Lost Time in Rockport by Mike Bozart - HTML preview

Lost Time in Rockport

by Mike Bozart

© 2020 Mike Bozart 

Rockport – or what is left of it – is on the northern coast of California. It is commonly considered the beginning (southern boundary) of The Lost Coast.

A group of seven men, five Caucasian and two Chinese, all in their mid-20s to mid-30s, are walking along an ashen-sand beach, following a wide-but-shallow brook (Cottoneva Creek) upstream. Their well-worn denim work clothes are frayed and stained. They are chanting in the quickly-becoming-eerily-dense advection fog.

“Summer Landing. Summer Landing. Some are landing on Summer Landing. Winter schooners a-mooring at Summer Landing. That tall rock’s top got lopped. Tomorrow another redwood gets chopped. Old man [Robert E.] Miller suspended a flat bridge. But the footing is tricky up on that ridge. We came for the gold. Now we sleep with the mold. And we always have a cold. Summer Landing … pfft! Summer Landing. Some are landing on Summer Landing. Summer Landing. Some are landing on …”

The two Chinese immigrants, whose English is quite limited, mouth the verses to fit in. They are with the only white workers who will associate with them. Yes, the anti-Asian racism was pervasive and bluntly invidious.

At a still sylvan Dodge Gulch, the white Americans split off from the Chinese men on this grayer-than-grey February Saturday evening in 1879. All begin heading to their company-apportioned living quarters.

“Enjoy your Sunday off, gents,” the brown-haired white man with a rusty mustache pauses to say. “See you bright and early Monday morning.” Bright? Haven’t seen the sun before noon in months.

The two Chinese men, Bohai (means sea waves) and Bolin (means soft rain), both nod and wave goodbye. Soon they are back at their rustic lodgings. Bolin, who is older (35), sleeps on the narrow bed; Bohai, aged 26, sleeps on a makeshift cot that is set off to the side of the fireplace. In front of the stone hearth is a small dining table.

After quietly eating their bowls of rice, the men begin to converse in Cantonese (approximate translations) over a bottle of whiskey.

“Is this really worth it?” Bohai asks dejectedly. “Shouldn’t we have just stayed in Shanghai?” Is he freaking nuts?!

“And starved to death?” Bolin rejoins. “I’ve already saved a tidy sum of money. I’m content to stay right here.”

“But, most of the Americans don’t like us.”

“Most is not all, Bohai. Remember when we first started logging here? Remember how no one would come near us?” Exactly.

“Yes. That’s what I mean. We are not welcome here.”

Bolin sighs. “But now we walk home with five white men who talk to us as friends.” But, are they really our friends?

Bohai groans. “Hardly any Chinese women around here, Bolin. The white women won’t have anything to do with us.” Guess he’s tired of shaking his snake.

“Ah, the young buck is feeling horny. Maybe you need to go down to Chinatown in San Francisco for a week and get it out of your system. I’m sure that the boss would give you some time off.” This is just lost time in Rockport. My youthful years … quickly slipping away. Don’t want to be old and alone, looking back on a life that was only spent working. What is the point in that?

“Don’t you want to get married and start a family, Bolin?”

“No, not really.” I knew that he was an odd one. Why did I ever set foot on that boat in Hangzhou Bay? Why?! What an astoundingly dumb idea!

After five seconds of pensive silence, Bohai looks back up. “Well, I do. It’s normal to want to start a family.”

“Like I said, go down to ‘Frisco’. Have a whore straighten out your noodle. You can go ahead and bring her back here if you’d prefer. It’s ok with me.” A whore? Noodle?

“I don’t want to marry a whore!” Marry? Oh, dear.

“Listen.” Bolin then sets his glass down on the wooden table. “I’ll let you two have this place to yourselves. In three months I will have enough money to build my own place on a small plot of land up the creek that an American sold me last year.”

“You never told me about that. Why didn’t you ever mention this to me?” Fang warned me that Bolin wasn’t straight-up. But, I didn’t believe him. Another mistake.

“You never asked.” Bolin grins wryly.

“How would I know to ask?” Bohai lobbed that one right in my wheelhouse. This is going to be good. Probably the highlight of the night. Well, for me at least.

