I rarely wear a jacket and slacks these days, haven’t bought a dress shirt in more than five years, but Friday last I put on my very best, tucked four old black and white photos in my shirt pocket and set sail for HMCS Nonsuch on Kingsway.
A ‘meet and greet’ was under way for sailors old and new to celebrate the 100th anniversary of our Royal Canadian Navy. It was called the Naval Service of Canada on May 4, 1910 and renamed Royal Canadian Navy on Aug. 29, 1911.
My old uniform, if I still had it, wouldn’t have fit but I’d have been proud to again wear my bell bottoms, jersey, gun shirt, collar, silk and lanyard. I’d have whitened the web belt and gaiters as well, polished the brass and cut my hair — pusser (regulation). I remember a sub-lieutenant standing close behind while on parade, waiting for long seconds and then asking in a loud voice, ‘Am I hurting you?’ ‘No sir,’ I replied. ‘Well I bloody well should be, I’m standing on your hair.’ I was at the barber the next day.
At the door on Friday, I stop and put my feet together, like I would at the top of a gangway. This isn’t my old ship, just carries the same name. My ship is now a baseball field in Riverdale but her armaments are here, one torpedo and one deck gun. When I sign the guest book, I feel the need to produce my bona fides, four black and white pictures of a 16-year-old kid, in uniform, carrying a trumpet, standing in his parents’ living room almost 50 years ago. I was a reservist, no hope then of active service. Not so today, a substantial part of the ‘at sea’ navy is composed of those in the reserve.
Fellow columnist and poet, St. Albert resident Lt. (N) Tim Cusack is the executive officer on Nonsuch. He is a reservist, a high school vice-principal by day and father of three boys, a good friend and the one who made sure I came and brought the photos.
I met some ‘old salts,’ WRENS, (Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service) and several of the crew of the HMCS Edmonton in for this special visit. I talked with a few, shook a few hands but mostly I’m nursing a beer and then a neat rum (a tot) ladled by two former chief petty officers.
I show a few the pictures and tell fewer still that at 16, short months after the photos were taken, with the Cuban missile crisis in full bloom, I was advised I could be called up. We’d laughed on Friday night. I’d have been ashes before I could report to the ship.
The officers and crew of the Edmonton are fine men and women; we should be proud of them, they’re dressed in their whites, looking all tidy. The Edmonton is a coastal patrol vessel — modern, fast and manoeuvrable; she is a beautiful ship able to turn in her own length, at full speed dipping her bridge wings almost to the water. Her crew is more than 50 per cent reservists, they’ve been busy catching dope runners, gun smugglers and interdicting ships trying to smuggle people on our West Coast.
Met a nice young couple seeking guidance from the executive officer, both master seamen, marrying soon and thinking about their next career steps in the senior service.
When I’m driving home the navy’s motto comes to mind after all these years, ‘Ready Aye Ready,’ the truth still in those words.
Of course, maybe it’s just me.
Andy Michaelson is a St. Albert writer and poet.
