The Ritual

I woke up with this in my head this afternoon. I had to get it down. Ideally the two parts would be side by side like a Norse Saga, but I don't know how to do that on this page.

The Ritual 

It happens every day.

The old man awakes early.

At any time of the day.

It is time.

All over the world.

He dresses in the dark, so as to not wake his daughter's family.

From dawns early light to the depths of night.

The jacket no longer really fits, but the hat does.

There may be one person or hundreds.

He know which street and row and plot he is going to.

It is always solemn, respectful and defiant.

There is a chain across the gate, but it isn't a barrier. 

The words spoken vary from simple to elegant, but it boils down to three words.

They had been acquaintances before going away, they became more through what they did.

It is a bond that brings people together to remember.

Dawn approaches, as it did on that long ago and far away Hill.

It can happen in grand halls or the dark of a forgotten alley.

The old man pops to and renders a salute to his friend who died on that Hill.

It may come from a crystal glass or a paper wrapped bottle but the ritual remains-

He drinks the Toast and this year breaks the glass. He will be here in this field of stones next year and some one else will give the toast-

TO ABSENT COMRADES!

I Stood the Watch

I have singled up all lines and cast them off on cold gray misty dawns and plotted the bearing to the Cape Henry Light leaving home port. 

Before I hit the Boat I trained for two years on the job I was to do, it was after I arrived on board that I started my real education. I was a mess crank, non-qual and nearly got the Golden Flapper Award.  I went Ho! Ho! Ho! in the Escape Tower and nearly drowned in the Casualty Trainer.  I learned to be prepared.  My shipmates taught me what I needed to know.

Studied piping tabs so hard that I can still trace out major air, hydraulic and seawater systems today.  I have been on Port and Starboard as well as Port and Report.  I slept through my first trip to test depth.

We rode the Chicken Switches to the surface and heard the screw of a torpedo pass close aboard.  I learned how to cleanup after a Broken Spear and how to render a Subroc warhead unusable. 

I have a Shell Back and a Blue Nose.  I know the jokes and the hazing on the Boats:  Greasing; Pressure Test; Sea Bats; Got any nude pictures of your wife? and more.  I have been driven crazy and driven others crazy just to relieve the boredom. We watched the same six movies every night for three months even though we had over a hundred aboard.

I have had to wash my clean clothes twice before my wife would let me bring my sea bag in the house after a long run because of the smell..

I was drenched by the diesel on topside watch in the heat of the Med and froze in Groton one memorable January night.  I was the Shore Patrol in Christiansted, but never saw another White Hat all night long. Loved and hated the Boat and my officers.  Gotten drunk in foreign ports and saw cultural marvels.

In practice, I have sank more tonnage than all the Boats of all sides during both World Wars.  I am far from being the only one able to make that claim.

Traded for the dog watch as the below decks watch so I could play with my daughter on the Mess Deck during more than one holiday duty day. Played roulette for the first time at the Midway Party and learned card games for other times.

Counted turns in Sonar and flew the Boat as a plainsman.  Sat at the Firing Key and prayed not to hear the order to shoot. Waltzed Matilda for hours on end.  Been prosecuted out of an Area of Operation and snuck back in to continue the job.  Been put on report and commended.

Been to Scotland, Puerto Rico, Spain, Italy, Norway, Saint Crouix and off the coast of other places I still can't talk about.  Drank my Fish soaked in Sambuca and had my Crow tacked on. Loaded stores (cups of fresh milk coming up from below to slake our thirst and go with the "biscuits" we were scarfing down in Holy Loch) and weapons (a restraing strap breaking after we had stared lowering a MK-48 was handled with no panic).  Eaten powdered eggs, nearly rotten cabbage and way too much canned ravioli, along with some of the best food I have ever had.  Made friends I still have and worked with men I couldn't stand, but trusted with my life to do their jobs.  Seen men who could not handle the Boat break.

I have been on the Bridge while every star in the universe shone down in all their glory and watched dolphins surf the bow waves as we started into port.

I Qualified.  I am a part of a Brotherhood of all other Submariners.  I stood the watch and would do it again if my Country need my tired old bones.

The Travele's Choice

He stands at a fork in the road-bent, bowed and weary from his journey.  A choice  must be made, to continue forward on the hard, cold road or take the branch that leads quickly to his narrow bed.

The dark hag beacons him, urging him to ride her brother's pale horse to that cold inn.  To put his burdens, pain and cares down- to rest full and dark.  No companion is there to urge him on, not for a long time.  No faith keeps him on his journey, no hope for a lighter load tomorrow.  Only duty to the innocent holds him to his steepening path.  Few joys have have lightened his burdens, few companions have traveled with him for long.  Each joy and companion he treasures as he journeys down the path looking forward to the next unexpected treasure around the next bend. 

    

He considers his pains and his desires, then hikes up his burdens to continue down the path he is on.  Pains, sorrows and loneliness travel on with him, but he continues.  There is still joy to be found and the possibility of companions on this road before he rest.  The fork in the road is never too far ahead to take, but for now he will wait to rest in his narrow bed.

