17 NOV, 1989
I ate lunch down in Wardroom Two, clear mistake. It was fried formerly frozen fish, wax beans and possibly the worst macaroni and cheese I have ever tasted. I sat with Skipper Dussman and a couple VF-31 Tomcatters, and listened to tales of Figther Squadron liberty. One of them featured the Skipper drinking some sort of ritual liquor whose attraction was a large coiled snake in the bottle.
He said it didn’t taste so good. I’m pleased we didn’t wind up in that club. After food and some more paper work I started to rally and thought that going ashore with my laundry for some baguettes avec frommage et saucisses- I think the French sounds better than what the troops call them: horse c**k sandwiches.
It was thus with deep disappointment that I heard the XO come up over the 1MC and announce that boating was cancelled due to generally shitty weather. Wind down the deck of about fifty knots; rain, whitecaps. They couldn’t get the liberty boats alongside the camel. The tried all afternoon and finally gave up and cancelled liberty altogether about 1800.
It was a totally wasted day. I intended to get a good workout, and had the best of intentions. I changed, went up to the flight deck and started doing the circuit. Coming back up from the stern I was leaning into the wind and moving about twelve inches with each stride. It rapidly became too hard. I stopped and went down to the stateroom to get my jump rope.
I held the plastic-beaded rope and looked at the rack. It looked so comfortable that I succumbed and climbed in, just to rest my eyes for a moment. I woke up after dinner. I couldn’t bring myself to go down and feed again so I brewed a cup o’ noodles and ate a can of tuna. I wished I had some of that explosive moutarde, but maybe I’ll be able to take care of that tomorrow. At least I have been able to catch up on some shuteye and there will be no hangover tomorrow. I’ve got to get my laundry done. Briefings with the SIXTH Fleet Staff are scheduled for Sunday and then we haul up the hook and head back to sea on Monday.
18 NOV:
It is shaping up to be another lost day. First liberty boat called away at 0600L; I heard it in the darkness and felt optimistic that there would be a chance to get ashore before we pull out. Scooter laid on a meeting in his OPS O capacity to plan for the next nine day line period before Palma. I get up, shower and trundle up to Mission Planning to read the boards and start getting things ready for the nine o’clock meeting.
I am on my third cup of coffee when I hear the announcement that boating is suspended again. I sigh. I had promised to call home again today and now the hours stretch ahead with no prospect of relief. No mail arrives. We are in a gray limbo.
The OPS O meeting revealed another schedule change: this one puts us in Palma for nine days and changes the Presidential Air Show for Mr. Bush to the 1st of December from the 4th. The Marseilles port call was undisturbed. We beat the schedule around for an hour, making plans to cope with the various exercises. We would start with the Three Star visit by the 6TH Fleet commander, VADM Williams, on the 20th, then an opposed Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) breakout on the same day, bombing and low levels on Sardinia the following day, and then participation in a French national air defense exercise called “Harmonie Sud-Est.”
For that, we will provide aggressor services for their Air Force and get to fly a few low level hops. After the meeting broke I puttered around the office, killing time until lunch. Then the phone rang and Lutt-man and I were summoned to CAG’s stateroom for an impromptu Staff Meeting.
We had most of a quorum and CAG launched us into the second schedule change of the morning. This one featured trimming the nine days in Palma to three and driving us direct from Malta to Naples for four days. This meeting lingered for about forty minutes (CAG to DCAG: “Grog, you couldn’t have a five minute meeting if your feet were on burning coals.”) Then a burger in Wardroom One and I wandered down to my stateroom. I turned on the TV and picked up a paperback. The Michigan-Illinois game came on the ship’s entertainment channel and I put down the book and curled up to watch….
The next thing I knew Moose was fumbling with the lock on my door so he could retrieve the coat he had left two days before. It looked like the boats were running again. I looked at my watch and saw it was just before 1500.
I threw on my civvies and followed Moose down the ladder to the hangar bay. We were joined immediately by Toad, Lutt-man and Mark. This was going to be Mark’s first real trip ashore, since he is way too serious. We all had to make calls home, and who knows, maybe there could even be a beer out there.
The Liberty line stretched back from the fantail, around the Jet Shop and back into the Hangar Bay. It looked like it was going to take a while to get off the ship. When we did, we found a partly cloudy day with whitecaps and crisp breeze. It was exhilarating to be outside. The utility boat ride was wild and featured crazy Frenchmen on windsurfers zigging-and-zagging across the wake between us and the carrier.
When we got to Fleet Landing we scrambled off the boat and ambled down the waterfront to the park near the Naval Headquarters. A battery of public phones surrounded a circular snack stand. We bought Telecartes from the Tabac across the street. Around the corner was the coin shop that had the strange insignia in the window. I purchased two of them via the total immersion method, making up words for “aircraft carrier.”
What I said probably meant “flying boat” (bateau-avion) but it didn’t seem to matter. My experience thus far has been that simple efforts to communicate in French reap tremendous benefits. It is an interesting process. I start out in French, they play along, and when we get to a point where it is too hard pour moi they provide the English necessary to complete the transaction and then we gracefully go back to the elementary level of French I can handle. We had a couple beers in the park and waited patiently in line at the payphones.
I finally get my turn after about forty minutes and deposit my card in the slot. Just getting a phone doesn’t mean you are in there; with only a limited number of lines available you can try for an hour to get through to the AT&T USA Direct operator. I’m in luck.
I get through to home and start to talk. As we exchange pleasantries, I look at the sandwich stand 30 feet away, where a Toulonaise gent angrily stalks up to the counter and begins to berate the girl working there.
I am getting to an important moment in the call when the Frenchman drags the girl out and begins to slap her viciously across the face. She defends herself by spitting in his face, and he responds by kicking her in the shins.
Other French people are standing back, New York style, as the conflict migrates into the lunch stand. The woman is fumbling with something under the counter and my eyes widen as I wonder if she is going to come up with one of the long, sharp bread knives.
The conversation with America is getting increasingly surreal. Finally, the Frenchman gives the woman a last savage cuff and strides off across the park. About then the units give out on my telecarte, and so ends one of the weirdest calls of my life.
Our whole little band seemed to be feeling a little depressed by the contact with home, missing our lives and our people. Besides, the floor show here was over.
We headed up the boardwalk for a couple more lagers, and I discover to my pleasure that I am indeed fully fluent in the French language again and can understand all manner of things going on around me. Eventually, we wind up once more in the Gut, this time with CAG and company. We have a wonderful time talking to the working girls and carrying on as our depression lifts.
CAG exercises adult leadership in the nick of time and we depart for Fleet Landing at a reasonable hour; sometimes it is good to follow the King. We get back to the FID at a reasonable hour without getting too wet or cold, and turn up the rock and roll in the stateroom. This action produces an irate Scooter who sputters and rants for a while. We agree to turn down the tunes.
I think he isn’t sleeping very well. He may know something we don’t, but this French stuff is great.
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