It was easy to understand why the waiting list at Larry’s marina was so long, and also why the marina had grown from near nothing to one of the largest on the river. It was where well-mannered and safety-minded people kept their boats.
On the wall of Larry’s office was a picture of the “marina” when he bought it several years before—a short and rickety dock to which three houseboats had long been tied up. Larry laughed when he said that one boat was used for selling bootleg liquor, the other two used by local prostitutes on weekends. As the marina’s new owner, he lost no time in getting rid of all of it and making a fresh start. He wanted his new marina to be an orderly and safe place where boat owners could thoroughly enjoy themselves.
He carefully planned each new dock before it was built and put into the water. Then he built a restaurant the way he thought it ought to be and began serving food he knew everyone would like. He also built a service facility large enough to handle most boat repairs, yet small enough to not to disturb the peace and quiet.
Specifically, if you wanted to keep your boat there, Larry insisted on an in-person chat during which he reviewed the dozen rules you would be required to follow, each concerned with what he believed to be either an important safety or personal behavior issue.
Violate a rule the first time, and he would give you a friendly reminder. After all, he reasoned, we all tend to forget at times, especially when we’re tired, excited, or caught up in the moment. If there was a second time, you would receive a warning of “please don’t do that again.”
With a third offense, however, you were given thirty days to remove your boat from the premises. Once gone, you weren’t allowed to come back with it or any other boat you owned. No excuses and no exceptions. If you didn’t wish to sign off on those terms, and yes, your signature was required, he’d smile, thank you for your interest, and that was that.
Larry explained it this way. It’s basic human behavior. If he allowed anyone to break rules without consequences, they would continue breaking them. They would tell their friends who would then try to get a slip there so they could all be at the same marina. That process would keep repeating itself until so many “rule breakers” were there that not only would he likely lose control, but also lose responsible and well-mannered boaters.
He knew of a distant marina downriver where that actually happened. Beginning with just one boater, an undesirable faction became large enough and brazen enough to not only take control of their part of the marina, but to also warn the marina owner to stay off “their” dock. In the meantime, those who wanted no part of such behavior, were leaving to find someplace else to keep their boat. It all came to a head one night when a drunken brawl forced the frantic owner of the marina to call the police. After officers restored order, they emphasized to the owner the importance of enforcing the rules so such an event wouldn’t happen again.
That marina owner hadn’t realized the simple logic that Larry believed: Whether good or bad, people attract their like kind. If you want only those who are willing to obey the rules, you must reprimand those who don’t.
On a much larger scale, all laws are rooted in that reality. Even if a law is desirable and reasonable as every law should be, it will fail if not enforced, and when that happens, everyone loses.
Unfortunately, examples of that are everywhere, a prominent one being that speed limits on streets and highways are now largely ignored for lack of enforcement. That, in turn, promotes reckless driving resulting in many thousands of people being killed or so badly injured they must endure for the rest of their lives the pain of their broken bodies and dashed dreams.
It’s a sure bet that you, a seeker of a good and long life, would much prefer everywhere be a “Larry’s marina” no matter what’s necessary to make it so.
