Having recently spent the weekend at our cabin in Washington County, I’m pleased to report that spring has finally come to stay at our modest Down East pied-à-terre.

A late morning walk revealed only the usual crop of fallen tree limbs. Down at the shore we found all our boats accounted for. Boats? Plural? Well, yeah. There’s that dented, 14-foot aluminum skiff on the lawn plus a couple of plastic kayaks on the lower deck.

I know, kayaks are technically considered “personal watercraft.” But isn’t that just another way of saying “plastic boat”?

Somehow I find it impossible to think of some oversized bathtub toy as a real boat. This probably has something to do with having grown up in a shipbuilding family long before people started tossing around phrases like “personal watercraft.”

Back then, real boats (the kind that mattered to kids like me) were rugged, seaworthy vessels fully capable of crossing any ocean should the need arise.

Our family boat, a 36-footer christened Acadienne fit the bill nicely. Resurrected phoenix-like from the salvaged remains of a decommissioned Coast Guard Cutter, my dad insisted he’d built her as a “cabin cruiser” for family outings, proudly proclaiming that Acadienne would “comfortably sleep six” (which was true only if four of them were small children camped out on the afterdeck).

And to the casual observer it might have passed for a cabin cruiser; but, to a kid like me, the sleek, purposeful lines, powerful engine, fully equipped flying bridge and gleaming metal pulpit extending well beyond her prow told a very different tale.

To any kid as crazy about deep-sea fishing as I was, this “cabin cruiser” was obviously a thinly disguised sport fisherman; it was a serious deepwater vessel built for one purpose only — to seek out, harpoon and land one of the ocean’s magnificent game fish — the Atlantic bluefin tuna!

Harpoon? Ayuh, you heard right! Running somewhere around a half-ton and upwards of 15 feet in length, the Atlantic bluefin is a true leviathan, a real life monster of the deep. The very notion of landing one of these behemoths by means of something as mundane as fishing line seemed preposterous. That would be like towing a stranded Buick with a bent coat hanger.

Besides, at the tender age of 13, having recently devoured both Melville’s classic "Moby Dick" and Hemingway’s "The Old Man and the Sea," my adolescent brain was perfectly primed to experience an epic battle on the high seas. Luckily my chance came along much sooner than I’d ever expected.

Although the details of how I came to be involved in this expedition are lost in the mists of time, my memories of the event are remarkably clear even decades later.

The sun was warm, the ocean’s surface glassy calm as we idled quietly just beyond Outer Heron Island. My dad had given me strict instructions to stand in the pulpit, harpoon at the ready, while high above me in the flying bridge, he scanned the horizon for a slim, knifelike dorsal fin trailing a frothy white wake through deep blue water — the telltale sign of a breaching bluefin.

Suddenly, he dropped his binoculars and gestured for me to hold on tight. Then he hit the throttle. The big engine roared to life and the boat leapt forward. The chase was on!

As we approached our quarry I hastily reviewed instructions, which had been drilled into me over the past week. Aware that any excess noise might spook the big fish, I gripped the harpoon shaft, checking to make sure that the brass barb on the business end of the device was properly tethered to the heavy cable painstakingly coiled along the starboard rail; all the while keeping an eye on the tuna swimming some 30 yards off our port bow.

Glancing up, I nodded as Pop gave me the “go” sign. Then, leaning back and taking careful aim I hurled my harpoon directly at the monster’s back.

What happened next is a blur. Figuring I’d scored a direct hit I watched as the creature dove, cable flying off the deck and following him down. Yes! I’d done it!

Then the line went slack. Moments later the sight of my harpoon bobbing to the surface confirmed the sad truth. My quarry had vanished into the depths.

What really happened that day? Did I strike glancing blow or miss my target completely? Strangely that never seemed to matter too much, either then or now.

What mattered was that I’d tried my best, faring far better than Captain Ahab, yet somehow arriving back at the dock with a “fish story” to rival the one recounted by Hemingway’s “old man.”