---

Tuesday, July 2--

11:42 a.m.-

He smoked a Tiparillo cigar and regularly poured cooled coffee from his mug back into the showroom Mr. Coffee carafe and refilled another half cup, this man who sold me the motor. It was a small town sports center, selling ATV's and motorcycles and snowmobiles and outboard motors and boats big and small and dusty accessories jumbled on shelves and dangling from metal-fatigued peg hooks. Whether lethargic from life or the ninety-two degree heat (the place wasn't air conditioned), he was polite but drab, without much enthusiasm inside. But he had what I wanted, though Johnson not Mercury, and dealt me a deal.

Yesterday started excitingly when I phoned my local marine dealer and inquired about used Mercury motors to match my size specifications.

"Yes, we just took in one on Saturday. Short shaft, manual start. Hardly used. A smart investment at an attractive price."

So I hitched my boat up with the motor I wanted to trade and drove the half-mile for a look.

"It's back here," Smarm said after introducing himself and shaking my hand. He led me into the garage area past a sign strictly warning unauthorized tourists that insurance regulations disallowed it. The motor, with its hat off, was bolted to the side of a tank containing milky dirty liquid that I guessed had once been water.

"Here it is," he grinned, flourishing gestures and professional white teeth like a game show model. He waited for my move.

"Can you start it?"

"Oh, sure."

Dressed in a knit sport shirt and pressed dress shorts, he stepped up, pulled out the choke, and yanked the starter rope.

Motor burped. The man pulled twelve or twenty more times, explaining with increasing conviction that "...Virg hadn't checked it out yet but that after he checked it out and made sure it checked out it would start and run perfectly because, "the old couple who traded it in on Saturday never used it but only stored it in a shed."

I asked where the engine hood was, because all I saw on the floor was a cowling with big letters for Tracker, an off-brand motor name. He picked it up, mumbling something about "just a different decal," but that Mercury made it as he pointed to small letters underneath the foreign brand, "by Mercury."

Encouraging, but nonetheless alarming, because the cowling was shaped like a value-line brand Mercury made for a few years but discontinued two years ago, due to really pissed users.

"Virg'll check it out later today--he's our best technician, fifty-three years combined experience--and it'll be ready tomorrow for you to scoot along fast in your outstanding boat. Let's check out your motor."

Into the parking lot under heavy sun. Mr. Smarm squats behind my motor and twirls the prop with a finger. And, four times says, "hmm."

"It's bent," he announces. "I see serious concentric rotation."

I also see, though he must not--because he says nothing from where he's inspecting--taffy-colored grease oozing out from somewhere inside.

He stands, cups his crotch and adjusts internal parts. "I want Virg to see this, and pressure check it," he stated, retreating into the garage shade.

A teenager wearing a "Virg" badge came out with a hose attached to a gauge, attached it, then pumped it and pronounced my motor seal weak.

I said I'd be back in the morning to see how things were going with the other motor.

But within an hour I was fretting about the validity of that outboard with its alien cover and Mercury minimizing its responsibility.

I phoned neighboring small-town marinas to see what they had. Most had nothing. But Bert, a salesman in Three Lakes, helpfully said that the used Tracker I'd seen earlier was, based on the model number I gave him, long-shafted and likely a cheap version, not a full Mercury. Though he could order me one.

"Three or four days."

"Check availability and give me a call."

I dialed Tomahawk, twenty-five miles opposite.

"Yes, I have that horsepower, short shaft, manual start."

Picked up thirteen-year-old daughter Chelsea to come along for the fun. We first drove to see Bert in Three Lakes to show off my motor, to see what sort of deal he could do.

"Bert isn't here," spoke a girl eating a plateful of exploded chocolate chip cookies and spilling crumbs down into her cleavage.

"What do you want?" snipped a man from behind a closed bathroom door.

"A new 25 horsepower Mercury," I replied through the rustic plastic mobile home door.

"They don't make a short shaft. How much did he quote you?"

I said.

"That's below cost," echoed inside the small space.

"How can it be below cost if they don't make it?"

This voice had a sales lot savvy of fifty-thousand dollar yachts and seemed not interested in ordering non-existent products for the likes of me. Chelsea gave the glossy wood-grain a glare and we went away, toward the dealer fifty miles away who had a Johnson on the main street town of three thousand.

