By Ben Alper
Living in the densely populated North End can sometimes feel like living in a small can of tightly-packed but friendly sardines. You’re never too far from a neighborly hello or a pre-COVID out-of-towner lugging a Mike’s Pastry box and asking directions to Old North Church.
Contrast our tightly packed community with the constant fleet of massive yachts that visit the North End Waterfront each summer. One recent vessel, the Lady Lara, is taller than a Prince Street walk up and longer than a festival parade.
Whenever I see one of these mammoth cruisers, I ask myself the same question: Why does anybody need a boat that big? Why would you need a vessel that requires Google Maps just to find the bathroom?
I also ask myself, what would I do if I had a boat as big as these behemoths? Here are the benefits I could think of:
- I would install a giant waterbed in my master cabin large enough to hold a family of harbor seals.
- I would have a custom-designed deck chair for every day of the decade.
- I would place an ad in Craigslist offering to tow a 100-person team of waterskiing acrobats.
- I would invite my family and friends to a bow-to-stern buffet that covers two time zones.
- I would dock near the Aquarium and propose to the proper city agencies and neighborhood groups adding 60 floors of residential and business space to my top deck. I would rename my yacht the SS Don Chiofaro.
- I would spend endless years renovating my boat and then spend the same amount of time waiting for Xfinity to install cable TV.
- I would hire 20 extra captains and name them Popeye1, Popeye2, Popeye3…
- Safety would always be my first priority. I would insist my guests maintain a social distance of no less than 50 yards.
- I would load my boat on my giant trailer and take it to my giant lake near my giant summer home in Vermont.
- Every Patriots Day, I’d dress up like Paul Revere, mount a horse and ride around the deck yelling, “The British are coming by sea – in boats not nearly impressive as mine!”
…if I owned a really big boat.
Local comedy writer Ben Alper is the author of “Thank You for Not Talking: A Laughable Look at Introverts.”
Thanks for the laugh
V.I.