Deployment Chronicles- Article 3 “The Brits”

Another update! Well as you know I don’t sleep very often and to add to my stress I was in talking to the captain last night
and at the end of our conversation concering submarine tactics he asked me if I’m ready for my officer of the deck board. I told him that I was but I had not been able to schedule one thus far. He said consider it done, your Officer of the Deck [OOD] is this week. I walked out of his room and shook my fist at the ceiling. I don’t know that I’m completely, but I suppose I am as ready as I’ll ever be.. He wants me to get it before our first port visit and that’s in 9 days! I feel very perplexed and even more stressed but I made some phone calls and I’m getting support from the other officers so I guess no sleeping for me at all this next week… I might actually have to drink an energy drink! How horrible

Last night 6 brittish officers and chiefs from the royal navy came onboard and stayed till this morning and to talk tactics. A warrant officer equivalent to an E-9 or masterchief in our navy was the anti submarine specialist and his name was Rocky. What a great guy. An older gentlemen full of gestures and good humor. I just love the brits! They were making jokes and overall have always been an enjoyable group this far. Of course I slide right into the british aire, if you will. I was walking around saying “top of the morning to you” at midnight last night and “bloody hell” when things weren’t going well. O how we laughed. Rocky has been in the British navy for quite some time and is full of experience. I talked with him late into the night. They left this morning via helo. I bought him a ball cap and waved him off and he was just delighted.

Yesterday while I was studying for my OOD board in the wardroom [the place where all the officers hang out], a warrant officer came in and there’s one thing you should know about warrant officers. NEVER PISS THEM OFF. They are a bunch of sea rugged, well educated, specialized people, who become officers because of their high stature and they can do pretty much anything and get away with it. It is not advisible for a junior officer to walk in their way at any time. You don’t believe me, just ask a few of them on my ship. But me, I disregard all of this politics and I have become good friends with all of them. ha. He tells me many stories about the days of the gulf war and there’s one in particular that I would like to share. One of the warrant officers told me about his first deployment during the gulf war when he was only 18. We had been going over engineering situations and I got into a debate with him over a casualty and how long you could steam before having to pull in somewhere to fix it. He said, “trust me, I win, my first ship steamed with this casualty for 4 months while deployed before we got home and had it fixed.”

“I said “what!? no way.”

He told me that he was off the coast of Iran on christmas day [his first deployment lasted 11.5 months instead of 6 due to continuous tasking] and they had authorized their ship to attack Iran with all the tomahawk missles they carried on board. On Christmas day! And so they did. They put in the firing keys turned on the missle switchboards and unloaded every opposition missle they carried until they only had defensive missles left. And while they fired all of these missiles two at a time the captain from the bridge blasted here comes santa claus over the 1MC [the loud speaker system]!! O my! That would have been quite an
experience.

He also told me about how he joined the navy at the ripe age of 18. He had actually been pulled over across the state boarder and had 5 jugs of moonshine in his trunk. If you get caught across state boards with moonshine then this is a federal offense. The judge gave him two options, take 5 felonies and go to jail or pick a fine institution such as the military service. He replied, ”hello water.” He also told me that deployments are nothing like they used to be back in the day. Before you had no means of communicating except via letter. Now we have email and the internet and all of this stuff. He said I hate hearing kids complain about being on deployment, its not a deployment if my wife can still bitch at me.” Haha. I love his vulgar attitude to pieces.

Deployment Chronicles- Article 2 “Sea Sickness isn’t for the Weak”

Hello all,

Well I finally feel good about transiting the ship forward to aft without puking my brains out. Yesterday the ship was rocking so much it was an extra effort just to transit from one place to the other because you had to focus on not running into things and I had to hold onto equipment so I didn’t slam into the bulkheads. It was soo annoying. I was miserable. When I was in the shower I almost fell over twice and had to grab the shower curtain, while the  water was sloshing all over the place because we were rocking so much. I can’t believe that’s how I started the deployment. Ugh.

I asked J how he’s doing on the carrier and he said well… [This is a day in the life of him:] I stop at starbucks in the morning and then head on over to the gym and play some b-ball and then I stop by the library and pick out a nice book and then I go to the lounge to read through it. Finally I head to one of the ready rooms to hang out with the pilots and then I pretty much call it a night. Jerk. I don’t think they can even feel the rocking on the carrier. I’m still glad I’m over here though, on my small little ship, bumping around in the ocean, at any rate its much more personable. At least I know all the names of the crew members.

