Michael row your boat ashore... somewhere else

My neighbor Mike has issues dealing with life mainly because anything out side of his own self-cognizance has relatively little importance.  Here's an example.  Seven years ago his daughter Amy got married.  At that time Amy worked at a resort in Ocean City, Maryland, and owned a home about 5 miles inland.  One sunny afternoon, as I returned home from work, I saw Mike standing on his front sidewalk talking to a man I didn't know.  Anyway, Mike sees me get out of my truck and waves me over.  "Come look at what I got Amy for a wedding present."  When I walked over, I saw this very nice sailboat, teak interior, with it's mast up, sitting in the yard beside his house.  "Oh," I said, knowing I sounded surprised, "you bought her a boat."  And, of course, that is what he had done.

Amy's boat

And he'd done so without asking Amy if she'd like a boat as a wedding present, which turned out to be something she did not want at all.  Amy doesn't sail, and neither does her husband, in fact neither do Mike nor his wife Karen.  He bought his daughter a boat for her wedding because in his head he could easily picture her taking them out sailing every time they visited.  But since Amy didn't want the boat, the thing has been sitting in Mike's side yard, wrapped up in tarps, for 7 years.  Sometime down the road Mike and Karen will be selling their house, they've told me that is the plan.  I have no doubt that the boat will be part of the package.