Tommy Wilson: Love of the sea in my DNA

I can sit for hours and watch the world float on by. Photo/File

We all need a place of refuge when the going gets tough and for many of us, we have our favourite special spot, where we go to sit and ponder the meaning of life - and the challenges we face living it.

For me Pilot Bay has always been that special place. I can sit for hours and watch the world float on by. Ki tai wiwi, ki tai wa wa - the tide comes in the tide goes out - like life itself, returning home on the outgoing to the deep unknown of the open sea.

I guess it is because I share many happy memories growing up along its safe shores that I find such peace in and around Pilot Bay. The perfectly manicured pathways are like an octopus' garden - just as the Beatles sang, and sometimes when this whole world starts to get me down and people are just too much to bear, I head to the harbour and park up.

To sit and gaze out at Te Awanui and the flotilla of bobbing boats who dance to the tune of ki tai wiwi - ki tai wa wa is my 'up on the roof' escape. It is a meditation in itself - and I have been doing quite a bit of that lately in light of what is going on globally.

There is something about the soothing effect of the sea and the craft who cosy up to it. Is it because they all have a story to tell about their glory days? Maybe so, especially the waka which are a little long in the tooth and would have been around in my dad's day when he was a commercial fisherman here in Tauranga Moana?

I don't know but whatever it is it works and it feels like it is in my DNA to seek solace from the sea and all who sail on her.

Dad, like many fishermen loved the serenity of the sea. He trusted it, he looked after it and in turn, the sea looked after him. From a young boy brought up on the streets of Auckland and watched over by Uncle Scrim, the patron saint for the homeless, Dad had a little 16-footer he called home, and as a very young teenager just around the corner from heading out to war, he found his own refuge out on the sparkling waters of the Waitemata.

It was only recently when I put the past pieces of Dad's jigsaw together that I worked why I have found a calling to help with the homeless? It's in my DNA.

I loved to listen to Dad's fishing stories and the characters he was in cahoots with - especially the yarns told when sheltering from the storm or a hangover out at Tuhua (Mayor Island).

Especially the yarns about boats gone by.
The Golden Gate, Tide Song, Aorangi, Zora and The Vanguard were all part of Dad's floating whakapapa.

Fishing boats have a whakapapa - history of their own, a deep long lineage of glory days when the size of the catch grew in stature each time the stories was retold and could only be measured by the captain telling the story.

I guess there could have been a bit of that embroidering of the truth inherited by this storyteller from his father. Just saying . . .

He could bring those boats to life, each as a legend with on board characters worthy of any Disney script. Jack Costello, Jimmy Wells the butcher - who also had the best fish 'n' chip shop anywhere in the Bay, Ces and Earle Marsh, Killer Preston, Ian Boyce and the larger-than-life Ross Bennett being strapped to the dingy and floated into Mayor Island's sou-east bay.

Big Ross was a big bugger and this was the only way they could get him into shore.
They were all blasts from his past and I remember them all when I sit and stare out from Pilot Bay, reminiscing about the many happy childhood memories aboard Dad's fishing boats, the Little Maree and the Halcyon.

There was nothing better than being on a boat with your father fishing, especially when the late-night yarns starting flowing.

Magic moments howling with laughter out on the briny - anchored off in the entrance to Pilot Bay, hoping to hook a fresh snapper for breakfast. Each story a toanga for us to hold on to in later life.

All of them glory days for Dad and well-earned after a war he never came home from.
As we stand by and wait for which way the world will turn, not knowing what tomorrow brings, it is a good time to head down to the harbour and watch the world float by.

The tide comes in - the tide goes out. Ki tai wiwi - Ki tai wa wa.

broblack@xtra.co.nz

Tommy Wilson is a columnist and author.