and have  myself a brew. The place was clean, airy and was practically empty. There were probably a total of four people in the joint, two guys at the end of the bar talking business and two women at a table talking about something. One of them was about thirty and after watching her I figured she was one of those nervous types. No interest for her on my part. The other woman was in her mid to late 40s and appeared to be somewhat interesting. Curiosity got the best of me and I wanted to check her out because there was just something interesting about her that I couldn't quite figure out.

When I got out of the army it was a double whammy for me. In a period of a week I had lost my employment and been handed a divorce decree. I took it pretty hard.  Getting a job was a snap. There was a housing boom going on and I became a framer. 

The last thing I was looking for was a fertile 20-something to remarry and have a bunch of kids with. One word about a biological clock ticking made this freight train take a dirt road. The other thing I avoided were the younger "I want to go to the club" airheads. Most of them just wanted some sucker to take them to the new cool place so they could go shopping for Prince Charming at someone else's expense. I wanted to start dating again but not in the traditional sense. I wanted to meet interesting woman and have fun. 

In short I was dating strictly for fun and made no bones about it.

And I was sitting in an almost empty bar looking at a woman that looked interesting. There was something interesting about her. I thought things over and decided to take a chance. I my little plan turned into a horror show the only thing that would happen to me was I would get told to leave by the bartender. Most places don't call the police unless there is actual violence or a refusal to leave when the bartender give you the word. Just then I had brainstorm. A few feet down in the bar well there was a bar rag. I snatched it up and wrung it out under the bar.

Then I took it and went over to the table and a plain tone of personal curiosity held it in front of the older woman and innocently asked her, "Does this rag smell like chloroform?"

With a thoughtful look on her face she sniffed near it and replied in a thoughtful tone of voice "I  think it's nail polish remover."

It was obvious the knew how the dark humored game was played.

The younger one had turned completely ashen faced and her eyes showed sheer terror. She looked like she was facing being shanghaied by a Barbary Pirate and be carted to be sold to an A-rab and forced to be a white slave. I admit I had a hard time keeping a straight face with the look on her face. 

"Oh," I said innocently and returned to my barstool and waited to see what happened net. I didn't have to wait for long.

A couple of minutes later she headed to the women's room and I noticed she had taken the long route that passed by my stool. As she passed by she whispered "My friend's leaving. Stick around."

She left the ladies room and walked her friend out and parked her drink on the other end of the bar. She quickly returned, grabbed her drink and sat down next to me. "You scared the daylights out of Darlene," she said. "That will be all over work tomorrow. "

"Hope that won't get you into hot water," I said.

"Certainly not," she said. "I'll just explain that I met a charming young man with a good sense of humor and she'll look like an idiot. It happens quite a lot there with her. She's a scared mess."

We exchanged names and our drinks were low, I asked her if she was hungry. 

"I'll do you one even better," she said. "My sons are coming over for dinner and I have to leave to start cooking. Care to join us?"

When I'm in on the road one of the rules is never refuse an offer for a meal. Needless to say, I accepted. She wrote her address down in case we separated and I followed her home. I noticed she paid attention because when we got separated by a stop light she pulled over ahead and waited. I was mildly impressed. She had a brain in her head.

We entered and there were her two sons in the living room. She looked at the pair of them and said, "I scraped up a starving orphan after work. Meet Piccolo. He was just too charming to be left behind after he asked me if the rag he was holding smelled like chloroform." Her voice was so cheerfully sarcastic." She continued. "Julia was aghast. She turned as white as a ghost when he asked me that."

Both sons laughed. the younger one asked me if I came from a family of serial killers. I rolled my eyes and grinned. I saw that dark sarcasm ran in the family. I felt right at home.

"Actually I'm a commercial fisherman," I replied. 

"That explains a lot," said Carol. 

The sons asked me a few questions and I offered to take them for a tour of a fishing boat if they wanted. I explained that maybe we couldn't board unless I knew the owner but could point some things out. 

Over dinner I learned that both sons were pretty much out of the house and that one was a college student interested in electrical engineering and the other was an apprentice machinist. 

I noticed that Carol had pretty much let go of he babies as they became men. She treated them like men which is somewhat unusual because too many mothers often don't seem to know when to let go. They seem to want to keep their babies forever. As a mother it looked like she had done a hell of a good job with the pair of them. I found out she'd been divorced for about ten years and raised both of them through their teenage years. She must have been a pretty tough woman to do that job so well. Those are rough years. I later asked her about it and she said it was fairly easy. She gave both of them responsibilities and held them to task. 

The boys ate and discussed a few family things and wandered off. I went out to the station wagon and fished a bottle of cognac out from under the front seat and poured us both a strong belt.

That's when I was completely up front with her. I told her my life was a chaotic mess and that in a little over a week I was headed back to Alaska to return to the water. I told her I was reconnoitering for a future sailboat purchase.

She gave me a warm smile and said, "I can't compete with that but I've always wanted a fling with a sailor. Why don't you operate out of here while you're in town." That was a surprise! I took her up on her offer.

She went to work every day and I took the day to scout around until I left about a week later. On the weekend after work we had fun doing simple things together. We caught a movie and laughed together. Another night I gave her and her youngest son a tour of a purse seiner. I got lucky and gave them the complete tour because when the skipper and I played 'who do you know?" We both knew a couple of the same people in the business and he welcomed us aboard. 

One night she asked me what I had seen in her when we met.

"An imagination, a sense of humor. Fact is I don't want to start a family. It's not time for me to start a family. What drew me is that you simply looked interesting. I wanted some decent company that understood life. You more than fit the bill."

As planned I returned back to Kodiak and found my fishing gig had fallen through (Murphy was an optimist) and snagged a carpentry gig for a while.

We wrote for while and off and on and the following year when I returned with cash in hand I called and found she was seeing someone else when I called her to let her know when I found my boat. 

I found her, a heavy 24'7" Sailstar (formerly Bristol) Corsair. She was perfect for my purposes. She had been sitting on the dock about a quarter mile from the restaurant we had met in. I called her and she came and met me dockside. She was up front with me as I had been with her. She told me she was 'seeing a fella'. 

I grinned. "Ilsa, is his name Lazlo? We'll always have Everett."

It was a reference to the movie Casablanca. One evening we had watched it on TV although both of us had seen it before. This was circa 1984. She gave me a warm smile.

She marveled at the boat and expressed  concern over the size of her. I pointed out that a Pacific Seacraft Flicka 20s have made circumnavigations before. She seemed relieved.

I told her I was going to shake the boat down by moving her to Port Townsend and putting her on the hard and return to Kodiak to make money to fund the trip and probably arrive in PT in mid May leave in June. 

Then she asked me to drop her a line when I left PT for Kodiak and keep her posted about my trip. I thought about it and thought it may make her new boyfriend leery and suggested calling her son instead. 

"I'll tell him to accept collect calls," she said. Her youngest had expressed an interest in my trip so I agreed. The first time I called him he said he was keeping track of me on a map so every time I called I gave him a list of our stops. I remember looking at my watch to keep the calls down to under 3 minutes which was the initial charge.

When I arrived in Kodiak I went to Wodlingers Drug store and bought a post card. I addressed it to her son and the message read, 'Arrived in Kodiak. Piece of cake.'

We never heard from each other again and I hope she had a good life. If she's still alive she'd be in her 90s and her two sons in their 60s.

I just tucked the whole ting away as a pleasant memory.

I never used the chloroform line again.