Return of memories of a sailor. (part 2)

In the last episode we left our hero living on a sailboat and eking out a living as a commercial fisherman and in doubt of his future.

Brought to you by none other than Beefaroni!

By 1986 I was living in a sailboat in Dog Bay, Kodiak. She was a small boat, 24' 7" and capable of crossing oceans even if it wasn't going to be comfortable.

I was single, working mainly as a fisherman except that now I was incapable of working on fish boats in the Bering Sea during winter.

I had fished salmon, herring, Black cod, halibut and King crab. While I was capable of fishing the first three, my winter crab fishing days were behind me. I had seen the elephant. At thirty-five I had been to about fifty funerals and memorial services and only about three weddings. 

Not all of the deaths were from the boats, proper. Some of these were from the businesses and lifestyles that ran with it. Spotting herring from a small plane can be deadly. With that much money at stake spotting pilots seem to forget to watch out for other planes and I remember more than one mid air collision.

Drug abuse was fairly common and that was a certain part of it. I had managed to keep clear of that malady. Suicide also accounted for a couple of deaths. My neighbor on Dog Bay shot himself. Still, I loved fishing. Still, I loved the work and I loved the men and woman in the business.

The previous winter I had stopped crab fishing. I pretty much found myself a shivering, quaking mess when I tried to board the crab boat out in Dutch Harbor. I simply could not force myself to do it and quit right then and there. Twenty minutes later I was replaced by another deckhand's cousin.

It proved to be a good move because a couple of trips later the boat went down with all hands. 

It was early April of '86 when the weather broke. I had wintered on my sailboat and it had been rather enjoyable. I had  fed myself by doing occasional odd jobs. I woke up and realized I had to change careers or die. In order to do that I would have to leave town. There were no ands, ifs or buts about it.

Still, come later Spring of '86 I had a good spring/summer/early fall left in me and I fished a halibut season and jumped on another boat headed west fishing for Black cod with a promise to be able to fish for halibut again. Black cod would pay my expenses and halibut would make me a bundle. 

By May I was headed to Dutch Harbor on a 96 foot Bender that had been modified with sponsons to improve stability. She was actually built as a crabber but was now geared up for long lining. As I had predicted, Black cod paid the expenses and my bills and halibut had left me with a good sized wad of cash.

I sailed from Kodiak mid August and made an epic trip in my sailboat to Friday Harbor, Washington arriving a couple of days before Halloween. When I left Kodiak and took the helm for the first night and looked at the stars it was probably one of the most interesting time of my life. 

I was at sea, headed to the unkonown. I was 35, had no job, no prospects, a limited amount of cash, someone I was responsible for another human's life because I had a crew of one going along just for the adventure of it. 

But I had my ship to sail, and my star to steer her by and realized I was truly master of my own fate. It was a damned heady feeling. I had literally cast my fate to the wind. Not a whole lot of people can say they have done that.

Two days later we were in the middle of a wild storm. It's another story in itself. We got the living daylights kicked out of us for about 36 hours and the instant it was over we were becalmed for the better part of a day. Go figure. We landed in Sitka.

Some time later in Ketchikan, I met the woman that would later become my wife. In Friday Harbor I put my boat on the hard and returned to Ketchikan where I worked ashore, bored to tears doing odd jobs and driving a cab. I did a couple of sailboat deliveries which kept my sanity. I also brought the boat back to Ketchikan and that helped keep me sane.

By mid '89 she and I decided to return to the Lower 48 as our parents were aged and we wanted to spend time with them. We left Ketchikan and arrived in Pittsburgh about Halloween. There wasn't a whole lot of work in Pittsburgh but I managed to frame a couple of houses and do a remodel. Sometime near Christmas I went to Massachusetts to see my family and en route I met half of a tug crew that were headed home following their tour.

They told me that the place they worked was in an upheaval and were hiring. I stood a fair chance of getting hired with my commercial fishing background and they gave me a phone number.

Several days later when I got back to Pittsburgh I called. We talked and I was called in for an interview. I realized I should have called as soon as I got the phone number. The place was mobbed. Everyone there had credentials. I had none to speak of but I knew that if I could get a letter of intent I could have an entry level Z card inside of 24 hours. 

I felt like a fighter down on points that could only win by a knockout. I needed something on my application that would make them stop cold and look at me. It came to me as I was organizing my records to fill out the extensive application. They wanted my entire work history since Day One!