The other night when the helo was about to take off, rotars were engaged and turning, one of the pilots got very sea sick and threw up in the helo. Therefore he was unable to fly. Then, we had a meeting with the commodore in the wardroom and everyone was making bets beforehand on who was going to get sick… Well, the commodore was in the middle of something [idk what] and I saw masterchief get a fireball out and put it in her mouth. I didn’t think anything of it. Then a minute later she turned her head and I heard the fireball hitting the floor and along with it well… the contents of her lunch. The captain didn’t even know and that was the funniest part because he was sitting beside her and he didn’t even turn to look. She left and as soon as the commodore was done talking I can down to our room to ensure she was okay. She didn’t even look sick when it happened. She assured me she was feeling much better, but she and I both spent the afternoon in our racks.

My guys always know when I’m sea sick because our spaces are very far forward and when I get sick I can’t go to them and work there because I can’t stand the rocking. Today they said, “I see your feeling better ma’am, you’ve come back down to sonar and are working.” My response: Shove it.

Everyone has been asking about my sister, who came to see me off. They all say my goodness you and your sister are an exact replica of each other. Then the next question every time is how old is she again? Men. I just tell them she’s out of their league. Period.  Haha.

I’ve been studying diligently for my Officer of the Deck board… Okay fine maybe not diligently but periodically. I just don’t want to study! My board will be in the next few weeks and once I get my letter I’ll probably move to the bridge. I’m on watch down in combat right now, but there’s nothing like being up on the bridge. They moved the clocks ahead one hour at 2100 as we are crossing the ocean and I definitely got screwed with that. I only got to sleep 2 hours before I had watch and now its 4am and I have 2 and a half more hours to go and I’m dying. Hopefully I’ll be able to stay awake. I guess I’m going to go and look over some of my notes. More to come…!

Confessions of a Writer<3

Deployment Chronicles– From the Beginning 1 “And so it begins…”

Preparing for the deployment has taken much of my time. It has been very eventful this past few days to say the least. E arrived back in the states from Ecuador on Friday and then she and my mom and dad drove down yesterday to bon voyage me today when my ship pulled away from the pier.

The goodbyes were very hard. I had to say goodbye to my roomates and my family, and emotions were high. My roomates and I stood in a circle hugging for 5 minutes straight and when we pulled away from the pier this morning that’s when I finally realized 7 months is going to be a loooong time on the ship. The atmosphere was very different today. There was an anticipation in the air, for what I cannot be certain of, I just know it felt different.

As I walked down to my room to change out of my summer white uniform once we were headed out the channel, I also realized that this crazy ship is no different. We went from event to event. I will not be sleeping today and probably not tomorrow either. I have a scenario from 0300-0600 and tomorrow isn’t looking any better either.

Our first steele beach picnic is this Sunday. That’s when everyone gets to relax and they grill on this huge grill we have and we listen to music. Apparently there will also be a mini driving range set up on the flight deck. I guess that’s what gets to happen when the commodore is embarked.

The seas have already been treating me poorly. As soon as we got underway we started rocking. It doesn’t help that we are headed straight across to open ocean. Luckily, I started taking the pills two days ago, but even still I’m really feeling it. I can’t even go up forward to my spaces because it is horrible up there and the bow is just pounding into the water and I can’t handle it.

I wonder what the seas have in store?

Confessions of a Writer <3

Ska ska ska– SKIING.

What an absolutely glorious weekend I had in the past two days.  There are so many times that I wish I could freeze capture instances in my life so that when I’m in a more upsetting place in the world, I can replay the best times over and over again like a loop reel on repeat.

On Saturday morning, I was up and so excited that I couldn’t even sit still. We were going Skiing, I was going to be on the slopes in a little over 5 hours, and I was going to have that feeling… the one with the quiet serene of the mountain calling to you as you feel you are separated from the rest of the world.

We were heading to Snowshoe WV, and as it so happens it was quite peaceful since AT&T was really the only carrier that worked within 2 hours of the area and everyone in my group had verizon wireless. I’m even more excited to be able to get rid of my phone for a few days and really just not worry about anything or anybody except who I’m with and the mountain.

When we arrived, the adrenaline and anticipation of the first run was emanating off of me and I was really focused on making it happen. We changed quickly, and I got all of my gear on and ready, I even wore my boots up the mountain.

We parked on the top of the world, or so said the sign, and we beeline for the first access to the trails. The first run was as magnificent as I had anticipated and so were the 20 runs after that. The powder was perfect, better than powder on the East coast in the past 2 years.

