I should have 8335 words, but I only have 4189. This means I'm 4146 behind the pace. #NaNoWriMo - 5th daily output.
You figure reporting suicide thoughts might be enough to get out or at least start the process. You ask to see a Chaplain. You get permission and leave the ship in your work clothes, find the Chaplain's office. He invites you in, tells you to leave the door open and he greets passing people with raised eyebrows and a head toss as you report that you want to kill yourself. "What do you think will happen if you do it?" He asks. "I'll wake up in a hospital," you answer honestly. That seems to be enough for him, he makes a note, signs a paper, holds it for you to take, tells you to give it to your ship's Medical Officer and return to duty. Your Boatswain's Mate 2nd Class Petty Officer, Junior, who you've been working with and who's shown himself to be a good guy tells you that while you were gone, Operations has been looking for you. You have no idea what that means and assume it's bad, but Junior gets you clear.
"Operations Department, up on the Bridge, wants to offer you a transfere." "Where?" "Up to their department. They're impressed with your test scores, they think your smart or something," he smiles, leans close in your face, "they think you're too good for the Deck Crew, they want you to go up to see them so they can blow smoke up your ass about being a Quartermaster." "Should I do that?" you're confused and would glad to hear his advice. "Well, you got to go see them, they sent for you, but you don't have to take the transfere." You go up the ladder to the wheelhouse, step through the back hatch up on the bridge deck. You report to the First Class Petty Officer of Operations, he introduces you to Churbuck, the Second Class. "You'd be working with him." You look at Churbuck, he looks intelligent. You haven't said it, but you're thinking yes. You move sleeping compartments, move into the middle of the ship, a big compartment, a maze of three-high racks over foot lockers. Seventy guys sleep here. You have a choice and you take a top rack again. "You better not be a bed wetter, I'm sleeping under you." You barely look at him. You put your shit in the locker and leave. Up the ladder.
You try to find some place to be on the ship when you're off duty. Someplace where you're not in anyone's way and people don't question why you're there. Between meals, you sit in the Messdecks at whatever table is empty, you write letters to Karen, your girlfriend in Sacramento. Your romance has not been smooth, lately. You both just graduated from your respective High Schools. She's staying there to go to Sac State in the Fall and you're here on Active Duty for two years, not much connection. You had kept it romantic for two years. You and she exchanged frequent letters, long letters, fun, playful letters with always elaborate declarations of undying love. They made you both high, so much so that when you did get together - for a few days at Easter, a couple of times in the Summer, Thanksgiving, New Year - you flowed in a blissful mist, together like dance partners, in all your planned and spontaneous activities. The last visit, though, in Sacramento, her friends got you on a ouija board, four peoples' hands on the controller and they asked if you had been faithful to Karen and it slid immediately over to "no", before you could send it the other way to "yes". You had at least two girlfriends at school all the time you were writing Karen. You met her in a Sierra Summer resort in between your Sophomore and Junior year. You did love her and only toyed with the emotions of the others. But there's a lot of hanging out and date time you spent with girls from school, who you didn't love.
You tried to make it better with letters to Karen. You're suppose to learn signaling with flags and with Morse Code on light for your new job as Quartermaster Striker, you're suppose to study a Correspondence Course preparing to move up to Third Class. The thing with the flags seems interesting, but the light, the flashing light in dot dash code - that you knew you're not going to get. And study the Quartermaster book on off hours? No. Churbuck taught you a few things, taking azimuths, correcting carts, how to record and code a weather report. These are the chores of being a Quartermaster. You learn reluctantly and perform the calculations poorly. You correct the charts ok, so Churbuck has you in the chart house most of the time after the swabbing's been done and if there's no chipping or painting project underway. You paint neatly around the buttons and levers on the communication boxes in the pilot house, so any painting work goes first to you, instead of to Funke, the Signalman Striker, the only other raw Seaman in Operations. Funke is shorter than you, , from Minnesota, his torso and thighs swell his dungarees he's more interested in talking Country and Western music than Jazz, he'll listen to anything on the radio. He doesn't take the Joseph Conrad books from the ship's library, you do. You take Funke to some of your favorite haunts downtown San Diego, you eat Cheeseburgers watch movies and eat pizza. He has a good time, but would rather stay aboard ship or on Base the next night.
"Operations Department, up on the Bridge, wants to offer you a transfere." "Where?" "Up to their department. They're impressed with your test scores, they think your smart or something," he smiles, leans close in your face, "they think you're too good for the Deck Crew, they want you to go up to see them so they can blow smoke up your ass about being a Quartermaster." "Should I do that?" you're confused and would glad to hear his advice. "Well, you got to go see them, they sent for you, but you don't have to take the transfere." You go up the ladder to the wheelhouse, step through the back hatch up on the bridge deck. You report to the First Class Petty Officer of Operations, he introduces you to Churbuck, the Second Class. "You'd be working with him." You look at Churbuck, he looks intelligent. You haven't said it, but you're thinking yes. You move sleeping compartments, move into the middle of the ship, a big compartment, a maze of three-high racks over foot lockers. Seventy guys sleep here. You have a choice and you take a top rack again. "You better not be a bed wetter, I'm sleeping under you." You barely look at him. You put your shit in the locker and leave. Up the ladder.
You try to find some place to be on the ship when you're off duty. Someplace where you're not in anyone's way and people don't question why you're there. Between meals, you sit in the Messdecks at whatever table is empty, you write letters to Karen, your girlfriend in Sacramento. Your romance has not been smooth, lately. You both just graduated from your respective High Schools. She's staying there to go to Sac State in the Fall and you're here on Active Duty for two years, not much connection. You had kept it romantic for two years. You and she exchanged frequent letters, long letters, fun, playful letters with always elaborate declarations of undying love. They made you both high, so much so that when you did get together - for a few days at Easter, a couple of times in the Summer, Thanksgiving, New Year - you flowed in a blissful mist, together like dance partners, in all your planned and spontaneous activities. The last visit, though, in Sacramento, her friends got you on a ouija board, four peoples' hands on the controller and they asked if you had been faithful to Karen and it slid immediately over to "no", before you could send it the other way to "yes". You had at least two girlfriends at school all the time you were writing Karen. You met her in a Sierra Summer resort in between your Sophomore and Junior year. You did love her and only toyed with the emotions of the others. But there's a lot of hanging out and date time you spent with girls from school, who you didn't love.
You tried to make it better with letters to Karen. You're suppose to learn signaling with flags and with Morse Code on light for your new job as Quartermaster Striker, you're suppose to study a Correspondence Course preparing to move up to Third Class. The thing with the flags seems interesting, but the light, the flashing light in dot dash code - that you knew you're not going to get. And study the Quartermaster book on off hours? No. Churbuck taught you a few things, taking azimuths, correcting carts, how to record and code a weather report. These are the chores of being a Quartermaster. You learn reluctantly and perform the calculations poorly. You correct the charts ok, so Churbuck has you in the chart house most of the time after the swabbing's been done and if there's no chipping or painting project underway. You paint neatly around the buttons and levers on the communication boxes in the pilot house, so any painting work goes first to you, instead of to Funke, the Signalman Striker, the only other raw Seaman in Operations. Funke is shorter than you, , from Minnesota, his torso and thighs swell his dungarees he's more interested in talking Country and Western music than Jazz, he'll listen to anything on the radio. He doesn't take the Joseph Conrad books from the ship's library, you do. You take Funke to some of your favorite haunts downtown San Diego, you eat Cheeseburgers watch movies and eat pizza. He has a good time, but would rather stay aboard ship or on Base the next night.
