Occasionally we come across a person on a boat who has no place in our community.
Like the ignoramus who arrived at the lock today after we’d been tied for almost thirty minutes waiting for it to be brought back online. “I’m very fast” he shouted as he drove at cruising speed to the head of the queue timing his run to perfection as the light turned green, oblivious to the protests of all whose turn it was. In the context of one’s life span, one’s summer afloat, one’s week, or even one’s afternoon, there is no cause for angst over the loss of ten minutes of travelling time, and we really should take it with a grain of salt. But this is the maritime equivalent of sneaking into a parking spot that someone else has been waiting for the occupant to vacate.
The penalty for doing so should be imprisonment for life, or perhaps even longer.
Still, as we sat in the afternoon in the shade of the ancient buildings that line Saverne’s cobbled streets, we were congratulating ourselves on the manner in which we had completely forgotten the incident. Then our “Tea of Alsace” arrived, an iced green-tea concoction with wild mandarins and lemon and green mirabelle plums. It was as sweet as our day had been, with an ever so slightly bitter aftertaste.
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