First Christmas Away From Home

We were wild. We, we had no fear. We, we didn’t know what was going on. The older hands now, the older hands that were there and they had wives and family home and everything like you know. And they used to, you could see the, the look of fear on their face. But us guys, they, you know, we didn’t care, we’d run around there as though we, we were individuals. We was never gonna, Rambo wouldn’t touch us. The officers were a great bunch of people, especially the captain, and the navigating officer. They were great people. All, all the, they ate the same thing as the ratings did aboard ship. There was no, there were no difference. Everybody was treated the same. That’s one thing about that. This was in December, and I was there and I had a bucket of paint and a paint brush. I was told to paint all the stuff that, that you’d see with a bit of rust on it, and I painted all the things that were rusty. And there was two old fellas sitting there and they said, “How you doing there young fella? ”And I said, “I’m doing good.” You know, like, you know. He said, “What’s your problem today? ” I said, “You know,” I said, “it’s Christmas Eve.” He said, “So what? ” You know, they, they had nothing. They, they didn’t care whether they come back or not, they had no concern about home life. And I was thinking good God my mother and father my brothers are all home. And I said, “But there will be no turkey, no turkey dinner tomorrow.” “Oh, yeah,” the guy said. He said, “There’ll be turkey dinner tomorrow.” He said, “and plum pudding.” And I said, “How’s that going to happen? ” Well, he said, “The helicopter will be bringing it in then.” Well, man, I swallowed that hook, line and sinker. And I painted that thing from stem to stern on that ship, and I fell asleep that night and I was dreaming, my God, am I gonna get that turkey dinner tomorrow. The next day, we went into the line, and the cook, who went to the galley, put out my plate. He slapped a big bowl of, a big ladle full of macaroni. “Happy New, Merry Christmas!” That was our Christmas Day, first Christmas without home. That was tough. It was rough.