On the Bay nothing is taken for granted. Daily life may already be largely prescribed, but the specifics of those lives is as different as the shape of the whitecaps that develop on the Bay on a windy day. Little things like the grooming habits among Watermen - some men came 'to-the-boat', everyday, dressed as neat as a pin. Wives took great care and pride to make sure, 'my man didn't go to work looking like he ain't got no home'. Of course there were always the men who looked like motherless children, their dirty clothes, mismatched socks, coats closed with safety pins, not buttons or clasps, and headgear that couldn't protect anything from inclement weather. Especially in the Fall and Winter the clothes could make the man.
I had a bunch of uncles - at one time or another all of them worked on the Bay.
One uncle was a dandy, as pristine as pristine could get. His clothes, the hair on his head, his mustache, the manicure of his short nails on his long fingers - this was the way he presented himself everyday. A second uncle, a jovial fellow, loved his bottle. One night he got drunk, slipped, fell into a ditch hitting his head on a rock. He drowned in less than eighteen inches of water.
When they found him, in his back pocket he had a small bottle of whiskey, still intact, and a wet bible. Dandy or drunk, on the Bay, big or little, nothing could ever be taken for granted.
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