The Long Months At Sea

I haven't told you about the crafty side of going to sea. 

The ship from the launch boat

What would you do if you were stuck in the middle of the great, big, giant, ominous, boring sea all day every day, day after day? For me, in my twenties it was a dilemma I faced routinely. I was one of those rare merchant seapersons who was on a ship in the middle of the ocean laying fiber optic submarine cable (so you all can make a phone call or peruse the internet, (no it isn't mainly via satellite)). We would set out from shore to spend 30-60-90 days (or more) at sea slowly laying cable the size of your garden hose on the bottom of the ocean. It is slow and boring 99% of the time. Most of the time you are traveling at about old lady jogging pace. All of the time there is no sign of life. No happy seagulls. No whales, or dolphins, or anything. Just you, the horizon of more nothingness, and the ocean churning around you. Most of the time it is gloomy, grey and chilly. The North Atlantic swallows ships for fun. It has done this for millenia. She is always hungry to remind you that you are but a speck of dust in her skirt.

That's the outside of your house. The house you live in is grey. An endless right angle of steel covered in steel grey. Grey is the color of failed red blood cells. The color that life leaves behind when everything around the being has bailed. Surrendered. Given up. Dead. You will hardly ever see me in two colors; grey and khaki. There has been too much of my life already in them. I can even assign a face to the particular color of khaki that is the plebe short and shirt of arrival at KP. That color is puke bile on canvas. That color is forbidden. The warm grey of cashmere is a completely different hue than steel grey. The shade of WW's and wartime. The 40's era of a nation setting itself to right the wrongs abroad. Yeah, I struggle to embrace that murky black meets white too.

Everything screams early 1990's in this one.
At the dock Baltimore, MD, full on 80's attire.

The world of going to sea is so bleek you find reasons to go on within it. For some it is the escape of being away. No family drama. No to-do lists to be done by a spouse overworked with family. You are away. So far away you get to be a whole other person. If you want to. (Many do). But, the 12 hour days of working stop. You have to fill the 12 remaining. That's where the hobbies come in.

There is a whole ship load of hobbies happening in staterooms, on bunkbeds, in common areas/rec rooms. Some use the gym. Others watch endless movies. A small few have side hustles. 

I collect old whale waste from sailors idle hands. A busk collection to rival the whaling museum in Massachusetts. The art of sailors is a whole topic onto itself. For me, at sea, I would carefully select a topic to fill my four months. One trip I learned all of the scientific names of the native flowers of North America. Another I read the entire volume of Internal Medicine, Mercks guide (not the one I should have read in prep for vet school). Another trip was watercolor 101. 

Some of the busks.

For the Captain and Medical Officer on one ship it was braided rugs. Now, when I talk about a hobby to bring to sea just think about the amount of stuff you need to carry aboard when you choose wool-braided-rugs. 

The material for these was carried aboard via an elevator in industrial sized garbage bags. The kind that resembled a prison reformed Santa. They would spend an afternoon in Maine, near the place where the cable factory was, picking out the fabric to make their rugs. They brought these huge, (so heavy), bolts of wool in every color (except a pastel). Once aboard and underway, they started by washing all of the material. Laid it out to dry in long runner.  They would lay it out full length in the Captains office, the unused staterooms. Hang them from the overheads in bathrooms. Banners of bullet proof hall runners streaming down the narrow passageways. We, for just a few days, looked like a runaway art exhibition, avant garde flair. After the fabric was cleaned, dry and shrunk to its workable size, they covered the floor like a fashion designer with healthy knees, and cut them all into strips about 2 inches wide. From there they rolled the strips up in coils and hold it with rubber bands. Piles of ribbon wool strips were then sorted to make the patterns of the rugs. Two weeks in they were ready to commence braiding.

The 8-12 am watch for the Captain was his bridge time. Breakfast was an all hands event for all of the officers. 7 am to 8 am, and then the work day began. He would climb up to the bridge, a 6 story trip of steel staircases with a cup of coffee and the morning paper from the radio officer. He stood his watch mostly chatting with other crew members, the cable engineers, the steward, radio officer, Chief Engineer, the Purser, Chief Mate, got all of his crew in order. Tasks set for the day, so he could braid and assemble in his office the rest of the afternoon. 

They would spend all day braiding the coils. Piling them like pet snakes. Weeks later the rugs would be started. Every size, shape, color, pattern. It was a marvel to behold. 

By the time we hit port, typically 4 months later, they had a stack of rugs to rival the Turks.

I bought a few of them for my mom. She was enamored with the idea. A romantic trip traveling the globe and the sailors art to show for the time that passed. 

When my mom passed away I took them all back to my house. 30 years has passed and although I still refuse to wear that particular color of khaki or grey I can  now feel the warmth of that wool under my L.L.Bean slippers and reminisce about a life and a time that only belongs in a story.

What's your sea-story? Your side hustle? The art you make along the way of life?