By MARY RICHMOND
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
They say some people are born with silver spoons in their mouth, but back in the day no real Cape Codders were born with such useless appendages. They were born with the grit of sand between their toes, the stick-to-itiveness of salt spray in their hair, the song of the wind in their ears and the magnetic lure of the ocean in their bones.

"Operating a boat business always attracted me, so that's what I did," says Marcus Sherman, owner of the catboat Eventide. (Staff photo by Paul Blackmore)

For most this meant getting on a boat at a very young age and staying there, learning the ins and outs of local coves, the vagaries of waterfront weather and the turnings of the tides and currents.

Times have changed, and today those born here often build houses, teach school or work in health care, public service or computer-related industries instead of working on the water. If they do get on the water, it's for recreation.

But some still manage to grow up learning the ways and wiles of a water-bound life, while adapting to a world willing to hire them for their local expertise.

If you've been to Hyannis Harbor, you've probably seen the catboat with the huge cat face on the sail. Available for a number of daily sailing tours, it's owned and operated by Marcus Sherman of Hyannisport.

Sherman grew up in the same house he still lives in, just down the street from the beach. He can't remember a time when he didn't have a boat to putter about in.

Like many young Cape Codders in the '60s and '70s, he left home to go to college and then found work that kept him over the bridge. In Sherman's case that was halfway across the world working on an engineering project.

After a while, ''We were living in Bangkok, Thailand, and the kids were getting older and I didn't want to be traveling and moving all around while they were in school, so we moved back home,'' he says. ''Operating a boat business always attracted me, so that's what I did.''

For the last 20 years he's run the catboat Eventide out of Hyannis Harbor giving tours of Hyannisport and the surrounding area.

''Sailing is just great,'' he adds. ''It's always interesting. We always take different routes, and there's different weather, tides and currents to deal with. And the people are always interesting. We get people from all over the world, and meeting and talking with them is the best part.''

In the winter he works for various boatyards and often has a restoration project going on in his backyard. He's partial to working on Wianno Seniors, and his careful handiwork is respected in boating circles.

(Published: August 28, 2006)