Unike most fishermen, I had kept careful records of my boating history. I had done this in case I wanted to get a charter boat license in the future. 

As I was going through it I realized something. My first five years in the fisheries I had worked on numerous boats filling in for sick, injured fishermen or those that needed a trip off. If an Alaskan looked at the list he would think I was OK because I kept busy. Stateside it would be a black eye. People would think I couldn't hold a steady job.

So to cover that five year period I simply wrote "French Foreign Legion, highest rank: Corporal."

There was no way then that my entry could be investigated successfully. At the time the internet was in its infancy and besides that, the Legion was reported to be pretty tight lipped. 

The woman I handed my application to scanned it and her eyes popped open. She look at me. "Presumably you speak French," she said. I answered her in Junior High French and she got up and delivered the application to the interviewer.

I was called in next and the first thing I was asked was what it had been like in the Legion. I told him I had been a mechanic and that it was like almost any other military outfit except more disciplined. I knew better than to play it up. I played it down.

I think he wanted to hear about being awarded the Legion of Honor for shooting 38 A-rabs off the back of a camel or some damned thing. Sometimes I think I should have said that and they will send me the medal as soon as they figure out how they could get 38 people on the back of a camel in the first place. Whatever. I played it down. 

He went through my records briefly noting the lifeboatman course I had taken at Ketchikan Community College and then got up and stuck hus head out the door. "Hey, Louise! Give this guy a letter of intent! I haven't hired a Foreign Legionnaire before." He turned to me. "As soon as you get your Z card I'll put you to work as an Ordinary on one of out tugs." He gave me sheet of advice a list of helpful places in Baltimore along with the address of the Regional Exam Center. Louise handed me my letter, I was given a drug test and I was off and running.

I arrived at the Baltimore REC at about 1330 and it was not very busy. Instead of the bum's rush, the Coastie went through my record and found some of my fishing time could be used toward Able Seaman and that my Lifeboatman. In fact, I left Baltimore with 'Lifeboatman' stamped on my new Z-card!

I immediately called my better half and she was excited but made one stipulation. If anything got flaky, stupid or outright dangerous I was to immediately jump ship, no questions asked. I agreed. 

The next day I reported in at 0800 and by noon I was on board a tug as an Ordinary Seaman. The person that hired me was astonished to see the Lifeboatman's endorsement on my brand new Z-card. I was now 38 years old and had finally fulfilled a childhood dream. I was now a bona fide documented Merchant Mariner AND had a job! I arrived in the proper place, at the proper time in the appointed uniform (basically rags) and went to work.

Incidentally someone once asked me about Merchant Marine uniforms. I told him he could get a complete issue from Ruth the Bag Lady, Goodwill, and a couple garage sales for about ten bucks.

Actually there is more than a germ of truth to that. These days when we load or discharge we wear company supplied coveralls and work shoes. Some companies supply various work uniforms and some companies don't. When we're not loading or discharging we wear what we want. 

One of my favorite sea stories is when two of us were called to the office and I showed up in a suit and tie and my shipmate showed up in greasy coveralls with a pair of pink bunny slippers over his work boots. Feel free to ask me about that sometime. I think I got in more trouble over that than he did.

Why a suit? The company stopped issuing coveralls and I could buy suits at Goodwill for a lot less than coveralls!  

Although it was no longer a case of sailing the Seven Seas and visiting exotic ports overseas anymore, I would get acquainted with most American seaports during my career. Hell, those days were over for practically everyone in the American marine transportation business since automation and overseas flagged vessels have killed that kind of job off. A job on a tug was nothing to sneeze at.

The work came easily to me and inside a trip or two I became an adequate deckhand.

Six months later I heard there was going to be a company run Tankerman trainee course. When I tried to apply I was told I didn't have enough time in the company. I asked if I could take the math test anyway and the two personel people chuckled and handed it to me. I sat there while they corrected it and I got a 100% and they looked at each other.

I had gotten off of my tug an hour or so earlier and was headed home. I hopped into Yellow Truck (a tired, worn out well loved  junker) and left for home. When I had been home about a week the phone rang. It was the man that had corrected my test. 

"You put me in a bind," he said. "Someone upstairs wants to know why the ONLY guy to max the math test isn't in the program. He waived your time requirement. You're off the tug effective now and the class begins in two weeks."

