September’s Nine

(Anybody got a spare orca?)

In the mid 1990’s, my mother lived aboard a sailboat in Eagle Harbor on Bainbridge island. Every few weeks, I’d take the ferry crossing from downtown Seattle to Bainbridge and walk through the little town of Winslow to her moorage.

One Autumn evening, I found myself on the observation deck staring at the backs of a small group of commuters who, in turn, were staring past the prow. The engines slowed as the boat made the turn into the harbor and, in the muted respite, a bearded man in a trenchcoat turned to me. He made small talk in the quiet push toward the distant dock.

I wasn’t surprised when he told me that he had once fallen overboard. There is a whole list of things bearded men in trenchcoats have said to me.

He was terrified, he recounted, and knew he was going to die in the water. But very quickly, he was rescued by an orca. It steadfastly brought him to shore and he now calls the orcas his friends.

I cannot remember all of the details of his story but I remember it being just realistic enough to kinda be plausible but not really.

Mostly, I remember having no response – not because I was unaffected, but because I couldn’t stop imagining the man in a trench coat clinging for dear life to a slippery, wide porpoise as they breached the water with spectacular speed. Could he hang on? It would have been unfair to ask him.

The ferry docked, we disembarked, and I did not see him again. 

A few years later (maybe less) I read in the paper that he had died. Apparently, he had been an icon of the commute. Expertly timed chats were his thing.

The short article stated that he had once had a family – a wife and child– but alcoholism washed that all away. He had lived a transient life for a decade and was a mainstay on the route to and from Bainbridge Island. 

I wondered, how could such a sweet man lose his family? Why didn’t they take care of him? Why didn’t they fight for him? How bad of an alcoholic could he have been? 

I have come to know the rueful answers to those questions.   

Now, when he comes to mind, and he does often, I remember him as three people. 

The man who loved greatly and was greatly loved. 

The man whose alcohol consumption destroyed the life he built.

The man who could only be saved by an orca. 

Godspeed, orca.