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The crow is a strange bird and the tale I am about to tell is even stranger. I am not a strong believer in the supernatural, I have never seen a ghost or a goblin, with the exception of Hallowe’en. I don’t believe in reincarnation, or at least I didn’t! Billy Crowe, the former editor of the Fishermen’s Voice passed away and his brother Mike took over the paper. Bill and I were great friends. I always told him that he looked and acted just like his namesake – a crow.
Now Mike called me a few weeks ago and reminded me that we had an obligation to fulfill: Bill made us promise to scatter his ashes across Frenchman’s Bay where he loved to motor across in the warm summer months. With the weather being what it has been with calm days being hard to come by, and Mike traveling alot, we have not gotten it done. I have been having trouble with my boat and had a hard time with it. About three weeks ago I had a visit from an old friend from Germany who brought me a box of special chocolates from there. They are filled with brandy and they have quite a kick to them. I am a diabetic and sometimes my sugar drops when I am working on the water. It makes me faint and dizzy feeling. One of these chocolates remedies that in a minute. I took a full box aboard the boat and put them on the bulkhead up behind the fathometer with my spare pack of cigarettes. The chocolates were in a cardboard box wrapped in cellophane, the cigarettes were hard pack. The next morning when I went to the wharf my son was there sitting in his truck. He motioned me to come over. I got in with him and he said, “Dad, I just saw the damndest thing – a crow was aboard your boat and I saw him flapping around in there, then, he flew out and landed on a limb of that big tree on the point, only he crash landed and went ass over teakettle into the brush.” He said that bird must have been a sick one or something. He took an awful digger. I rowed aboard the boat and there on the engine cover was my box of Brandy filled chocolates with six holes pecked through the box and all the brandy sucked out of six of those chocolates. I think they were probably about 1/2 ounce apiece, quite a load for a three pound crow. No wonder he crash landed. Back in the platform was my cigarettes with the pack ripped open and cigarettes strewn around everywhere. Billy always liked to smoke a lot when he drank! Now, you could pass this off as just a coincidence, but listen to the rest of the story. I took my boat to a repair shop that day, it was about a twelve mile run from here to Downeast Diesel and tied it up to their wharf. It was there for a couple days and John called me on the third day and said it would be ready about noon. I went over and the boat was ready when I got there. I went in the office and paid the bill and when I came out John came up to me and said, “I never lost anything out of a boat before - everything is in your boat, except I saw a damn crow fly out of there this morning, and he had that box of candy that was on your bulkhead. He flew across the harbor with them.” I started laughing and I told him the story and John knew Billy, so he believed me. This is all the Gospel truth, so you decide. Just coincidence? Maybe! But the reason I am writing this story at 5 a.m. is because a damned crow parked outside my bedroom window this morning about 4:30 and squawked and cawed until I got up. You can bet your butt on one thing, the ashes will be scattered this weekend. Look out for the bird. Good Fishing, Capt. Perry Wrinkle |
