Mother, Mother Ocean… – [At Sea – 06/28/2011]

I’ve watched the men who sail you
Change from sail to steam
In your belly you hold the treasures that few have ever seen
Most of ‘em dreams…

Coming back to this class of ship has been very unusual for me in a lot of respects. For one thing it’s been a year since I worked a cruise that was less than three weeks long. More than a year since I worked a cruise with this many children. When you’re privileged enough to work the longer cruises, you meet a lot of fantastic people, and make some amazing friends, but you don’t see many kids. When I was on the World Cruise, I met only four children, and only became attached to two – and if I’m honest with myself, one of those two more than the other (though they were both wonderful, and I’m NOT just saying that because their mother reads this blog).

As I sit writing this though, there are children dancing on the dance floor of the upstairs lounge in front of me. Little kids, probably no more than 7.

You see, the layout of this type of ship is different than the ones I’ve been working on for the past year. On the smaller ships the library (that is to say my office) is located on one of the mid-decks of the ship, and the windows run along the sides. Ship before last I had a lovely view of a lifeboat. At any rate, on this ship it’s not like that, on this class of ship the library is actually integrated with the upstairs lounge. There’s a solo guitarist up here every night, and the view from my desk chair stretches a full 180 degrees. The same view as the bridge that resides two decks below my feet, only without the responsibility of well – being the bridge. Truly, I have the best office on the ship.

It’s not just that though. The different clientele takes some getting used to, but it’s not all that unusual. After you’ve done the switch from the world to the relocation cruise, changing clientele doesn’t bother you so much. It’s that this class of ship has a different feel to them and I mean that literally, not emotionally.

Because the library on vista ships is on deck 10, you can feel the ocean a lot more than you can on smaller ships. It sounds like it should be the opposite, but in reality the larger ships move considerably more than the smaller. As a result, when I sit up here listening to the guitarist play “Rainbow Connection” when we’re on a sea that’s rolling a fair bit more than normal, it feels more like being in a cradle than anything else.

People ask me all the time whether or not I get seasick. In truth I’ve only gotten seasick three times in my life, all three of which were under abnormal circumstances. I don’t get “land sick”, never have to find my land-legs when I get off the ship, – I think that’s because I never really feel like I leave the ocean. I carry her with me so to speak.

A few years ago, the Tall Ships came to my hometown for a big festival, and I had the luck to get a spot on one of the sunset sails. One of the crew members was talking to me afterward and told me she wouldn’t be surprised if I ended up crewing a tallship one day: “you’re one of us,” she said “eventually the old saying turns around, and we talk about having a little blood in our salt water”

Mother, mother ocean…I have heard your call…