Haze Gray and Underway
I served one tour on active duty in the U.S. Navy. I enlisted for four years, one of which was dedicated to training to be an aviation electrical technician. My fleet assignment, carrier-based Anti-Submarine Squadron 38, was headquartered at Naval Air Station (NAS) North Island near San Diego. At the time, VS-38 was attached to Carrier Air Wing II and the U.S.S. Ranger (CV-61), a diesel-powered flattop (since scuttled, sadly) that called the pier at NAS North Island home. I once tried to figure out how much time I spent aboard ship “haze gray and underway” and came to the conclusion that out of only 31 months in the fleet I was aboard ship at sea for nearly 15 of them. Needless to say, I had numerous experiences pulling into or out of our home base and various ports-of-call.
Manning the Rails
The U.S. Navy has a long tradition of “Manning the Rails,” a method of rendering honors by having sailors in dress uniform line up at regular intervals along the rails of a ship’s weather decks. I participated in just such a ceremony at least twice, once when passing the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and the other pulling into Vancouver Harbor in Canada when head of state was purportedly there. A similar but less formal tradition is called “At Quarters,” where the sailors line the decks entering foreign ports or when leaving or returning from an extended deployment.
Fifteen Months in Short Stints
My fifteen months at sea mostly came in short stints – two ten-day “refresher training” cruises to nowhere, a few two-week spins off the Southern California (SoCal) coast to give pilots opportunities to earn their carrier qualifications, a one-month “Rim of the Pacific” (RimPac) cruise to Hawaii, and a two-month “Surge” to Korea, Japan, and the Bering Sea was responsible for most of my time. None were enough to earn my Sea Service Deployment Ribbon, which required three consecutive months away from your home port. My lone extended deployment was my last on active duty: a memorable six-month Western Pacific (WestPac) cruise which at the time seemed as if it would never end.
USS Ranger Returns Home
It did, of course. I was 24 years old, and had never been separated from my large family at Christmas – until then. It was hoped we would be back before Christmas Day, but it was not until December 29 that SoCal came into view. Already melancholy for having “missed Christmas” (though I was allowed to decorate our workshop and arrange a gift exchange among my work center shipmates), I was assigned to an off-load work party, keeping me on the ship for a few more hours. Knowing my East Coast family could not meet me anyway, what did it matter? Much of the crew was “At Quarters” on the flight deck or on sponsons, scanning the crowd and waving joyfully. I sat glumly atop our squadron gear on the hangar deck and watched the new dads disembark and lead the rest of the ship’s company into the colorful throng of families on the North Island Pier, then witnessed their many joyful reunions from afar. As the pier slowly emptied over the next few hours, we working party stiffs were left to our individual and communal miseries.
Not Home Yet
Pastor Ray Stedman tells a story about an unhappy homecoming in his book Talking To My Father (1997, Discovery House).
An old missionary couple had been working in Africa for years, and they were returning to New York City to retire. They had no pension; their health was broken; they were defeated, discouraged, and afraid. They discovered they were booked on the same ship as President Teddy Roosevelt, who was returning from one of his big-game hunting expeditions.
No one paid much attention to them. They watched the fanfare that accompanied the President’s entourage, with passengers trying to catch a glimpse of the great man.
As the ship moved across the ocean, the old missionary said to his wife, “Something is wrong. Why should we have given our lives in faithful service for God in Africa all these many years and have no one care a thing about us? Here this man comes back from a hunting trip and everybody makes much over him, but nobody gives two hoots about us.”
“Dear, you shouldn’t feel that way,” his wife said.
“I can’t help it; it doesn’t seem right.”
When the ship docked in New York, a band was waiting to greet the President. The mayor and other dignitaries were there. The papers were full of the President’s arrival, but no one noticed this missionary couple. They slipped off the ship and found a cheap flat on the East side, hoping the next day to see what they could do to make a living in the city.
That night, the man’s spirit broke. He said to his wife, “I can’t take this; God is not treating us fairly.”
His wife replied, “Why don’t you go into the bedroom and tell that to the Lord?”
A short time later he came out from the bedroom, but now his face was completely different. His wife asked, “Dear, what happened?”
“The Lord settled it with me,” he said. “I told him how bitter I was that the President should receive this tremendous homecoming, when no one met us as we returned home. And when I finished, it seemed as though the Lord put his hand on my shoulder and simply said, ‘But you’re not home yet!’”
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