As we steamed back to the States, our future at sea was uncertain. We didn’t get much info about where we were headed or what our mission was to be. I was getting to be a short timer so I wasn’t too concerned about it. By now, I had my sea legs, knew my job fairly well, was well liked on the bridge mainly because of the excellent coffee I made regularly, and because I tried not to be an ass most of the time. Down below decks, I was a killer double deck pinochle player so had my circle of card playing friends. Also played a lot of 5 card Tonk (a rummy game), also called Tee-Tee. Played for points which turned into money at the end of the week. Got pretty intense near payday. Got good enough that I usually ended up even on the books, won some, lost some. We didn’t play pinochle for money though. Just for the fun of it. My favorite game to wile away the hours at sea.
At our speed, 8 to 13 kts, it takes around 18 days to go from the Philippines to Honolulu steaming 24/7. I can’t recall for sure, but I think we dallied a bit at sea and took at least 25 days to get there. This is the trip where we had following seas from that typhoon. I was on the bridge on a nice sunny day with the capt’n, XO, first mate, and the navigator not long after we went to sea. We had been rocking 20 degrees side to side for 3-4 days and everyone was on edge. The navigator was just doing his job but the capt’n and XO were berating him in a joking way about why we were spending so much time in the ‘troughs’. And he had his reason…basically he was trying to save fuel. Nothing was decided that day, but a couple days on, I happened to be up on the bridge again (it was my duty station after all) and this time the cap’t ORDERED the navigator to choose a course so we weren’t in the troughs all day and night. So after a couple hours of course plotting by the navigator, the orders for a course change were relayed to the helmsman and we started to do a zig-zag route at sea as that was the only way to get out of the troughs. Capt’n again came on the intercom for a ship wide announcement about it and everyone cheered that we were to be out of the troughs for at least half the time. And once again, I would keep track of when those course changes occurred and show up in the wheel house near that time, than talk the helmsman into letting me make the course change. Fun.
So, we wasted some fuel and took 5-6 days longer to make it from Subic Bay, Philippines to Honolulu, Hawaii. We did have some equipment down in the well deck so the capt’n had a built in excuse for staying out of the troughs, so there would be less chance something would break loose and be tossed around down there. Excess marine equipment mostly. Some of it was being repaired by the marines that came with it.
That’s an interesting part of the story…the few marines we had aboard as we headed home were battle weary, so their sarge came up with this plan to keep them occupied that wasn’t marching and polishing their guns and whatnot. The ship had a full compliment of mechanics, machinists, boiler mates and others along with a full machine shop to do some heavy duty type mechanical work. What the sarge had those marines doing down in the well deck to keep their minds off the war was tearing down and rebuilding several of the engines in the vehicles down in the well deck. With the help of Navy personnel and the equipment we had aboard. This kept the marines from dwelling on the war they’d just experienced. And it reduced the number of fights between the Marines and Navy. It was pretty cool that we all worked at helping those guys overcome the effects of the horrors they’d experienced at war.
Not much to report on this visit to Pearl City in Hawaii. We only stayed 3 days to refuel and resupply with fresh produce and then we headed for San Diego. I can’t even remember if we were allowed to go ashore. Probably were, but not much time for messing around. For a fast ship, Hawaii to San Diego is a 9 day trip. For us it took 2 weeks. Again, lots of large swells we had to contend with, but now they were following us mostly so we didn’t have a side to side sway. After several weeks of heavy seas, it starts to wear on ya. But as we neared the California coast, the big waves had melted away mostly. Smooth sailing for several days. Didn’t have to zig-zag any more. Weather was really nice.
And we headed right for the shipyards. Learned just before we arrived that the ship was to be decommissioned and that was to be while I was still aboard. But that didn’t happen. Instead we were just assigned to San Diego to wait for it (hurry up and wait). So we arrived in San Diego around April or May of ’66. Nice weather. Even went over with a friend to enjoy the company of two young teenage girls at their pool…with their parents out of town. Naturally, I screwed up and slid their poor dog down the water slide into the pool (it had been sitting there at the bottom of the slide! It looked like he wanted to try it!). And then I forgot to remove my $365 hard contacts and they got lost in the pool. BUT…my friend and the two girls carefully swam around until they found them just floating there around a foot below the water surface. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t see well enough to have done that myself, but my friend said it wasn’t hard to spot them at all. The girls were a bit pissed at me so we left and just had burgers somewhere then headed back to the ship.
We did eventually end up in dry dock, and I had some liberty coming to me so I flew home. And there I met the most gorgeous blond 16 year old who lived next door to my parents house. After two weeks hanging out with her, stealing a kiss or two during some heavy make out sessions, headed back to SD and the ship yards. And 3-4 weeks later, she gets in touch and lets me know she’ll be in San Diego with her older brother and SIL. Wow. Looking forward to that. By now I was nineteen so all grown up and mature (…right). But I wasn’t opposed to a bit of showing off so when she got in town, I told her where I was, and she makes her way all the way down to the dry dock. You would not believe how the guys reacted when she walked up the gangplank and asked for me. Boy was that fun. As we walked back to the base gate, the ships railings were crowded with sailors all wanting to catch a glimpse of her as word had gotten around. She was a beauty. She wasn’t above basking in all those glances at her either.