After clearing his throat in an exaggerated fashion, Bolin quips: “So, now you’re asking me?” He then guffaws so loud that the un-caulked windowpanes rattle. He’s not right in the head. It’s time for me to move on. Maybe just relocate to San Francisco. Take up residence in a Chinatown shanty. Even if it’s only a low-pay menial job, I would stand a chance of meeting a female. It’s never going to happen here. This is just lost time in Rockport.

Bohai waits for Bolin’s uproarious laughter to subside. “So, this is going to be it for you: work six days a week slicing and loading timber and then get drunk on Saturday night. I’m sorry, Bolin, but this is not going to be enough for me. I need more; life should be more.” More problems.

“An aspirational lad, are you? You must have that ambitious Hong Kong blood.” Whatever.

Suddenly, the cabin is shaking. The table’s legs begin to bounce on the madrone-slat floor. A metal trinket falls off the mantle. It’s a moderate earthquake. However in a mere 11 seconds, the temblor ceases.

“Woah!” Bohai exclaims. “Glad that’s over.”

“Ah, just another shaker,” Bolin remarks. “The ground here is alive.” Way too alive.

“Unlike our China,” Bohai adds. He really wants to be back in China. Poor fellow.

“I experienced several earthquakes in China,” Bolin boldly broadcasts. “One was quite severe – a lot of damage.”

“Speaking of damage, I’m going to go down to the mill to see if anything got smashed.”

“Why do you want to do that?” Bolin enquires. “That’s not your responsibility. Anyway, you’re off the clock now. Relax. Here, have another drink.”

“No, that’s ok. I feel restless. I’ll be back in 20 or 30 minutes.” And with that, Bohai stumbled out the front (and only) door. Hope he doesn’t get in any trouble. He seems a bit moody tonight.

Bohai strides down the wooden tramway that parallels Cottoneva Creek. The woods are quiet. The fog now has a sponge-like density. He arrives at the sawmill in only six minutes. There appears to be no structural damage. Then he turns west as a rogue wave crashes below. He thinks about the 200-foot-long (61 meters) suspension bridge between the sea stacks. Yeah, let’s check that out. Nothing else to do. Don’t want to hear Bolin re-tell the same old lame jokes.

As Bohai winds his way down the narrow switchbacks on the ocean-side cliff to the beginning of the first bridge, he stops and gazes at the marine-layer-capped, froth-laced bight. Why did I leave my homeland? Really wish I were back home. I’m just not cut out for life in a foreign land like America. The language is too hard to learn. And not a single Chinese woman here. Well, there certainly are some in San Francisco. That’s it; my mind’s made-up: I’m going to Chinatown tomorrow morning. Early. I’m done with Rockport. Won’t be coming back, either. Will Bolin be angry? No, don’t think so. He’s a solitary type; he’ll enjoy having that shack to himself. Bet he’s glad when I’m gone. But, who will his drinking buddy be? Well, that will be his problem to solve.

Bohai then looks down and notices a discarded plank of red fir that is about one foot long by six inches wide by two inches thick (30.48 cm x 15.24 cm x 5.08 cm). He extracts his penknife and carves a short line into the damp wood.

浪费时间 Rockport ‘79

Once in the middle of the suspension bridge, he tosses his engraved slab of wood to the sea. Bohai can faintly see the plank bobbing in the swells. Wonder where it ends up. Wonder where I end up. Don’t want to end up alone like Bolin. Wonder why he prefers a celibate life. He’s so asocial. He just generally doesn’t like people. Maybe something happened in his childhood. Bet that’s it.

Bohai would safely make it to San Francisco. And in two satisfied years, he would be getting married in Chinatown. He rapidly learned plumbing and led a mostly contented life with his two children, a son and a daughter.

Bolin would never see or hear from Bohai after his departure on that Sunday morning. However, three Sundays later while walking along the beach portion of the cove just north of Rockport Bay, Bolin noticed a small section of lumber that was half-buried in the sand. He whispered the Chinese part of the message: “Waste time? Or maybe, ‘lost time’?” Probably the latter. I bet that Bohai carved this. Yeah, I know that he did. Who else can write in Chinese here? Well, there are several others, but I bet that he did it. Yeah, it was definitely him. That was his sentiment. Did he do it on his last night in Rockport? Lost time … Well, I hope that he has found his Miss Happiness in Chinatown. Or wherever he is. To each his own.