On day 2 when we got to the top of the mountain and started, we took a black diamond to the bottom. The day before, fog had settled down on the mountain and it was hard to see past the tree line. Now, this morning, during the first run of the day and the fog completely clearing before our eyes, the view became complete breath taking. I was in such a state of wonder tears were coming down my face and I had no idea how they go there. We spent all morning with the same wonderment stopping to take pictures at every opportunity. I had packed a lunch, and we sat and ate outside of the boat house right on the frozen lake. The conditions were perfect, the sun was shining, it was warm out, and the powder was excellent… it was everything I could have asked for to ski. I loved every second of it.

That evening, when we got back at the hotel, we jumped in the hot tub, relaxed, took a nap, and dressed up quite fancy for dinner. When we arrived for our reservation, we had to wait a few extra minutes so they walked us down the hallway to a study room with a guitar player and a bar, two fireplaces, rocking chairs and couches, and a view overlooking the slopes. I just can’t tell you how perfect it all was. We sat by the fire and drank a glass of wine and then we went and ate dinner, which was excellent as always.

Afterwards, we headed down the road past the village center to the Connection which was a “night club” of sorts and enjoyed a fun night of dancing and of course smoked a little cigar for the momentous occasion.

On Wednesday I leave for a month long underway, it will be a good time to relive the moments I suppose.

 

 

Bloodhound Award

What is the bloodhound award you ask? Well its pretty much the only award available to the sonar tech’s on board ships. And when I say only award, I mean only award for the whole group, so its obviously kind of a big deal. Since joining the navy I haven’t wanted to get any awards and I surely haven’t been seeking any accomplished letters. As far as my fitrep goes, fuck it.  I do what I do because its what I want to do, not to make me better than people. But this award, given out once a year, allows you to say that you are the best sonar division on the East Coast for the WHOLE year. I’m really really really excited about it.

When I wrote the award for my division I took extreme care  and read through it like 20 times because I wanted it to be really good and very well written. I take a lot of pride in that stuff, I really believe that my division deserves it, and I really want them to get it, more than anything. We’ve been going through a shit ton of stuff over the past year and I ran the division without a chief for 5 months and we were still doing great even when I didn’t have good direction and also when I had to deal with the dickheads who have a problem if they can’t talk to a chief specifically. You’d be surprised how much weight that collar device carries between first class to chief.

So, I spent a good deal of time on it and luckily, I’ve been writing papers for a long freaking while, so I used every resource I had available. When it did go to the captain for reviewal he only made five changes and I was pretty happy with those results. We have submitted the award but it will be  a few more moths time before we find out who wins the award.

In the event that we do win, we get to raise a flag on our ship for the whole year with a bloodhound on it, showing that we have the best sonar tech’s on the whole east coast. And also, we will look very good because we haven’t been deployed yet.

I might not care about single awards, but I really take pride in awards received by the whole group, in fact, I’d say I’m more excited about it then my division is and I’m not even a sonar tech, I’m just the ASWO. ha.

Give me a Sign.

So when do you know the answer? When is it clear? What am I even doing writing this? Can I please just live my life without the bother of a relationship to worry about? But then, if that were the case, I would be alone. But haven’t I been on my own my whole life so far? When does it end?

Have I asked enough questions yet? cuz I have much more where that came from, believe you me.

Why don’t I stop asking questions and start telling some stories? Yes, that’s a great idea.

This past week I attended a conference, there’s many details but none of which are of importance so I shall leave them out. While there I was, as usual, one of the lowest ranked and least knowledgeable people attending.

& you know what? I really might not know all of this navy stuff, but I’m surely not stupid. I know I’m not the smartest person in the world and I worked really really freaking hard for my degree, but when people judge on me, when they don’t even know me, well that’s upsetting.

I mean honestly though, if you leave the navy in a few years, or 20, when you do get out, all of the information that you studied and knew, will be meaningless. 20 years you might eat, sleep, and breathe navy, but when you leave, no one in the civilian world can know of your accomplishments, or understand them completely.

So why do this to ourselves? Why jam this information into our minds, when we can just look up the information and we don’t have waste the information. I mean I loose knowledge that I otherwise would remember from my college degree all the time and I feel that the reason is because I’m trying to learn all navy all the time.

I want to learn, but I just really don’t feel that its that big of a deal to not know all of the information by heart. And it surely doesn’t make me stupid, it just makes me less knowledgeable about the navy. whatever.

So now, I’m done rambling and I feel better about it already. Thanks!

