Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 1, 1990 TAG: 9006020442
SECTION: SMITH MOUNTAIN TIMES PAGE: SM2 EDITION: BEDFORD/FRANKLING
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
He has also read the dark novels Joseph Conrad wrote about men and the sea.
Jester has done saltwater sailing himself in Carolina coastal waters.
But now the his 25-foot "Toni Too" is tied up at the Pelican Point Yacht Club at Smith Mountain Lake. The excess white nylon line tied around the cleats holding her in her berth are neatly and expertly coiled.
On a recent Saturday morning - with a good wind on the lake and the lines of the "Toni Too" and the other sailboats slapping gently - Jester was securing the open forward hatch of the boat.
Jester, a man who confesses that he likes to keep things shipshape, explained that there was enough wind to cause the open hatch to close abruptly.
At 35, Jester is a bachelor and, unlike Melville's Capt. Ahab, does not seem to be concerned with obsession.
His sailboat seems a little confining to people who are used to their own bedrooms, but Jester does all right sleeping in the V-shaped forward berth.
"It's an alternate lifestyle," Jester said.
Jester, who has an hour's commute each day in an aging Chevy Nova to his job as manager of Ewald-Clark's downtown Roanoke store, said economics are also a part of what he called "living aboard."
Living on a sailboat means that he doesn't have to pay apartment rent, he said, and this means he "can pay off the boat at an accelerated rate."
Jester's lifestyle also means that he doesn't have a phone - which is a lack that doesn't bother him.
He eats most of his meals ashore, although a small stove on board could handle a one-pan dish. There is a toilet or "head" aboard, but Jester uses a shower at the yacht club - a procedure that is fairly painless if the timing is right.
The lack of space, he said, is not bothersome.
Actually, it teaches a man to buy only what he needs: `'You don't have room for any extraneous junk."
"It is small," he added. "But in the '60s, I knew people who lived in vans."
Jester said the average sailor on a Melville whaling vessel had only one small bunk and a sea chest.
The question came up about a bachelor and a sailboat and parties and girls, but Jester took some of the romance out of that.
"There is a certain contingent of women who would turn their noses up at a guy who lives on a boat," he said.
There are women who do not look down so harshly on men who live on sailboats, he said, but who "are a little frightened at first."
Jester said he would not comment in terms of numbers about such women.
Jester is not a canvas sailor bothered by speedboats or their wakes. "There's enough water for everyone," he said.
But, he said, he is bothered by "someone piloting a boat drunk or children piloting a boat at about 55 miles an hour."
Jester had been living on this boat for about two months, but he lived on one for two years on the North Carolina coast.
He got interested in sailing about 17 years ago and bought his first boat in 1977. The "Toni Too," named for his sister Antoinette, is his fourth.
Somewhere in the future, he said, is another boat named "Antoinette III."
The boat's cabin was neat and there was good wood in the paneling. Behind one small couch there was a bookcase full of books about sailing.
A battered guitar case with Jester's initials on it was on the floor - or deck - and Jester said he plays often.
"Any time I want to go sailing, I can - which is a big advantage," Jester said.
And, unlike people who have boats on the lake and live elsewhere, Jester said he can pick his times. The absentee boat owner, he said, is often stuck with the weather that is there on the day of arrival.
Jester has options. He doesn't sail "unless the wind and weather are something I would enjoy."
There are differences between sailing on an inland lake and coastal waters - the main one being that Smith Mountain Lake is uniformly deep and there are few sand shoals.
"I have yet to run aground on Smith Mountain Lake," Jester said.
The summer is before Don Jester and the "Toni Too."
The boat has dockside electric power and heaters, Jester said, but he also remembered his boat covered with ice when he was living on the coast.
"I've got to see how the winters go here," Jester said.
by CNB