Searching for stories is a benign addiction but an addiction nonetheless. Powerful, seductive, and relentless, an addiction to other people’s stories is a fix easily fixed. Stories are everywhere; they stitch us together and create common places in-between the chasms. But to get the best stories, you have to travel. You never know where you might find the next book.

At this moment, I’m on a small, 29’ powerboat, headed down the East Coast chasing fall and listening to stories. Traveling by water is very different from traveling by land. So far we’ve encountered whole segments of the American experience that are only available to people who travel on boats or live on the water.

Our vessel, a Dyer 29’ named Goose, is one of the smallest to attempt this 900-mile trip from Newport, RI, to Charleston, SC. We are an unlikely sight – an elderly classic boat with two elderly not-so-classic crew. Almost everywhere we go, people stop to comment or ask about her and then us. Usually, after a moment, they start talking about themselves.

We’ve chatted with fishermen, boat captains, delivery captains, and tug operators, and met folks that simply live aboard a boat and hang potted plants off the transom. We’ve seen marvelous vistas like the vast salt marshes of southern New Jersey called the Pine Barrens – all barren and piney. We’ve even encountered a lighted inflatable dragon. Mostly, we’ve met a big swath of simply nice folks. And stories, as always, are everywhere.

One evening, we tied up Goose at a small boat yard and the dock master told us the story of his grandfather, a kid from Sicily, and how he found a home in Jersey and stayed for generations. Sal has a photo of his grandfather on his virgin voyage to the States with Lady Liberty behind him.

As we went down the East River, past the Statue of Liberty, she struck me as quite a sight, all alone at the entrance to the harbor. Just for a second, you can imagine her through others’ eyes in their approach, anxious and optimistic for a new chapter.