Monday, August 28, 2017
Why I Have A Harpoon Head In My Bedroom
By Donovan Baldwin
If you go into my bedroom (Don't look at the mess.), sooner or later you will see something that you might want to ask me about.
Maybe the harpoon head.
If we dig around some more, we'll find belaying pins, marlinspikes, some pieces of fancy knotting, and books on knots.
Things my father owned.
He had a love for fishing, sailing ships, old things related to the sea, and, his hobby was knotting.
Hence all the knotted things he made; a dog leash, a whistle lanyard...now, the whip I can't explain, but, he DID make it. He used to go to an old ship chandler's business in a musty old building down on South Palafox Street in Pensacola.
Often I went with him.
Old guy running it could have been the model for Dickens' "Ebenezer Scrooge", to my young mind.
All I've got left is this stuff...oh yeah, and memories. Memories of my dad, with a book on his lap, belaying pins and marlinspikes driving my mother crazy, as he tried to tie the knots in the books.
Musty, dusty old store.
Musty, dusty old memories. But, they've stood the test of time..
Dad died in 1981. Gone 36 years as I write this.
Miss him, but, still got the memories and the knots tying us together.
The harpoon head? Never knew why he bought the damn thing. Just liked it I guess.
That's how he was.
Me too.
Maybe the harpoon head.
If we dig around some more, we'll find belaying pins, marlinspikes, some pieces of fancy knotting, and books on knots.
Things my father owned.
He had a love for fishing, sailing ships, old things related to the sea, and, his hobby was knotting.
Hence all the knotted things he made; a dog leash, a whistle lanyard...now, the whip I can't explain, but, he DID make it. He used to go to an old ship chandler's business in a musty old building down on South Palafox Street in Pensacola.
Often I went with him.
Old guy running it could have been the model for Dickens' "Ebenezer Scrooge", to my young mind.
All I've got left is this stuff...oh yeah, and memories. Memories of my dad, with a book on his lap, belaying pins and marlinspikes driving my mother crazy, as he tried to tie the knots in the books.
Musty, dusty old store.
Musty, dusty old memories. But, they've stood the test of time..
Dad died in 1981. Gone 36 years as I write this.
Miss him, but, still got the memories and the knots tying us together.
The harpoon head? Never knew why he bought the damn thing. Just liked it I guess.
That's how he was.
Me too.
Labels: dad, donovan baldwin, harpoon, harpoon head, knots, knotting, memories, memory, my father, sailing ships, ship chandler
