When my Father was alive and before I started High School, every summer our family used to travel to Westport Island, Maine, for two weeks of vacation. The island was separated from the mainland by a river (I think). We got to it by way of a cable ferry. The ferry was essentially a raft, domed in the middle. You would drive on, and if you were the first car on, you would drive up over the dome and park at the other end. The ferrymen would put blocks of wood under your tires to keep you from having a free, permanent car wash. When all loaded up and secure, The ferrymen would signal the guy at the wench station who would haul the ferry across the water to the other side.
One time the cable parted and all of us, cars, passengers and ferrymen, went floating out to sea on the tide. Nearby Lobstermen saw our distress and pulled alongside. They made fast to the ferry and pulled us to where we were going. I don't remember which side we ended up at, but we stayed there at least as long as it took to repair the cable.
I don't know how anyone else felt, but I was not afraid. Maybe I was just too young to imagine the possible consequences: lost at sea, shipwrecked, captured by pirates, food for the fishes ...
I also don't know if my parents had an ideal happy marriage. I do know I never felt insecure as if my whole world could shatter. If my parents did not have love, they had respect, dignity, honor, consistency. If it was not ideal, they stayed anyway. That is why I did not wring my hands when the ferry cable parted.
