« | Home | »  Thirty Thousand Seals and a Whale    I have many
cousins, some of whom I grew up with, others I’ve never met
whose names I don’t know. Of the two closest to me – the boys I
used to keep from beating each other up at Christmas parties
past – one is a Marine in the Helmand Province of Afghanistan,
and the other is a lobsterman in Hull. My father, a retired
truck driver, spends most of his time sailing (on his own or
with his mates), fixing up boats (his own or others’), rowing in
the harbour (for pleasure or salvage), serving in the Coast
Guard Auxiliary (one patrol a week), or wading in the bay raking
up clams (an activity called quahoggin’), or reading books about
nautical adventures (he also likes Knut Hamsun). At my aunt’s I
sat down next to my father and the lobsterman, who were staring
oddly at the closing credits of the movie Finding Nemo. (It’s
one of those houses where a screen in every room has to be
playing something: others were showing American football and
replays from monster truck