 

I can feel you falling away

No longer the lost no longer the same

And i can see you starting to break

I’ll keep you alive if you show me the way

Forever and ever the scars will remain

 

Give me a sign

 

 

Model Citizen, Zero Discipline

I’m backkkkk… and this is legit. I have been underway for the past 2 months!!!! and it was very unexpected. We barely had any communications with the real world.

This is how it all started… We began our group sail with our strike group, and that was pretty intense for me. It was Anti Submarine warfare exercises round the clock and little to no rest for me and my guys. We were dying. We were playing war games, and that is always exciting, and this time we even had real submarines to track and track us. While underway the wardroom thought it would be great to grow mustaches for the month. O my goodness we had a whole bunch of pedophiles walking around. I mean SCARY people. I was totally appalled.

So about 16 days into the group sail, we stopped in Mayport just for a few hours and this is when I found out that we were staying in Mayport for the next 2 days and we weren’t going back out with the ships. We were detaching from them and heading South to Panama on an ASW (Anti Submarine Warfare) mission. How cool is that???? I was going to be able to get involved and get some real experience.

And just like that, we took on some extra stores, batten down the hatches, I went to the strip club with some guys the night prior, and then the next morning we were sailing South at 25 knots, headed for Cuba and Cancun and ultimately Panama City, Panama South America.

Not many people were excited about this, but deep down, I was excited. This is the kind of shit I signed up for, although I played it off very carefully, not  letting most people in on my excitement factor.

Now for many of you out there who aren’t aware, the panama canal is quite the transit and it takes about 12 hours at sea & anchor to get through it all which again meant no sleep for me. But, I got to be on the bridge the whole time so I couldn’t really complain that much.

Here’s how the canal works. First you drive on up to the first set of locks, there are 5 total, and you parked the ship in the canal like its in a car garage or something. The doors behind you close and the lock starts filling up with water. From the forecastle they take lines that are attached to cars that are on tracks and they help guide you through the whole way so you don’t scrape the sides and bump around in there while you wait. So as the water fills up, you eventually rise high enough for the next set of doors to open. Basically they raise the ship up to transit you through. On the other side of the locks, there’s a lake and you transit that and then do it all over again through another set. It was way cooler than I expected. The ingenuity of the human mind, I’ll tell you.

On both sides of the canal there are tons of ships anchored out that are waiting their turn to transit the canal, sometimes they have to wait for a few days just to get through. I’m sure they weren’t happy we jumped line, but the Navy is always on an agenda.

Once we were safely through we stopped at some piers just on the other side of the second full set of locks and we spent the night, which gave people a time to rest up after the long transit, but more importantly allowed us to refuel and take on stores before continuing on our mission.

My first foreign port, and we weren’t even allowed to go anywhere! I guess I can’t count this one… I still sent out 10 postcards to all my friends and family, just so I could feel like I was a tourist.

After our day of rest, we were underway and still steaming at 25 knots rushing over to the area below Guatemala and El Salvador. When we arrived on station, well that’s when our hell began. We were put into port and starboard watches which means 12 hours of watch a day. It is terrible. It was 7 hours on watch, 7 hours off, 5 hours on watch, 5 hours off. These times became very tough for me. I do not drink coffee or energy drinks (I’ve never had either) and I refuse to drink that stuff so I was walking around like a zombie. All I did was eat, sleep, and stand watch.

At noon everyday we had a meeting scheduled where we would be able to get together and talk about our plan of attack. On the first day I was standing up waiting to get everyone’s attention and I said, “good afternoon war council.” Apparently they liked that one because the next day instead of it saying meeting in the plan of the day it said war council meeting. I laughed when I saw it.

We stayed on port and starboard watches for two weeks before we had to go and refuel. One day when we were driving around and I was directing the ship where to go I decided to make a star pattern on the display with the ship. Needless to say I completed my pattern, took a picture of it since the line shows where the ship goes, and then I emailed it to my dad, because I mostly drove it in this pattern just so I could tell my dad, I was driving it like I stole it. He got a kick out of that one.

While working our way towards Columbia, we embarked a Coast Guard Ledet, two helos, a desron staff, and a Columbian officer. It was quite the to do. I met some very interesting people. We stayed on station for endgame and then we headed back for home. Luckily, we did make it home the Friday before thanksgiving which made people very happy.

I missed a wedding, and my corrective vision while we were gone, but the experience was great. I can’t wait to get to some more foreign ports!!!

Earl Had to Die, Goooodbye Earl, We Need a Break!

