Too much fun boating

A few years ago I drove down from Tampa to the condo to meet Mom and Dad for the weekend.  We planned to drive the boat down to Naples for the day to visit Bronson at the Marina.  When we started off the weather was pretty decent but things had gotten a little choppy right as we were turning up the river for the last 30 minutes of the drive to the marina.  By the time we got to the marina there was a down pour so it was perfect timing.

We were going to wait out the storm so we stayed with Bronson for several hours, had lunch and more than a few drinks.  We were wrapping things up when Mom and I decided to have just one more drink.  The last drink that puts you over the edge when you start having a really good time.  Since Dad was driving the boat he took it easy on the alcohol and was just not quite in the same place as we were.  The water was still rough and when we left the river and turned to head north into the gulf the waves were probably 6-8 feet.

Once we got going things calmed down a little but overall we rode through 4-6 foot waves and it was rough.  We knew Dad was getting ticked because Mom and I were carrying on, laughing, and having a good time behind Dad driving the boat.  About 5 minutes into the gulf, Mom thought it would be funny to trickle a little bit of cold water down Dad’s back.  This was something that he did to her all the time to joke around.  But when she did it to him on that day, man I wish I’d had my camera ready, because he got a look on his face like he was going to kill somebody.  He turned to us and screamed, “You think this is a fucking game?!?”  The he turned back to the wheel and cranked up the boat to almost full speed.  The boat was smashing down on the waves, bam, bam bam but he wasn’t slowing down.  Mom and I thought it was funny because he had to stand in one spot and get the shit beat out of him whereas we could allow our knees to cushion some of the shock of each wave crashing against the boat.  It took an hour to get to Ft Myers and he did not say a word.  By the time we got back he had calmed down some but avoided us for quite a while.

Shawn