A Parrot's Tale

by Joe Falzone 

1997  

Whenever I feel mean and spleenful and knocking men's hats about I think of the beautiful summer day July 1992 when Bob Coddington, David Haisley, and I arrived at Bristol, Rhode Island. My heart skipped a beat when I looked at her the Blue Parrot. She was long and graceful. Her blue hull reflected off the waters of Narraganset Bay. A far cry from when I saw her being built in the Bristol shipyard.  

It was not long before we were rounding Port Judith and as Mother Nature would have it, the clouds darkened and the wind started to blow out of the northwest- 24, 28, 32 knots. We were surfing down the Sound at 9, 10, 11 knots. Down came the jib. But we could not reef the main, and we certainly could not come about. The faster we went the more the Blue Parrot and Bob Coddington enjoyed it. I was terrified. I was throwing sheets over the sides to slow her down. God, I love her!  

But that was only a prelude to what the Parrot had in store for us. Once, on a spinnaker run, the wind blowing 30 knots, the Parrot started to plane, 15 knots, 16 knots with Bob Gordon and Jim McCann wondering how they got into this. Jimmy stidl has a space between his teeth from a flying sheet when someone accidentally released the foreguy. We broached and stayed in that precarious position for almost a half hour until we could retrieve our spinnaker.  

And let's not forget the casualty list after just one hour in the 1994 Around Long Island Race in the pouring rain: Dunnigan-fractured toe and cracked rib; Joe Heslin-slipped disc; RJ DeRose-sea sick. Three down and six to go. We were more hospital ship than racing boat.  

The crew!! The crew came from the four corners of the Manor. They were very young and eager. I called them the Parroteers. The Blue Parrot was their club house and their school We all learned a great deal together. There are so many memories: Jeff Arnold jumping overboard during a race around Block Island to recover his hat; irate calls from race committees and commodores looking for flags. Thank God we never sailed past the United Nations.    

The ice chest which broke off from overuse on a 20-hour trip to Block Island which took three days. What were they taking out ? They told me it was a health drink called Parrot Juice. Could they have been putting me on? Not John McLaughlin, Mike Mansfield, Sasha, Phil Hasl, the Dunnigans, or Timmy Fulton. Oh, no, never the Parroteers.

And on the glamour side,. who could ask for more? Christine Etsios, Sheryl Lang, Tracy Shannon, Allison Padavan, Mary Faughnan -gals who turned many a sailor's head as we raced in the Sound.  

After five unforgettable years the drama and comedy is over. All have departed. The Parroteers are off to college and new careers and so is the Blue Parrot.. I donated her to the State Merchant Marine Academy. We will still see her ply the waters off City Island with new and impetuous crews.

Is the saga over, I wonder?  

THE PARROTEERS: Jeff Arnold, the Dunnigans, Tinuny Fulton, Phil Hasl, John McLaughlin, Mike Mansfield, Charlie Smith, Sasha Tichter, Chris Wemer, Christine Etsios, Mary Faughnan, Sheryl Lang, Tracy Shannon, Allison Padavan.