Anyone on the East coast might have heard that Hurricane Earl was headed into town and just in time for labor day weekend. It couldn’t have been a worse time. I had all kinds of plans for labor day weekend and then they were considering sending all the ships out to sea, and or making us stay onboard in case the hurricane came in fast and furious. Total bust! But wait, Earl was classified as a Cat 4 as he turned to head up the east coast, and by the next morning he was down to a Cat 3. A few hours later they had him marked at a Cat 2 and now he was staying farther out, not even coming very close to shore.

They told us not to even come in on Friday, and that it would be best to make sure all family’s had an evacuation plan. I didn’t go in on Friday and when I woke up in the morning I jumped up and ran to the window just to see what was happening. & when I looked out, nothing was happening, it wasn’t even raining. Well, hey at least I got a day off. and about 3 hours later I got my weekend back, which meant that my plans weren’t completely ruined after all.

Immediately a friend and I went into overdrive and we planned the bachelorette party which had been cancelled at least 6 different times, because of the storm. In the end it went off without a hitch, we had everything we planned, we played games, drank wine, had great food, and we even had a penis shaped cake that we were able to throw in the oven at the last minute. It was a total success. I was pretty happy.

Then Sunday was the Rock and Roll VA beach Half Marathon. I was pumped for that to happen! I had watched the news all day Friday while they were deciding whether to continue with the race or cancel it, when they made the decision to continue with the race I was ecstatic.

4 officers from our ship ran the race including myself and our captain whom I ran into afterwards when I was looking for my friend. I had a very good time at the race and got sunburned as well. I love running races, they are so motivating. My legs are in horrible pain right now and I’m going to be sitting in bed for a better part of the day because I have off, but I do believe my workouts this week will be swimming, no running, I need a break!

I’m so happy everything worked out. Yay! for labor day weekend!

Japanese Adventure.

Wow! We just got back from a two week underway and boy was it jam packed with event after event. My newest story was quite the adventure and I am very glad to be sharing it. When we left, I knew that we were going to meet up with three Japanese ships and one other U.S. ship (the Donald Cook) in the middle of the Atlantic, and I was pretty excited. In preparation the navigator had all of the Junior Officer’s (JO’s) convene in the wardroom for manuvering board training. We were working on all of the stationing problems when Rear Admiral Thomas popped in for a visit and had a talk with us about well, our lives and SWO’s overall.

The next morning we were underway. I was the conning officer and things went smoothly. When we got out to the Atlantic and met up with the Japanese ships, there was word that some of the JO’s were going to be able to get RHIBed over via Japanese small boat and spend the day on board the ships. I had no thoughts at all that I would be picked because I don’t have a chief and my first class that helps me run the show went on leave to move houses. My division kept telling me “watch ma’am, their going to pick you, we just know it.” I did not believe them.

And they were right. I was picked and Patrick and I went together to the Kashima where we met some very interesting people. The beginning of the trip did not start off well to say the least. Our ship was dead in the water for the transfer because the Japanese version of the small boat was quite different from our version. We disembarked via the flight deck using a jacob’s ladder. I was the first one to climb down and the people in the small boat did not understand that they needed to hold on to the ladder in order for me to get safely down it so just when I was about to get into the boat, the ladder slipped out and I went crashing into the side of my own freaking ship. It wasn’t horrible, but now the rope ladder was in between my ship and the Japanese small boat and a rolling wave came up, of course. I frantically tried to climb up the ladder a few feet and my right leg did not make it. The Japanese small boat smashed into my leg and my leg smashed into the side of the ship and I screamed at the top of my lungs. When I did get down into the boat I didn’t think I was going to be able to walk but after a few minutes the pain subsided, and I decided to stick it out.

When we got to their ship they immediately took us up to the bridge to meet the captain and the admiral that was onboard for the world tour. Everything was so clean. That’s all I could think, after walking down the first p-way. Instead of having one ladder well on each side of the ship they had an ascending and descending ladder well’s side by side. That made for easy transiting. After we were introduced to the captain and the admiral we went to the wardroom to put our things down.

This is when I found out that 2 midshipmen were on the ship from the academy and they were riding for two weeks time. This was very good for me because they spoke Japanese pretty fluently and became our translators throughout the day. We took a tour and saw the ships layout. They have an elaborate apartment onboard for the emperor  and we tried to convince our tour guide to take us past the gold rope but he was unable to. boo. I really wanted to see it.

