This morning, during a break in my meeting, I logged on to a Boston web site to catch up on the marketing terrorists, a story I completely missed yesterday as I obliviously drove to and from Boston. Instead, a story about a local fishing boat caught my eye. The boat with two crew members has been missing off the coast of Maine since 2 a.m. this morning when it sent out a distress call. The Coast Guard is searching for it, but there is no news so far.

Port City is not a big fishing center, but we have three or four local boats that the boys and I see docked on the river almost every day. The Ladyluck is one of them. In fine weather you can barely spot them among the pleasure craft, but when it turns cold they’re the only boats on the seascape. They’re frequently featured in the prints by local artists and photographers. These unpretty tubs with their big nets and unwieldy antennae remind us that there are people out there who actually work really, really hard for a living. It makes me so sad to think that there are two of them out there waiting in that cold sea. With any luck, they are still waiting. I hope they come home soon.

Edited to add: The search was called off this weekend.