about clamming? I ask the elder Charles. He shrugs. “I like to do what I like to do. You know what I mean?” It isn’t easy, not in this era of tight regulations, but that observation gets only another shrug. “Nothing’s like it used to be.” Charles Jr., a thin beard tracing the ridge of his jaw, enthusiastically shows me the clam rigs, each powered by a four-speed V-6 tractor-trailer motor. “It’s the hardest job I ever had,” he says, explaining how fast the clam scoop flies off the bottom. “You got to pay attention or you’ll hurt yourself.” Right now it doesn’t look very promising for him to follow in his father’s footsteps, he explains, what with the state tightly regulating the clam beds. “If they’d leave the grounds out there open,” he says, “I’d keep doing it till I was as old as my dad.” Harbormaster Kopacz doesn’t mind taking me around some more, so we continue the
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