The Old Man, The Kid, and A Dumpling

It was the kind of hangover he liked… had cultivated. Enough of one to remind him that he’d had a good time, but not enough to shy him away from the first evening drink. Cradling a mug of coffee, he sat in the shop among the ancient and broken-down outboards that needed repair and watched the morning fog lift over Timmerman’s Island and disappear. High clouds were beginning to take form; it would be a fine day.

The first-year kid was early and walked past the float planes to the end of the dock where he sat down next to the scow and dangled his wadered legs in the lake. He too had a mug of coffee, but it was more an attempt to fit in than a necessity.

The freighter had been loaded the evening before with a week’s worth of refuse; that which couldn’t be burned or ground into slop and poured into the lake. The contents had been covered the evening before with a ratty blue tarp so that none of the lodge’s guests could see the unsightly pile of trash that was headed to the dump. That was their job for the morning, the old man and the chore-boy, to run the garbage scow the length of the lake, load everything into the panel truck, and haul it to the dump where they’d pay a fee to throw it onto one of the enormous mountains of trash generated by the fishing village of Dillingham.

The kid wanted to be a fishing guide, and he’d make a good one the old man judged; the kind he liked to work with. He was well built, with shoulders that’d spent summers haying, he was always early, never walked away from work, did his job with a smile, and he had a sense of humor. He was also the only son of the old man’s duck hunting partner, and as the kid had gotten older, he’d taken his father’s place in the blind. The old man and kid had become friends. It seemed only normal that the kid had followed him to Alaska to work summers at the lodge; where the guides were young enough to be the old man’s grand-children and he was older than most of the guests’ parents.

“Morning Bobby”, the old man said in greeting. “What are you studying?”

“Hey there, Bob.” The kid replied. “Just watching the clouds.” It was a curious point of pride that they both shared the same first name.

“What do they look like to you?” the old man asked, figuring to hear some weather-wisdom he’d imparted to the kid.

“Well, you see that one, high over Jack Knife Mountain… the one with a hole in it?”

“Yeah, what’s it tell you?”

“It tells me that it must be September, ‘cause it looks like a vagina.”

“Well, yeah,” the old man chuckled. “That’s one way to keep track of time. You want to make the run? I need another cup of coffee.” The old man had penciled it out once; the average Alaskan fishing guide drinks his weight in coffee every six weeks.

Lines were cast off while the first of the guests sleepily made their way up the hill from their cabins to what the guides called, “the big house” for breakfast. Bobby slowly idled away from the dock while the old man lit his first cigar.

The big twin four-cycle outboards were quiet enough to allow for conversation, but the two drifted away into their own thoughts as was their habit.

We’re more alike than he knows, the old man thought. Though he hides it well, I know he gets nervous when he works with the other, more experienced guides. He’s afraid of forgetting something, making a mistake, or stumbling and being marked as a kid, a fucking new guy. And me? I worry about the same damned things because if a stumble I’ll be thought of as a washed-up old man.

When they got to the beach, across from the village of Aleknagik, Bobby walked up the hill to fetch the old bakery truck that was used to haul everything, supplies, groceries, luggage, and trash. The muffler was long gone, and the old man could hear it coming before he could see it.  The truck was backed down the landing to the bow of the scow and the process of moving the trash began.

“Why don’t you take the back of the truck, and I’ll hand the barrels up to you,” Bobby suggested. But even this arrangement distressed the old man’s back to the point where he needed the occasional break.

Sensing this, Bobby stopped the process and walked to the back of the boat, returning with a cup of coffee. It was enough of a rest for the old man, the trash was moved, and they rode toward the dump in silence.

“Do you think that cute gal will be working the dump office today?” Bobby asked, breaking the silence.

“Ahhh… the “Little Dumpling”, the old man said. “She’s rather fetching, if I do say so myself.”

“Tyler holds the record for the smallest dump-bill she’s given so far this season; he thinks she likes him.”

“You go in and do the talking, kid… Tyler’s got nothing on you.”

The kid put on his best smile and the Dumpling seemed to perk up as he walked into the gate house. The conversation took much longer than it should have, and the old man watched the Dumpling admiringly. If I was twenty years younger, he thought, with a sigh, I might have a chance with her.

Bobby had a smile on his face as he hopped in the truck. “Twenty-five dollars for the whole load,” he said triumphantly.

“You should get her name and ask her out the next time you’re stuck in town,” the old man suggested. “You never know.”

“I don’t know,” Bobby said, “maybe, if she was twenty years younger.”

The old man sighed, looked out the window, and lit another cigar.