I said who I was, without saying why we were there.

"It's in the warehouse. I'll send Leo over to get it."

So we browsed through motorcycles and the tousled brochures, gawked at a twelve-foot long jetski precariously displayed above our heads, then considered ice cream pails with rubber boat plugs, dusty snowmobile helmets, and a new ATV with two flat tires listing left.

"You bring your motor?"

"It's in the car."

We went outside without a hose attached to a gauge. I popped the hatch. He glanced in.

"Does it run good?"

"Yeah. Runs great."

"Okay." He walked back inside, into a room, came out and reported what he could do.

I hesitated, because that's what adroit negotiators do on TV. The to-boot price was lower than expected.

"To be honest, that's rock-bottom," he sighed, sipping coffee.

"Let's do it."

We waited. I eavesdropped fragments of trauma between an employee and a phone caller. Yet everything is trauma in ninety-two degree heat.

Ten minutes later I spied a teenager wheel a JOHNSON box off a truck and into the workshop. Weary man told us it was here, that Leo would have it unpacked and started soon.

"Your motor runs real good?

"Yes."

"Think it'll make a good rental?

"Oh yes. Nice rental."

Ten minutes later I was summoned into the shop for an introductory lesson with my new motor.

"This here's the gas hose. Fuel goes through it into the motor. It clips on right here. This is the throttle. You twist it like this to go faster and turn it this here other way to slow down. The shifter lever is here and there ain't no brakes."

The design is less sophisticated than my Mercury--like Autopilot, which held the motor straight for stretches. And a throttle tightener knob to set the throttle open without my having to hold it. Or an ice-water dispenser. But that's okay. I'll get used to it.

"These here are the bolts," says the boss as he hands off a bag and spits Tiparillo splinters onto the receipt he's writing up. "Be sure to install them through the transom. We just had a phone call about a rental motor that fell off into Lake Katherine."

So away we went home.

Clamped it to the transom, lightening by forty pounds the weight on the trailer tongue. Loaded stuff up and, holding my breath, tiptoed through town. Strong winds on the water carried us away from the dock. Pulled and pulled on the starter cord without starting success. Finally put the anchor down fifty feet from the dock in case we had to row back.

We did.

Like learning quirks and personality idiosyncrasies of a new lover. Wrenched out the spark plugs.

Flooded.

Put 'em back in. Pull and curse and pull and curse and sweat. Then a cough and a bubble of blue smoke, two sneezes, smokelettes. It started, so I kissed EZ full on the lips.

I'd asked about break-in procedures.

"Up and down, do what you want, but not wide open." He handed me a bottle of outboard oil and said to, "go heavy on the oil at first. Put this with five gallons of gas for the first tank full. Not six as the mixture guide on the bottle side says."

But the owner's manual said to double the oil for the first ten hours, and not exceed half-throttle during the first five. The truth of the matter is, don't go hog-wild for a bit.

Upriver we idled and sped up once in a while, but what a torment not to kick-it open to see what it'll do. Up to Grand Sandbanks and a sweat-washing swim. Then all the way back to the big lake in town to show ourselves off.

OOPS! At 8:45 p.m. I gripped the gas tank handle and lifted it. Effortless; maybe half a gallon.

"Dumb ass."

(I'd prudently warned myself earlier about monitoring the gas level. I'd put in only four gallons for some idiot reason and going to town was so fun I'd unremembered my caution.)

"Damnit."

"Might make it back by idling."

"No. Besides, I'd be a wreck of nerves, expecting the motor to conk out halfway to the boat landing."

"You could go across the lake and beach along the county road and walk to the gas station."

"Too heavy."

"What about Pine Bar, the disreputable place you hate? They sell gas, at least during the day."

So I did. Pulled the boat onto shore. Told EZ, with a severe stare in my eyes to, "stay."

Loud autobiographical accounts and boozy outbursts drifted out of taproom screens. Through the doorway, sex organ jokes and reports of despised spouses merged above the bar then ricocheted off beer mirrors and bent walls, and hundred-degree air laid a layer of urine and beer cigarette smoke onto my flesh.

Seven male men and female women instantly stopped what they were doing and gave full--though not too sinister--regard to me.

