The timber fragment was wrapped like an heirloom. Estate clerk Ina found it beside a child's drawing of a boat with a wildly oversized mast. She initially catalogued the fragment as part of a model.
The owner's niece recognized the drawing as her own. Her uncle had built a small garden boat for her to sit in while he worked nearby. When it decayed, he kept one painted board and the drawing. It was neither a working vessel nor an accurate model, but the center of many afternoons she remembered clearly.
Ina revised the description after comparing the paint with a family photograph. The niece took both objects, laughing at the mast she had drawn larger than the house. Her uncle's note on the wrapper said only first voyage.
The phrase did not need a real crossing to be true in the household's language. Ina recorded the explanation plainly, leaving the family free to keep the larger meaning. A small piece of wood had survived because someone valued the world a child could imagine while sitting perfectly still beside him.