Chapter 19 A Boat.
The September that started my fourth year on the island, I thought long and hard about moving to the other side of the island.
There was little doubt that it was far more beautiful than where I had decided to settle.
I also was inspired by the fact that I could see land from there.
It made me want to escape.
I remembered young Zuri in our boat and I wished I had that very boat with me on the island.
How far I could have gone.
In spite of this longing to return to civilization, I was also afraid to leave the island.
What if I ended up somewhere even worse?
Plus, I had now been here for quite some time, and I had never seen another human being.
For that matter, I hadn't seen much of anything.
You know from experience Robinson, I said to myself that the worst always seems to happen when you venture away from home.
No, I wouldn't move my camp.
It was safe and comfortable, and I needed to stay put for now.
That didn't mean I stopped thinking about getting off the island.
I desperately wanted a boat.
The parts from our ship were still hidden down by the beach.
Maybe there was some way I could repair it after all.
Well, that was a foolish thought.
After weeks of hard work, I was forced to come to the same conclusion.
There was no fixing that boat.
Still, I had to have a boat.
My mind was made up.
I said out loud, I'll just have to build one then.
Again, what a foolish plan.
I didn't think it through before I started.
I spent weeks in the woods chopping down the perfect tree.
Once it fell, I spent nearly four months shaping the bottom and digging out the inside.
When that was all done, I had a mid-sized canoe.
There was just one problem.
How would I get the boat to water?
Right now, it's set in the middle of the forest.
I've Pushed, I pulled, I tugged, I kicked and screamed.
The boat simply would not budge and there was no way I could drag it all the way through the forest and the valley and then onto the beach.
What on earth was I thinking?
My struggle with the canoe ended up in nothing but frustration.
This boat was forever stuck on land.
"'It's funny if you think about it,' I said to Shippy.
"'On the beach, I've got pieces of a boat that won't float.
In the forest, I've got a canoe that would float, but I can't get it to water.
And so I celebrated my four-year anniversary on the island with two boats, neither of which would help me to escape my island'.
Despite the mishaps with the boats, there was enough food to eat and plenty of water to drink.
My house was safe and dry most of the time.
There were things that I missed from home, like carrots and peas, but I was healthy, and that's all that really mattered.
All in all, year four was good.
The rainy season started and it came time for me to try and fix my clothes.
I had rescued as many of the sailors clothes as I could from the ship all those years ago.
The most important items I saved were the shirts.
In total, I had about two dozen of them.
The shirts were made out of linen.
They were light and quite comfortable, but they were also getting worn out.
Many of them had turned to rags by now.
I tried to wear them one at a time so they would last as long as possible.
I had also rescued plenty of coats from the ship all those years ago, but the weather on the island was too hot to wear them.
Instead, I made them into pants and shorts.
If my baskets were awkward, my sewing was even worse.
By the time I was finished making my clothes, I looked like quite a sight.
My shirts were rags and I wore pants made out of coats.
Soon I decided just to make my wardrobe from goat skins.
It wasn't fashionable, but it was comfortable.
In addition to my goatskin clothes, I also made a hat.
My skin was very fair, and I tended to burn if I stayed outside for too long.
The hat worked well to keep off the sun.
While I was fixing up my wardrobe, I also made an umbrella.
It became my most prized possession.
Not only did it block out the sun, but it also kept me dry during the rainy season.