 

A post for Veterans

One Sunday in 2006, a young guy comes up to my Jewelry & Watch Repair kiosk in the Silver City Galleria Mall (Taunton, MA).  He showed me a item I had made on commission several months before, a sterling silver plate in the shape of a dog tag with a cross cut out, it had been a gift to him from a friend that had shipped out to Iraq the previous year.  He asked me to make him some plain ones, without the cutout.  He was shipping out for Iraq soon & wanted to have them engraved with something to give to his family & friends.  I got all fifteen of them done in two days.  After he told me what he wanted them for, I thought about what I would put on them, if I were going off to war.  This is what I came up with. 
Pax,
Jim

US Navy FTG2(SS) 1973-1979

I Have Chosen!

I have chosen this Duty.
I can not let it pass.

Not because I won't miss you,
nor that I love you less,
but because I love you more.

I have chosen this Duty,
To defend our Country,
our People, our Home. 
To defend you.

I have chosen this duty,
to be one of the "Rough Men".
Keep me in your heart until I return.

" We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm. "
George Orwell

Copyright 2006 J. M. Revells

A Christmas story I wrote a while ago.

"A Lump of Coal"

It was Christmas Eve a couple of years ago, I had been having a rough time, I was at a bar on the way home to drown my sorrows. The job was a bitch; with a boss who thought he was King; my son had hit the Terrible Twos with a vengeance; my baby girl had the colic and my wife was in the throws of another bout of Postpartum Depression. In general I was feeling used and abused about my life.

I had stopped in the bar to steel myself for a less than perfect Christmas that was costing me more than I could afford, with the bill collectors already calling about the hospital bills that the company insurance didn't cover on the baby's birth. I had had first one double with a beer chaser then two more in short order, as I was finishing off the last beer the Bartender came over and put a black rock on the bar in front of me.

"What's that?" I asked.

"It's a lump of coal. I'm playing Santa tonight and you're about to be a very bad boy." he replied. "You are about to get in your car and drive home, right?" I admitted as much, he continued "You've had enough to make your
driving skills less than optimal. In fact, as an expert on drinking, I would say you're drunk. If you drive drunk you are likely to get more than a lump of coal."

"Yea, yea, just what I need a lecture on drunk driving from a bartender!"

I started to get up, when he touched my arm and said, "Yes, I give this lecture to any one that needs it this time of year, because of my brother. He stopped by here one Christmas Eve after his company Christmas party. He drove a coal truck and had one more load to drop before he went home for the night. He had a couple of more drinks with me as well. He was totaly sloshed when he got up to go. I knew he had had more than enough, but he said he was going right home after dropping his load up the street from my house. He said he had to do it or his boss would fire him.  They knew at work that he was drinking more than he should, they had warned him that his job was in jeopardy if he missed any more deliveries."

"I had to close the bar so he left. My wife had the VW, she and the kids were due to pick me up soon.  We were going to spend Christmas Eve with her folks. I had closed the bar and was waiting out front for her, she was always on time no matter what, when a cop car pulled up. They asked my name and if my brother was a driver for the Coal Company. When I said yes, they asked me to come with them, that he had been involved in an accident."

I could see the tears in his eyes as he continued, "They took me to the truck, it was stopped in front of my house. As we pulled up to the back of the truck the first thing I saw was my brother sitting on the curb crying.
When he saw me he just started to say he was sorry over and over. The next thing I noticed was some metal the color of my VW sticking out from under the dump truck." 

"My wife and kids were dead. They told me my brother hadn't seen her because he was too drunk. He was speeding up the street when my wife pulled out of the driveway.  He pled guilty to manslaughter  and committed suicide shortly after being released from jail-he just couldn't forgive himself."

"I found this lump of coal on my lawn, it is part of the load he was delivering when he killed them."

"May I call a cab for you? It will be my Christmas gift." he asked. I took that cab ride. My problems didn't seem so bad after what he had told me. My wife was surprised when I came home in the cab. She was amazed that
I gave her such a big hug then spent the rest of the evening playing with the kids. Later that night she asked why, so I told her about the bartender's lump of coal. We were both in tears by the end.
 
The day after Christmas I had to go get the car for work Monday, so I went in to say thank you to the bartender. After I described him to the other bartender, I asked when he would be in again, the guy looked at me
strange. "Never, my Uncle left me the bar when he died some twenty years ago." I left the bar wondering.

Copyright 2000
Revised 2013
JM Revells

Some times my thought keep turning back to another time and place

Well it's Autumn here in New Hampshire, the trees have finally turned into the riot of color that brings people from all over the planet to see the leaves change.  It's the best time of the year to be here, but I find my mind is wandering back to the first maple trees I remember seeing.  It was when living on Boscabal Street in Nashville.  There were two huge maple trees in the front yard that provider amazing color in the fall.  They were part of my life and I remember them well.  Last time I was in Nashville I went by to check on them and they were still there.

