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domestic battles.
    Sometimes, Ruth would run away from Rolf and lock herself in the little bunkhouse behind their home while Rolf slept it off. She claimed to have been terrorized, but, in truth, she gave as good as she got. Perhaps even better.
    Ruth’s plans for gracious entertaining and lovely dinner parties for their friends usually ended disastrously. The facade she tried to present is reminiscent of the character “Hyacinth” on the popular British comedy show,
Keeping Up Appearances.
Hyacinth’s “candle-light suppers,” meant to be her open door into high society, never quite succeed—and neither did Ruth Neslund’s. Both the TV character and the real woman had fine china, floral arrangements, silver, and linens—but the women themselves lacked the charm and civility to carry these social evenings off. Many of the Neslunds’ longtime friends began to find excuses to decline Ruth’s invitations.
    One couple on Lopez Island would recall an evening with the Neslunds. The food was wonderful, and everything went well until the liquor began to flow and one of their hosts took offense at some remark the other made. Soon, the guests were forgotten and the meal was over as Ruth and Rolf battled with each other. Their company watched, stunned, and then tiptoed out.
    “Ruth called me the next day,” the wife of the guest couple remembered, “and I could tell she felt so bad. She apologized over and over for the way her dinner ended. I could tell she was terribly disappointed—and humiliated, too. She asked us to give her another chance, swearing that it would never happen again.”
    At length, the guests agreed to return for another meal with the Neslunds. Again, the table setting was perfect and the food was even better. But Ruth and Rolf could not seem to get through an evening without a fight, and the after-dinner “entertainment” was a repeat of what had happened before.
    Gossip about the failed dinner parties soon spread around Lopez Island, and those who considered themselves comedians added to it. Dining at the Neslunds’ home became a joke, and both career authors and other residents who lived on the island wrote hilarious, long poems or fashioned elaborate stories about them.
    In a way, it was sad that a couple who had been together for so long should come to be a laughingstock. In between their arguments, though, the Neslunds appeared to be happy enough. There are couples who seem to enjoy fighting and making up as much as they do making love—who actually use arguments as foreplay. Maybe the Neslunds fell in that category.
    They didn’t live close enough to their neighbors thattheir shouting carried through the woods, so no one cared very much. They were peculiar, but there were lots of “peculiars” in the islands and they were all accepted by the natives. The Neslunds had the right to do what they wanted.
    Although he was in his eighth decade, Rolf Neslund had no intention of retiring. He was one of the most dependable ships’ pilots around.
    He was well past his seventy-fifth birthday when the United States Coast Guard renewed his license on November 3, 1975, for five more years.
    TO U.S. MERCHANT MARINE OFFICER
This is to certify that Rolf Neslund, having been duly examined and found competent by the undersigned, is licensed to serve as Master of Steam or Motor Vessels of any gross tons upon oceans; radar observer; also First Class Pilot of New York Bay and Harbor to Yonkers; Boston Light Vessel to Boston, Via North and Narrows Channels; Nantucket and Vineyard Sounds; Delaware Bay and River to Philadelphia, Pa; Los Angeles Harbor to Wilmington; San Francisco Bay and Return; Columbia River, Astoria, Oregon to Sea and Return; and on Puget Sound and Connecting Inland Waters for the term of five years from this date.
    For nearly three more years, Rolf Neslund was considered to be fully capable of maneuvering huge ships from coast to coast and on the Atlantic and Pacific. He had every reason to