Culebra Gone Away

With other events putting this post to the side, I figure I better get it in now, or it will slip slide into the Great Ether Bin. This was going to be a farewell post to Bartender John, Big John, John the guy with the bright yellow boat (that was the subject of a post awhile back, when I thought it was being sold to some friends...but it wasn't). It still is a farewell post, but in a different time zone now.

I saw John's boat quite a long time (in Culebra time) before I met John. Big. Bright. Yellow. It swung on its anchor in the harbor, as suddenly there as many boats are, but it stayed. John hung out a lot at Dinghy Dock, and that parlayed into taking a job as a bartender there. He was never planning on staying long, but falling under Culebra's spell, he stayed longer than he thought he might. As certain sorts of persons tend to do...


Then one day, while he was planning his futue plans to move home to Ohio, where he'd spend time brushing up and sending out resumes, along comes guy in a dinghy with a dead engine, obviously in need of some help. John, in his dinghy, towed him in and they started talking - boats, dinghies, engines.

Computer John puts back on his Balloon John hat for the OTHER John's So Long adornment

Over a few days, they talked some more. Life, work, histories. It turned out this guy was/is one of the head honchos for a construction company, working on a 90 story building project in New York. It turned out he needed someone, someone with job experience that just happened to profile exactly John's area of expertise, to work on that building for the next four years. An offer was made, an offer was accepted.

 Tibetan prayer flags and Dog Balloon hats go together

John sold his boat to my own landlord, tidied up his loose ends and flew away to New York to begin again a life he'd sailed away from.

From shorts and t's to suits and ties. From dinghying home to streets and cabs. From rocking on the water to rocking on the phones. He's happy. We're happy for him.



Salud, John! Go well. 

Have a strangely good encounter Saturday! Do something  kindly spontaneous.