After the tour we headed to the bridge because they were just about to start Divtacs and we wanted to see it from their angle and of course see how efficient they were at taking stations. While there, I took lots of pictures and got some good ones of my ship in the water off of our starboard bow. They had the Japanese helo in the air and it was taking pictures of the formations. The captain of the Kashima got very annoyed because they didn’t want anyone outside for the pictures, but the captain of my ship was out on the bridge wing with a group of people and would not go inside. Patrick and I laughed a whole lot about this.

After the Divtacs it was time for lunch, what I had been waiting for this the whole time. Apparently a Friday in Japan is similar to slider Wednesday in the U.S. because they have rice and curry every Friday. I piled my tray high and took chopsticks plus a spoon, just in case. The food was pretty good. We had tea with our meal, which was very refreshing and I will say that the Japanese really do know how to cook some great rice., as if there would be any doubt.

While eating I asked a guy sitting across from me what kind of music he listens to. One of the midshipmen translated for me. He said that he liked American music. I asked him which kind. He said that his favorites were Lady Gaga and Slipnot. What a combination. I of course started singing raa raaa rra a aaaa “Bad Romance” and he started bouncing to the beat. Apparently they had stopped in D.C. as part of their world tour adventure, and half the ship had bought the new Lady Gaga C.D. We were laughing so hard and singing lady gaga songs at lunch. It was quite a show.

I enjoyed my entire day on board. I learned how to play Zero, caught up on the latest Japanese fashion with some of the girls, and learned about a great comic book read, saw their onboard symphony band practice, and even head banged to some Slipnot.

Going home, or back to my ship should I say, we flew by helo instead of by taking the small boat. It was a great time!

My Breakout.

Well, I’ve been onboard the ship for six months and yes I’m making a mark but I hadn’t done anything that spectacular that merited any attention whatsoever. I had been waiting impatiently to be put on the watch bill as the conning officer for the navigation outbound naval station Norfolk. This navigation detail is approximately 2:30 minutes long and it is a big deal to be on the bridge for it because EVERYONE and their mother is up there. The best of the best. Even the captain stays on the bridge the entire time.

When I finally got chosen to be the conning officer, they put me on the watch bill the day before the brief was supposed to take place. Way to screw me over, no time at all to prepare. I was seriously determined to make an impression with this brief. I wanted to do it very well.

I immediately ran up to the bridge and found QM1 the quartermaster I know the most and I immediately began freaking out and telling him I needed his help direly. He laughed and went and got the charts and notecards, and we proceeded to spend the next few hours going over said charts, writing notes, and setting me up for success. He added even more than what people normally say and I was nervous as shit. This was definitely going to be a make it or break it moment. No notecards, nobody had ever done it on the ship before. How do I know this? My ship was only just commissioned a year ago and most of the original crew is still onboard.

I took every word QM1 gave me and I prepared the shit out of the brief. It was awesome. He allowed me to take the charts home for the night with death threats if anything should happen to them, and then when I got home I practiced the brief until, well… I knew it by heart. Yeah I know, total nerd, but like I said I wanted to make a statement.

The next morning I went into the wardroom and helped set up the charts for the brief and then I waited patiently for everyone to come into the room. I thought I was going to throw up or something that’s how nervous I was. Geez. Drive me nuts. Let me get through this.

Of course, OF COURSE, the captain does not come for the start of the navigation brief. In all my time on board he has never not come to one of the navigation briefs. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!!?!??? Whatever, I’ll make him wish he was here. So it went on without him and when it came time to brief my part, I took off and I didn’t stop till I was through with it. I focused all of my attention on the executive officer (guy ranked right under the captain) and I didn’t look around because I didn’t know what people’s reactions were going to be. Later, I found out from QM1, that people were looking all around in disbelief that I was giving the brief so well and with no notes at all!

I did it flawlessly. I was loving it. When I finished with the first chart, people started clapping and one of the chiefs turned to the other ensigns and said, you guys just suck. I didn’t hear that part either because I was still focused. My personal favorite was when the executive officer actually had to quiet down the wardroom which I have also never seen before, because I had done so well nobody could stop talking.

I was very happy with the way the brief went and when the captain came in late, after missing my entire performance, they were all telling him he completely missed the best brief they had ever seen. I was silent.

Apparently though, after the brief had ended about three people had gone up to him and told him about it in much more detail. I was smiling behind this scenes by this time. I had scored big on this one. I was congratulated many times throughout the day, and it really felt good.

In the end, my small success propelled me through the week and on Friday, the captain told me that he had noticed my accomplishments. Sometimes the navy is so stressful and just sucks, so these small marks that I am able to make, just feel damn good.