But as an enlisted man I really was not exposed much to Latin, other than what we might read in the POD on occasion. I did not mean to disparage the Wardroom in reference to talk other than English. And always had a special feeling for the sea. I did spend the majority of my Navy career looking out at the sea some time during the day nearly everyday. I might also explain that I was never stationed on a Submarine until I was eligible to put in my papers. I took one of my Grand Sons to visit the tall ships here in Charleston harbor and after he managed the gangway and was standing near the rail looking out over the harbor he said “Papa it feels like the water is pulling me to it.” I told him that is why I spent most of my working life on the water, because it did the same thing to me. I still live on a Sea Island here in South Carolina. I was raised in Colorado but have not been back there except to visit for over 50 years. And within the last few years that same kind of feeling has returned, but it is due to infirmities now. You are right about old nautical myths and actualities too, for many years I never felt I could walk straight on dry land. What is an old Sailor to expect? Was it all a myth or was there truth in the thinking and expressing? I had no Idea that he had stolen the thought from Odysseus and that has left me between Scylla and Charybdis since the day I found out. He said when he retired he was going to go down to supply with an approved salvage chit, which would allow him to draw an anchor from Navy salvage, then he would head directly inland carrying that anchor on his shoulder, and, he said, when someone asked him what that was he had on his shoulder he was going to throw it down, right there, and that is where he was going to spend the rest of his life. My first leading Petty Officer of Fox Division on the USS Manchester (CL 83) back in 1954 told the sea story of his upcoming retirement. But I did believe it was vitally necessary to sail, and I still do. I never really had much time to learn the niceties of ward room talk, I was never asked to leave but when the Assistant Weapons Officer was grinning I got the clue that I should vacate because I did not understand any Latin.
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