The Raft

It's frightening to think that you mark your children merely by being yourself. . . . It seems unfair. You can't assume the responsibility for everything you do -- or don't do.
-- Simone De Beauvoir

Sunday, December 3, 2000
One year ago: Babe in the City
Two years ago: Missed Class
Three years ago: Dance with the Dancers

Jack had set the alarm, but he didn't get up notably early.

We started working in his garage, which is inconveniently far from his house. It's in a courtyard, and you have to walk aross the block of houses that his house is in, then down some treacherous stairs. Jack worked on his laundry at the same time we were decluttering the garage, since the laundry room is right there. We pulled out boxes of books that had collapsed, and repacked them. We made a pile of objects that should go in the house. I convinced Jack to get rid of some cardboard boxes, and the plastic his mattresses came in. We rolled the motorcycle out, and did a lot of organizing. He has so much stuff in there! Camping gear, supplies from the Vikingcon convention, tools, books, the life jackets from the raft... This was all in aid of getting the raft tucked away for the winter.

We went to try and movie the trailer with the raft on it. Why was it so heavy? There was water in the raft that had penetrated the tarp covering it. So we took a paddle and pressed down the side of the raft (half deflated) so the yucky water could come pouring out. Otherwise, we couldn't have gotten the trailer over to the truck!

But we succeeded in getting it hooked up, then Jack drove the half block and up into the courtyard. We used the vacuum to suck the air out of the raft, then heaved it off the trailer and onto the ground.

We knew that Jack had only a short time before he needed to go see his daughter A--- in the lockup, so we cut the work off so he could go shower. I went up to do computer stuff.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *    *

While Jack was gone, I decided to see what there was for dinner. Frozen chicken tenders, yukon gold potatoes, baby carrots -- these could all go in the crockpot, I guessed, on high since it was midafternoon already. But we were missing sauce ingredients! So I poured a balsamic vinegar-based salad dressing over it all.

I was surprised when Jack called me from work, after three. I hadn't understood that part of the plan, which would mean we'd be working on the raft in the dark. Oops!

He returned home around four o'clock, which is dusk at this time of year around here. Could we clean off the raft before it got pitch dark? D'oh! The hose bibs have all been turned off for the winter, and even after we unwrapped one from its plastic bag mummification, Jack couldn't get it turned on with a pair of pliers -- it must have been cut off at some remote place. So we changed plans, and went with buckets of water carried down from the house, and Simple Green sprinkled on straight. Scrub, rinse, and turn the blessed thing over and repeat. It's not so heavy, but the raft is big enough to be awkward.

After we'd rinsed the raft, we tried to roll it up. This was difficult! Jack exclaimed that we should have had more people. Eventually we folded it in thirds, and put the long yellow straps around it to hold it together. We managed to shove the thing into the garage, and left it at that. Whew!

*     *     *     *     *     *     *    *

We spent a quiet evening. The chicken in the crockpot came out very well! I must remember how I did it. Starting in the morning and cooking on low is usually better, so that's what I'd do next time.

I was feeling a bit neglected, and when I came upstairs to find Jack and found him playing solitaire I really felt bad. Of course, the truth was that he was very disturbed about the situation with his daughter, but had been stuffing that down and acting as if all were well. It's a true dilemma -- she'll probably be released from juvie after her hearing at the end of the week. Imagine her coming back and the same cycle starting again -- awful! But as her father, he's legally obligated to take her, it seems. So we talked about that for a while. I said that I realized the pressures he's under, but my tears were the equivalent of tugging on his sleeve, reminding him that I'm around.