When August rolled around, the Navy tried to get me to re-up as my active duty requirement was nearly up. This got me working on figuring out what I wanted to do. And eventually, I decided that I was going to head home, and use the GI Bill to go to college. Now I knew I didn’t have the money even with the GI Bill so I’d have to cool my heels and find a job for a while after I got home. But that was my plan so I told the Navy, no, I wasn’t going to re-up. They knew my plan was to head for college since they asked and I told them so they worked it out that I could be dismissed from my active duty tour in early Sept. of 1966, instead of my enlistment anniversary of February ’67. I was released 5 months early. Very nice of them. I left the ship with my friend who happened to muster out on the same day as I did. We headed up to Los Angeles where he lived just to hang out for a while. I made the mistake of calling my mom so she wouldn’t worry about why I wasn’t home when expected, but when I told her that I was staying in LA for a couple weeks (secretly thinking I’d go to a casting call and become a movie star) she freaked and lied to guilt me into coming home right then. She told me there was a big family reunion party already planned for my return, that all my relations were traveling hundreds of miles to greet me on my return. That wasn’t true, never happened, total bullshit. Well, whatever, water under the bridge. Boy was I pissed when I got home and found out.
Home was College Place, Washington. I was going to just hang around and get to know my gf better (that quickly didn’t work out, because she’d met someone else between the time she’d come to visit me in July, and when I got home in Sept. She eventually married him the next year). Eventually, dad gave me one of his old cars, a ’57 Mercury, we got it running pretty good, and I moved to the Tri-Cities (Pasco, Kennewick, & Richland, Washington) around 45 miles from home. The Navy had released me early enough to sign up for college the fall of ’66, but I didn’t have the money, so I planned on spending a year working first.
Columbia Basin College is in Pasco and it had an electronics program that I planned on attending fall of ’67, hopefully after saving money like crazy. I was determined and didn’t let my failure of the Navy’s electronics school prevent me from giving it a try. The Hanford Nuclear Site is there in the area with all the technology surrounding that sort of facility so it was better for finding a job than over in the Walla Walla area. The town didn’t even have a technical school. With the added benefit of being close enough to home and all the girls I knew over there that I could run home for fun but not be too close to the parents.
So after attending several USNR meetings in Walla Walla (remember I was a USN reservist), I worked out a deal where I could live, work, and go to college eventually in the Tri-Cities while keeping my reserve status properly fulfilled. Since I was a Viet Nam veteran, the people at the reserve meetings were more than happy to accommodate my needs. Few of them on staff had been in a war zone so most of them looked up to me, even the older ‘salts’. When I did end up going to college, the staff had worked it out so I didn’t have to attend meetings. That was a help since I wasn’t required to drive 100 miles round trip to a meeting once a week every Wednesday night.
Neither did I ever have to do another 2 week training at sea for reasons that are too obscure for me to remember now. I think I asked for, and received deferments for that since I was a war zone vet going to college.
And finally in ’71, my 7 year enlistment in the service was up, and I was mustered out with a honorable discharge. Thirteen years after that, I was kicking myself in the ass for not staying in the reserves. I would have been able to retire with 20 years in and all the benefits allowed a vet plus an income. That time had just zipped by. Had I stayed in, I would have only had to do 2 weeks of active duty per year, plus attend meetings either weekly or monthly depending on area I lived in. Easy. I really, really considered it though, so it’s not like I ignored the opportunity. Even considered reenlisting a few years down the road after I got my electronics degree. Thought I might give OCS a try and get an engineering degree at their officers school. Still had copies of the recommendations I’d gotten from the ships officers. But with my memory of failing the Navy’s electronics school back in ’64, I wasn’t willing to sign up for 6 years active duty and take the chance that I’d fail another Navy school. Besides, by the time that 7 years was up, I’d been married for a couple years and had a child, had gotten my degree, and started my electronics career. But I did really consider it many times over during those years, but life had gotten in the way, and it was complicated. When I retired for real, I could have used that steady retirement income from the Navy, but I just squeezed by without it, despite retiring 8 years early IRL.
Well, whatever. And now, because I’m a Vietnam vet, I do enjoy free medical care through the VA, along with reduced prices on meds. As most likely know, it’s not the best medical care in the world, but I’m lucky enough to be mostly healthy, except for the tinnitus I’ve got due to the big guns on the ship and the very loud noises in the ship yards that damaged my hearing. Other than that, I only have to contend with the regular stuff an older male faces. I’m happy with the care I’ve gotten from the VA so far. And it’s free (except for the co-pay meds, which don’t cost much).
And that’s the end of my Navy career stories. It was a great experience that I’d love to re-live parts of, like being at sea for a few weeks on a big ship, or a visit to those harbors I was at like Subic Bay and Da Nang and the one in Japan. Someday…