The course was two weeks of classroom and three tours working on an oil barge. At the end of the classroom part I was to head to Baltimore to take the Tankerman's test and have the endorsement put on my Z card. Unknown to the office, I had been corrosponding with the Baltimore REC and we had determined that between my tugboat time and the transferable fishing time I could sit for Able Seaman (AB). After the classroom portion of the Tankerman course I went to Baltimore and passed both tests. I was now an AB/Tankerman and my pay had doubled. 

I put in a bid on a manned black oil barge and the bid was accepted and that became my job for the next few years. Later I went over to a clean oil barge and have pretty much stayed in clean oil since, moving mainly gasoline, jet and diesel.

I intentionally bounced around the fleet for a few years, seeking out a lot of the long time Old School guys to work with. I wanted to learn my trade. I eschewed advancements and promotions. I knew those could come later. I was doing it my way.

Later this left me with an immense sense of pride. Occasionally some of my peers would call me and ask for solutions to problems. Just recently someone well up the food chain that was rewriting some kind of policy called me and asked about a proceedure. "Hey, How do you Old School guys do it?"

I have worked mainly MANNED barges. There are a lot of barges out there that are unmanned. The tug crews generally do double duty. They load and discharge them in addition to their tug duties. A manned barge generally has two people on it. They generally work a 6 hour on/off watch rotation with one man sleeping.

I stayed with manned barges because two man crews tend to stick together tighter and watch each other's flanks. Some two man crews get so used to each other they communicate a lot through facial expressions, watchwords, buzz words and the like. Other guys prefer life on the tugs.

I turned all of my sea time into the Coast Guard with an intention of getting a Master, Near Coastal license. The rules between getting licensed and documented are different. At the time for my AB the sea time had to have been on vessels over 68 feet or 100 tons. For a 100 ton Master, Near Coastal virtually all of my sea time was considered valid. In January, 1991 I sat for my Captain's licensed and passed with flying colors. In addition to being a documented AB/Tankerman I was now a Master of motor, steam and sailing vessels.

As an aside, there was another reason for me getting my license. It represented over 720 days at sea which is more time than the average college graduate spends in the classroom to get their degree. My father waas dead and my mother was mildly disappointed I had not gotten a degree. My license stated I was a bona fide US Merchant Marine Officer. When I sent her a copy I explained that it was my degree from Hawsepipe University and represented my four years in a classroom of a different sort. 

For those that don't understand 'Hawsepipe University', a hawsepiper is a licensee that obtained it on his own without going through an academy. In the business licensees are divided into two groups, schoolboys and hawsepipers. 

I've only sailed on my license a couple of times, having made my career manning oil barges which I work under the authority of my document. I have never missed a day's work outside of injury, suffered a layoff or gotten handed a bogus paycheck. All in all it's been a good career for me.

It's bought me a decent place to live and given me about half of my life to myself working on a 3 week on, 3 week off rotation. It's succeeded wonderfully at keeping me out of the 9-5 with two weeks off every year grind. All three of the loans I have ever taken out were repaid well ahead of time. The last vehicle I bought I simply wrote a check for.

On the other hand, I married a woman that has done a wonderful job of understanding the business I am in. I was fortunate enough to meet someone that had been a commercial fisherman for a while and understood boats and the people that crew them. She knew it wasn't just a job. It's a way of life.

Over the years I have heard a couple women ask my wife, "Does he still have that awful job?" Much to her credit she's set them straight.

I was very close to 40 when we married and we decided it was too late in life to start a family. There are a lot of drawbacks to the life. It's hard on families and Dear Old Dad's often absent at the birthdays, graduations, Thanksgivings and over the holidays. On the other hand, with a 3 on/off schedule it actually does give an opportunity for more uninterrupted quality time with the family. I know of one man that goes home to home school his kids. He and his wife take turns.

One thing that's a must for any relationships is that you HAVE to have a fully capable woman. Over the years I have heard a number of teary-eyed wives blubbering about some petty insignificant thing gone wrong. The one that comes to mind is the weeping little bride that was having a problem getting the cap off of a milk bottle! Seriously. She called her husband because she couldn't open a milk bottle! He didn't last too long. Last we heard he was working at a hardware store for peanuts. No great loss. He was pretty much a dud to begin with.

Of course the other end of the spectrum was when a guy in casual conversation with his wife found out his son had broken a leg a few days earlier. The wife had taken care of it and found it too insignificant to call her husband and bother him at work over it.

