What is it that draws us to the water, and some of us in particular to old boats?

Is it some subconscious urge deep in our genes to return to where life began aeons ago?

Is it all those free-floating, invigorating negative ions spinning through the air and the mist of the surf, the waves and the fog? As far back as the Vikings, my ancestors have been around the water and ships. My son surfs, races in shells and dories, and makes a living in the summer as an ocean lifeguard, just feet from the relentless waves.

Maybe it's that same primeval call to the wild that draws us to mountains and forests. We all want to test ourselves against nature and the elements, it's being outdoors in a wide expanse of nature where we realize the truth to the adage "Oh Lord, Thy Sea is so great and my boat is so small". Some of us relegated to the engine rooms have to settle for making things work rather than seeing nature in hand-to-hand contests. It's the mechanical things in our life that hold nature at arms length.

I remember the days on fishing boats with my dad, uncles, or friends, I'd listen to my dad explain the how to's of navigation by dead reckoning, triangulation. On a night trip out through a bad inlet, my best friend and I would be sent to the cabin below so as not to wind up overboard. Our view of the world was limited to what we could see through the partially opened cabin doors. We could look out over the stern and watch the stars then ocean, stars, then ocean.

I can recall how the exhilaration of hitting the waves and ducking the spray as we headed out to sea on a sun filled day would sometimes turn to a strange feeling in the pit of my stomach when the engine would stall, and the batteries would be dead, and the sky would cloud up. That's when I heard those colorful words from my uncles that my father had warned me about. Even then as I stood looking over the top of the cabin at the on coming waves, I always knew no matter what I'd wind up in the Navy, or the Coast Guard.

What is the attraction to the motion as our craft rides rolling and pitching through the seas, sometimes as the main deck is awash in surging foam? Why is there an emotion or feeling of disappointment that competes with our desire for family and home as the ship or craft comes to rest against a pier? Even just climbing out of a canoe onto the bank of a river at the end of a trip has a little bit of disappointment to it. Why are the dreams during the first night on dry land about the sea?

Now, here are a bunch of men, (and even some ladies) most eligible for senior citizen discounts at Mc Donald's, some of us who will never again fit into those old bell-bottoms and jumpers, longing to return to a time and place from our youth. Some of us couldn't wait to get off that dam hellhole of a ship. If some of us are in a gift shop with a nautical theme we may pick up a plaque that says, " A swell ship for the captain, a Hell ship for the crew" most of us can think of a particular time and place, or a person we'd like to forget. Maybe we think of an old tin can or bucket of bolts that should have been made into Toyotas long before we came aboard.

So here we are, trying to save an old ship that one of our (inebriated, if the rumor is correct) mates tried and failed, to "do in", long ago. That story is now legendary. The ship forever has a nickname based on that one incident alone. Every time it takes on water, or a drain backs up, it's "ah hah, see? I told ya so" It's famous within what is a relatively small community.

At least I thought so. Now I recall that years ago when I was still in the Navy, a family friend had been a storekeeper aboard the Tam. Then later, my civilian supervisor was a retired senior chief who had left the Tam just a day or so before the dry-dock incident.

Some years later I read a sea story. Something I hadn't done for some time. I had been in the Army for awhile and my attraction to ships was packed away like my memories. Imagine my surprise, I read on, wearing a broad grin, even as the hair on my neck prickled at the thought of being aboard the old ship in such a fury as happened in the fall of '91. I thought of watching the old inclinometer down in Main Control and the ship being off of the Coast of New Jersey my home state to boot!

I could almost taste the bile in my throat as my heart beat throbbed in my head, holding on for dear life, my thoughts competing, I wished I were on deck to lend a hand but just as glad to be in the engine room as the deck apes struggled to do their heroic deeds. Courage is not the absence of fear, its being afraid and doing your job anyway.

When experiencing heavy weather, I always tried to think in a positive light, probably somewhat naïve, but I thought, "If World War Two didn't sink her, a little rough weather won't either". That's what I told myself to keep my vivid imagination in check, even as unsecured objects would be thrown noisily to the deck.

In 1991, I had thought the ship was just a memory by then, converted to disposable razors, but here she was still active and home ported in New Hampshire, rather than "Gilligan's Island".

So in April now, we will get a chance to fill the ship with the sounds of feet on metal stair steps, the static of radio sets, the squawking of quick acting water tight doors, the internal clattering of pistons and crankshafts, followed by satisfying deep rumble as diesels turn over. With the main engines running, there will be those little pangs of exitement at the thought of getting under way, seeing someplace new, feeling the bow rise and fall to the seas.

There will be human voices again, quiet in the bridge and above decks offices and staterooms, louder where they have to compete with machinery.

I'd like to have a dollar for every time the phrase will be uttered… "I remember this one time…"