The Best Time I Woke Up 10 Miles Off the Coast of Puerto Rico on a Moving Boat Full of Strangers
by Jessica Lauer
Let me begin by mentioning that, in these continuously dire economic times, I would like to offer a tip for anyone who is quivering between the decision of whether to apply to grad school or to not apply to grad school, and that tip is: APPLY TO GRAD SCHOOL IN PUERTO RICO! My personal choice was the University of Puerto Rico — Mayaguez, but there are lots! If you do not speak Español (or even if you do), try their English Education program. Why Puerto Rico you ask?
— It’s U.S. territory so it is basically just like applying to any other accredited American university.
— It’s currently $49/credit. $49 PER CREDIT!
— They offer Teaching/Research Assistantships like any other accredited American university, which includes a tuition waiver and a monthly stipend, which means that…
— … you could GET PAID to drink tons of rum STUDY (and drink tons of rum) IN PUERTO RICO.
If it happens you decide to take this advice to heart, then you might also decide to stay on the Island for Easter break (“Semana Santa”) one year (you probably won’t be able to afford to fly home), and you might decide to go to the beach every single day instead of “catching up on work.” And after a day spent at the beach with your friend Dee, you might also decide to buy a six-pack of local brew (Medalla) and stop in a fishing town on your drive home so you can sit on the dock and watch the sunset. A couple of cold ones in, while sitting on said dock, while watching said sunset, you might just meet five strangers who own a huge fishing boat. It might be one of your lifetime goals to go deep sea fishing, and so you just might ask them to let you come deep sea fishing with them. And they just might say “yes!”
Looking back, the best time I woke up 10 miles of the coast of Puerto Rico on a moving boat full of strangers is the last time I will ever have the carefree (careless?) inhibition to ever wake up 10 miles off the coast of Puerto Rico on a moving boat full of strangers. At this point, it’s a little bit of the Murtaugh Effect (“I’m too old for this shit!”) happening, and before I do anything now, I really do think to myself, “What would my mother say….?” (Answer: nothing. She would just give me the “Mom eyes”/glare).
So, anyway: here we are, Dee and myself, perched on the edge of a dock drinking our sunset six-pack, and Mike and Leo, two aging gringos (mid-40’s to our mid-20’s) approach the dock in their dinghy. Small talk about the weather and the sunset happens, and then we find out that the humongous boat 30 feet out is “their” boat. Innnteresting! VERY interesting, Leo. I let the beer do the talking:
“Do you go fishing on that boat?” I ask Leo.
“Of course we do,” says Leo.
“Oh my god, REALLLYYY? Can we come???”
Leo seems a little caught off guard, but says he is absolutely certain his father, the **actual** owner of the boat, would just love to have us along tomorrow, and that he’ll go take us to meet him right now! He’s just at the bar around the corner.
(Of course he is.)
I turn on my charm as Dee and I march to the bar to meet Señor Captain, who would soon come to be known as Captain Gene. Now, let’s do the math here. If Leo is in his 40’s, we can assume Gene is at least 60-something. Just as a point of reference. We meet Gene and I do my best to charm his pants off (not literally). It works! We are in! The ship sets sail at 4am! We can sleep on the boat! Great news, even if very little sleep will actually be happening.
Well, now that we have locked in our deep sea fishing excursion for tomorrow, let’s ditch these oldies! Outside the bar I see Dee chatting with three young fellows and she gives me the “come over here” signal. Peace out, old dudes. I have some real flirting to do. I approach them, and Dee explains that these youngsters are beginner strippers and want to practice for us. Ummm, what?!?
“Do I have to pay you?” I ask them. Because that would be a problem. I think I had $5 left at this point in the night.
“No! Heavens no,” they assure me. Well, then… c’est la vie!
They tell me they are 19 and have a stripping business on the side of their real jobs (a policeman and a firefighter…reeeally? *sigh*). I don’t believe them, but am willing to believe them for the moment. After a free show in the gravel parking lot of a dingy Puerto Rican bar, Dee and I head over to the dinghy with Leo to go out to the big boat where we’ll sleep. It turns out the poor guy is so fucking shitfaced that he can’t start the boat motor. Ugh, MEN. Dee and I grab the oars and ask him which boat we are supposed to be paddling towards. We arrive at the fishing boat alive, and Leo escorts Dee and I to our private cabin, which happens to be a snug cellar with four bunks in it. We sit up giggling for about 20 minutes and talking about how we hope to wake up with all our organs in the morning.
Just as we are drifting off, the cabin door busts open and Leo stumbles in and grabs on tightly to both of our hands. HOLY FUCK WE REALLY ARE GOING TO DIE, I think to myself (or out loud, or both). “And I never even got to go deep sea fishing! Hmph!”
“I jus’ wann’ed you guys ta know that you’re rilllly good friends uf mine,” he drunkenly slurs.
We both nod eagerly at him in the dark in total agreement. Umm… you too, Leo… I mean, you’ve been a great friend for the like six hours I’ve known you, that is.
About three hours later, it’s time to rise and shine, and we make our way to top deck to see a silhouette of the island we departed from on the horizon. Captain Gene, gentleman that he is, makes sure we take about three different kinds of motion sick medicine immediately. Dee still gets sick immediately (the hangover does not help), and insists on sitting on the back of the boat so she can chuck over the side while Captain Gene, Sir Charles, Carl, Leo and Mike (the whole crew) look on nervously, waiting for her to go overboard. Being hungover on a giant fishing ship is indeed some kind of Hell. At about 9:30 a.m. Captain Gene asks if I would like some “cold barley soup.” Oh Gene, you have no idea how much I would like that.
That afternoon I was enlightened about the lives of five strangers whom I had met less than 24 hours before. Captain Gene proved to be quite the philosopher, had been boating for about 15 years, and also owns a house in the Bahamas, which he bought from an Englishman whom he met in a bar after three days there. I should mention at this point in time I was completing my third year of a two-year master’s program and my parents were kinda on my ass about that. The problem was, the university kept paying me to TA every semester, sooo… in my mind, what was the hurry? I explained this conflict to Captain Gene, and he really articulated everything I had wanted to say but couldn’t bring myself to say: I’m never going to graduate; I don’t really want to graduate.
First mate Carl was due to receive his first social security check that week, which he was wildly excited about. In his younger years, he used to play shows with Jimmy Buffett and they would split the door pot down the middle. Sir Charles had been a commercial fisherman for 20 years in Alaska. All of these men had just met a month ago and all of them have travelled extensively on their own boats throughout the years. They were particularly fond of Trinidad and South America. Leo is Gene’s son and has worked with Mike in a gun factory in New Hampshire for most of their lives. Mike is apparently a genius according to all the men, which I believed because he totally had the crazy eyes.
At about noon, we dock so Gene can fill up with gas/water/something, which apparently takes like three hours. For lunch, Captain Gene and crew grilled all the fish we (I mostly mean “they”) caught that morning and some papas on the boat for lunch. It was one of the tastiest and most memorable meals I’ve ever had.
That evening we departed the boat and drove the dinghy to the same dock we had been sitting on the night before, swigging beer and watching a different Puerto Rican sunset. We made it off the boat alive, I had helped reel in a barracuda, and could cross something off my “bucket list” — all with the help of five total strangers. So there you have it. It was one of the greatest days of my life and it taught me that sometimes, the best way to get what you want is to just ask for it — even if it means asking a stranger.
Jessica Lauer is now a PhD student on the mainland. See! She really *hasn’t* graduated yet!