Another advantage is you can live practically anywhere. Different companies have different travel policies. Some pay door to door round trip in CONUS but most expect you to get to your home port on your own.  One company gave its seagoing people a large travel stipend and they were on their own. It was large enough so that nobody complained because they generally came out ahead. I mention in CONUS because I know of a couple of guys that work opposite in a 12 week on/off rotation that have families overseas. One has his family in Thailand, the other in the Phillippines. The company is good with this. Sailors live everywhere in the States. It's a misnomer that we all live near the coast. I had a shipmate that was from the seafaring state of Idaho and another from Nebraska.

For years I drove to Philly, worked my 21 day tour and drove home. That amounted to about 12 hours, round trip. When you average it out, I drove well under 20 minutes a day. Many people have much longer commutes.

Pay is generally by the day. Any day or part of a day is a day's pay. I have been relieved a couple of minutes after midnight a few times over the years and gotten paid a day's pay for it. But it is a double edged sword. I've also been relieved at 2350 and not gotten the extra day. Over time it's a wash.

Overtime is generally anything over 12 hours at an hourly rate.  

Generally management isn't too bad. Virtually all middle managers have a seagoing background of some sort. Needless to say, there are exceptions. Oddly enough, in my experience this has been one place where HR is actually on your side for the most part.

Unions. Some companys are Union Shops, some are not. The first place I worked was a Union Shop and there was sometimes friction between labor and management. The Union there was probably needed to a point. I won't get into that.

The next place I worked was nonunion and in their efforts to stay nonunion treated us extremely well. 

The business does draw interesting people. They come in all kinds of educational backgrounds. Degree holders are somewhat common and I've worked with people holding Masters degrees working as entry level seamen alongside high school dropouts. Which one is a better seaman? It depends on the individual.  

Another thing is that for some the trade is difficult to leave. For many the lifestyle gets in one's blood. I've seen numerous people leave the trade and most of them return in some form or another. I've had many people say to me they were leaving and I've told several of them that they'd be back inside a couple of years.

One comes to mind. He said he was leaving for a shoreside job. I told him he'd be back and he insisted he's 'swallowed the hook' forever.

About 18 months later I ran into him again in the wheelhouse of a tug as he was standing behind the wheel in all his glory, mumbling about the tide, worrying about the upcoming painting season and in general carrying on. I looked at him and asked him what had happened.

I was treated to a sheepish look and he said that one day his wife told him she couldn't stand seeing him so miserable so she packed his seabag and told him to go back on the boats, pay cut or no pay cut. She just couldn't stand seeing him so miserable.

"Sounds like you married the right woman," I replied and he gave me a big grin.

I have seen that happen numerous times over the years. Most of them return.

He also dabbled a bit in photography and once made a poster of a tug in heavy seas with a wave in its early stages of breaking over the bow. The cutline was 'Ya gotta want to". I wish I had a copy.

You DO have to want to or you'll never really do well as a sailor.

I've made my living in a trade and it has served me well. Too many Karens are still living in a suburban bubble and think the only way for their sons and daughters to get ahead is with a college education.

In my area a lot of Karens think that Beattie Tech and CCAC (Community College, Allegheny County) are for deadbeats. They're wrong. The Karens have a lot to learn. The trade schools produce craftsmen of various sorts. It's strictly up to the student. What Karen doesn't realize is that talented craftsmen rather often turn into entrenpreneurs.

A guy I went to school with in the 60s did exactly this. While his peers were still in college he opened a very successful body and fender shop. I would imaging the first few years were touch and go, but so is the career of almost all college graduates.

They often leave school with the skills to start making good money to begin with nowhere to go but up. On the other hand, Karen's college bound kids are likely to leave school with dim employment prospects coupled with a huge student loan to pay off. 

While many kids could benefit with a college education, the kid leaving for school had damned well better have a viable plan. Too many kids don't and leave college with a worthless degree and huge debt. My favorite tale of woe was the clown with a Master's in puppetry. Yes. Puppetry. As in Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop. He was wondering why he couldn't start at $175K with his Master's.  

This portion has been brought to you by none other than RED ROSE TEA!

Aftermath.

About four or five years ago in a freak encounter I met the man that hired me and got me started.

The first thing he asked me was if I had really been in the French Foreign Legion. As usual, I went into my 'keep them guessing' mode and answered him in French.

"Huh," he said. "When I saw it I sort of thought it was a crock. Then I thought about it and figured anyone with enough moxie to put something like that on an application deserved a shot at it so I hired you."

"Merci beaucoup," I answered.