The deck of the Pavlof, as seen
from the Kalakala |
Finally got around
to volunteering on the Kalakala, where I quickly discovered that what
Tom Cook
taught me 10 years ago had gone up in smoke, burning dirty as poorly adjusted
cutting torch. No matter--my cuts were ugly but it was nothing the grinder
couldn't fix and the heat and sparks felt good singeing my knee through the
hole in my jeans. Buffing the rust off scrap steel, the sheet hummed
otherworldly, the moaning of ghosts trapped somewhere in the hull--maybe
the engine room where nude
painted-white dancers
webcast their movements, muscle
and bone surrogates for pistons frozen by rust. Then it was time for lunch,
Bill's bbq pasta, and the day
was just begun... |