In the spring and summer there would be giant garden spider webs stretching from the lower branches to the ground.  In the early morning hours the dew would create a kaleidoscope feel to the sun shining though them. 

Out back of the house next door was a commercial smokehouse that did hams and sausages; you could smell the hickory smoke all over the neighborhood. 

Most falls Granny would have my Uncles and us kids take all the leaves and pile them on this flower bed in the back yard.  We would take and bury a bunch of potatoes a couple of inches in the dirt then place all of the cast iron cookware in the leaves just before we set them on fire.  The cast iron would be cleaned out,  ready to re-season and all of us would have baked potatoes smothered in butter standing around the ashes of the fire.  It was a wonderful way to spend a brisk fall day.

The smells of autumn were wonderful as well!  The hickory wood from the smokehouse mixing with the smell of the oak wood and coal burning in the fireplaces of the houses and the leaves burning in the yards all on a crisp clear fall day.  It makes me want to go back.

A little traveling music please?

Since this Blog is supposed to have information on traveling and what to do on your trips I guess I should tell something about my last trip.  Wish I had had a trip recently, but I haven't, so how about a little information on the area I now live and work in?

The Upper Valley of the Connecticut River is comprised of the towns around White River Junction, VT Hanover and Lebanon, NH.  There are some great places to visit all around here.

Today I think I will talk about White River Junction (http://www.whiteriverjunction.org/).  The name is derived because it was a major train junction at the intersection of the White River and the Connecticut River. It is a strange little town.  It struggles with it's identity like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.  When you get off of I-91 at Exit 13 you see it's nature spread out before you.  Some industrial bleak and some high culture. If you go west you come to a plethora of moderate to high end hotels on the south side of the road across from the stately old buildings of the Veterans Hospital.  Even there it is a struggle between the upper end motels and the low end. There is a gas station and liqueur store just up the street before the turnoff to the modern Aquatic Center (http://uvac-swim.org/swimming/).  Going to the east off the exit brings you to North Main Street which goes down to the main part of town.  Immediately at the exit are a few places to eat and get gas. I am not a huge fan of China Station, a buffet restaurant, but it is inexpensive.  If you turn onto Sykes Mountain Avenue just down the street past the McDonald's you will come to the Cross Roads Cafe.  It's food is good over all and worth a stop if you don't want the usual fast food stop while traveling.  A little further down is  a place I really enjoy.  I must admit it is owned by a friend of mine, Sing.  The Taj-E-India (http://taj-e-india.com/) is a takeout only and catering place.  It serves Indian and some Chinese food.  You can order it as hot/spicy as you like and, unlike many places in New England get it spicy.   I highly recommend this place.

Going back to Main Street you will come to an interesting place to visit the Tip Top Cafe (http://www.tiptopcafevermont.com/) and the other shops located in the same building and nearby are upscale and diverse.  You can get antiques; make a stained glass window; have a costume made; bind a book; fire a pot; or dance the night away at the nearest thing to a club kid scene the Upper Valley offers.  Further down the street are a couple of day restaurants that do breakfast and lunch.  I have not tried either the Tucker Box or the Polka Dot Dinner nor Bo Ho's.  In the same block of buildings are the Hotel Coolidge (http://www.hotelcoolidge.com/about/index.html) an old Railroad hotel; the Northern Stage Theater (http://northernstage.org/), which brings Broadway Shows to our area, and a number of artsy or funky shops.  Near by on South Main Street is the Center for Cartoon Studies (http://www.cartoonstudies.org/) an internationally recognized art school.  Further dawn the street is a fine dining establishment called Elixir (http://www.elixirrestaurant.com/) and a music venue called Tupelo Music Hall (http://www.tupelohallvermont.com/) which also functions as a dance club called Club 188 on some of the nights that there is no concert offered. 

Bridge Street takes off from North Main just as it turns into South Main.  along this street you can visit one of two museums in town, if it is still open, or get a yoga lesson.  The Main Street Museum (http://www.mainstreetmuseum.org/) is an eclectic mixture of art and taxidermy displayed in an old Fire House, it also host an occasional evening of local music.  Just off of Bridge Street is Depot Street where the second museum is located.  The Rail Road Museum (http://cvrr.railfan.net/glorydays/pages/allaboard.html) is located at the Am Track Station and has a real steam engine as part of it's display.  They also have a scenic railway that has special trips all year long, the Green Mountain Railroad (http://www.rails-vt.com/) it is a great alternative to leaf peeping from your car in all that traffic. 

Across the bridge on Bridge Street is Maple Street and if you follow it on out to Hartford, VT you will come across a nice little historic society and Big Fatty's Barbecue (http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/315/1420487/restaurant/Vermont/White-River-Junction/Big-Fattys-BBQ-Hartford) their barbecue is OK, but they are the only place in New England outside of a Cracker Barrel Restaurant that I have found fried okra!