"Can I get gas?"

"I'll turn on the pump."

"Lowell," said Linda to Lowell, looking at me, "Bet the prick isn't circumcised. Find out."

"Do you have oil too?"

"Sure." She reached down and brought out a quart bottle of two-cycle oil with cheap chainsaw and lawnmower icons on the label.

It's stingy oil, especially not intended for new outboard motors and does not contain TC-W3, an ingredient important for all boat motors, especially those of mine. Especially during break-in. But I did not notice the deficiency until morning.

Twisted off the cap and poured in a lot. (Darkness didn't help. Neither did not having my reading glasses on.) As I pumped gasoline in the dim light the price spinners spun way too wildly. Stopped at four gallons. Then out of curiosity I climbed up on the concrete bunker where the pump was imbedded, to see the price per-gallon.

$2.69. Over a dollar more than in town.

But I was passionately relieved to be out of my plight, no matter the price. The total came to $14.73, and today I have returned to more customary sentiments about the place now, with seven gallons of TC-W3-mixed, $1.49 per-gallon gas down on the floor just behind my butt.

6:00 p.m. today-

The vet called this morning. Epilus. Tumor of the bone. The report from the Experts had stated three possibilities; it's likely she has a combination of each. There were differing opinions of its nature, the Vet said, or at least discrepant terminology's used from one university doctor to another. Some referred to it as "benign," but in his "reading-up on it last night," our doctor read opposing accounts that claimed it "malignant." He went into detail about treatments. Radiation, because of its locus in the jaw joint would run $3,600, or surgery for $1,800, which wasn't likely to succeed because of its insidious transposition into bone. Recovery from surgery would be dreadfully difficult and highly disfiguring, which neither EZ or I are concerned about.

I asked about the length of her life.

"Hard to know," he said. "But based on how fast it's growing, two weeks. Maybe a month."

EZ is sniffing the carpet in the bow, laying, front legs crossed ... now snapping at flies ... now rising to sit and stare away toward the sound of a barking dog.

So, we are going for a swim at Sandy Flats.

6:45-

Ooo. This new motor is fun. Like grandpa given Dexedrine, the boat gets up and skips Irish jigs on the top of the water. Nudge the throttle and it leaps, "Yes, Sir!" Once slothful the barge is now spry.

Although there is an annoying whistle to the motor, a sound not right. Unless it's a factory-installed indicator and will stop when the first ten hours is up, like a pop-up plug does to show cooks when Thanksgiving turkeys are ready to serve.

Maybe it's twin turbos, or tape-recorded jet turbines to discourage other boats from wanting to race.

Made a minor adjustment and it's made a major improvement. The tiller was tight, hard to steer, and was giving me a sore shoulder. I'd looked for a tension adjustment, even looked in the book, without clue. I saw it this morning while circling on land; a tiny spring-loaded screw low down at the side of a user-unfriendly place.

7:26-

We heard them coming. EZ sat up and stared upstream toward sounds of bickering and coarse laughter and bad-mannered splashing. An inflatable raft appeared first, tethered by rope to a canoe with an old man laid back inside, drinking from a bottle. The fun had run out much earlier for the man and woman contending inside the canoe. She swore violently and constantly, thrashing her paddle and splashing the river. Her mate in the stern yelled "more beer, Goddamnit! More beer!" Old man in the raft laughed and laughed.

The trio floated nearer. The woman's swimsuit was splotchy with wet. All had lobster-red sunburns and were entirely drunk.

Canoe man asked if they were close to the bridge. I said it was around the next bend.

"You got beer? Sell me beer."

"No," I denied and lied.

Woman resumed flailing her paddle hard and cursing, "Goddamnit! Get pumping, you fuck."

But the canoe was aimed toward shore and the husband's paddle was gone.

"Wha'bout Jack? You got Jack? Sell me fit'ty dollars fur yur bottle'a Jack."

I assured Raft Man I couldn't because I didn't.

"PADDLE!" woman demanded.

The man in the canoe stuck his cupped left hand into the river and stroked.

Current took them away.

9:08-

Humidity 98, temperature 76.

Sun is set. We are anchored in the rice flats for a wide view of the sky. Towering clouds tinged with orange in the north. Benign for us, but brightly throwing down lightning on others up there.