What does a waterman gift his father for Christmas?

A waterman, not long off hand-tonging for oysters this frigid late morning, came through the front door of a vintage shop in St. Michaels. Antique house filled with antique items. Wood, metal, paint, paper, glass, clay.  No plastic.

He headed immediately up the wooden stairs to the second floor. Two days before Christmas. He knew what he was after.

Looking through eyes surrounded by skin weathered and cold-hardened from the morning’s work, he carefully examined the dozen or so workboat models lining the shelves. Bright sunshine streaming through the windows of the upstairs room spotlighted the details he patiently noted.

“Sir,” I said, pointing my words in his direction, 10 feet or so away in the next small room. “Do you do much fishing around here?”

I was holding a small case filled with a dozen shining and colorful spinner lures, thinking about a gift for my grandson.

He didn’t look up from the boat he was eyeing.  Didn’t answer me.

“Sir,” I said with more volume. Still nothing.

“Sir,” once more with even more lung.

Three’s a charm.

He finally looked up at me and I asked the fishing question again. By now I realized his hearing wasn’t so great.  I know the feeling, having to frequently ask people to speak up. Maybe his issue being a hitch developed over a few decades behind the loud exhaust of deck-mounted diesel engines in workboats.  Tractor hitch I think farmers call it.

Looking at the lures, he said he didn’t do that kind of fishing.  “I fish but it’s mainly with nets, commercial fishing.  Pound nets mostly.”

He looked back down at the model boat. “But I’m oysterin’ now. Hand tonging.  Not much fishing at the moment.

“I want to buy a model boat for my father for Christmas, but man, they’re high.”

Everything’s high these days, I thought. “Groceries are what got me elected,” said Donald Trump in a recent interview.  True words from my point of view. Lots of factors, but groceries were definitely one of the big ones. Inflation might be easing but prices are certainly not coming down in any hurry. Money’s tight.

The details he had been eyeing on the models included price tags.  I had looked at them too.  Several hundred dollars, each.

Lots of time and effort–meticulous work–go into model building.  The best ones–and these were all high quality–amount to scaled down but highly accurate versions of the real deal, with tiny braided-cotton lines, metal anchors, and other detailed rigging, whether tongs or dredges.

But lots of time and effort also went into that wad of cash the Tilghman Islander was fingering in his pocket as he considered the gift for his father, probably a waterman himself.

At $35 a bushel and a 12-bushel daily limit, the purchase would cost him at least one full day’s work, that day’s work probably, and the cash he was paid for that effort.

The waterman took his time with all the models displayed but kept coming back to a handsomely painted draketail with its slim stern and elegant hull curving gently upward toward a proud stem. Chesapeake watermen have a great appreciation for the graceful lines of their workboats and the tools of their trade.

“He decorates his house with these,” the waterman said as he handed over his cash to the lady at the front desk.

“He will really appreciate this,” she said.

A lot of love, respect, and admiration in that pure, way-of-life gift.

Christmas, I thought. Its sentiments run deep.

Dennis Forney has been a publisher, journalist and columnist on the Delmarva Peninsula since 1972.  He writes from his home on Grace Creek in Bozman.