This may be kind of an odd topic for a post but I have been thinking about this lately.  I was going to share a recent story but as I was writing another came to mind which I would like to share. And yes, I laughed about it; a lot. The story…

It wasn’t until I was in my thirties that my mother decided to let a little tidbit about me and my sister out (many years after my parents’ divorce). My dad is very cheap. He could be the photo for the definition of “frugal” in the dictionary. But he also has dreams of having special things just like anyone else. He had always wanted a boat, but I came along instead. So no boat. Several years later, he wanted a color TV. Instead, my sister came along. So no color TV. So you can say I was supposed to be a boat and my sister was supposed to be a color TV.

A few years into his retirement, dad got his boat. It was a very nice pontoon boat. He invited a number of his friends for the christening of the boat; my sister was there too. I didn’t get invited. In fact I didn’t know he had a boat until several months later. The plan for the day was to go out to the middle of the lake and have a nice relaxing cookout on the boat. My sister was kind of enough to tell me what happened.

Everyone boarded the boat and dad did well at getting the boat headed out to the middle of the lake. He picked a nice spot where he intended to anchor the boat. He went and grabbed the anchor and tossed it into the water. Just as he let go of the anchor he realized that the anchor was not attached to a rope to hold the boat in place.  I was told the look on his face was priceless.

I still get a chuckle out of this as I was supposed be his first boat.

~”the Boat”