Faking It, Part 2
A story of our own expectations, by Ian, continued from Faking It, Part I.
This story was originally published on June 22, 2025.
That night a piercing ring shocked me from the depths of sleep.
I slap grabbed the phone and managed, “…Captain….”
“Sir, this is the Officer of the Deck. We had a pop-up contact on the starboard bow and we’re maneuvering to avoid.”
What time was it? One in the morning? “How close is it?” I asked with a voice like muddy gravel.
“Pretty damn close, sir.”
That woke me up. “I’m on my way,” I assured him, and threw the blankets aside.
This was it – the moment all captains prepare for. The panicked call from the Officer of the Deck, a dead sprint up two ladders, a focused rush into the pilothouse. Right full rudder! All engines back full! A hyper-focused, all-knowing, all-seeing, cool, calm, collected mariner channeling the days when ships were wood and sailors steel.
My feet hit the ice-cold floor and my fantasy fizzled around my shivering body, naked except for my boxers.
A few things went through my mind in a blink, which is incredible considering it had been dead to the world not ten seconds before. My reptile brain screamed for my stupid human body to move. My human brain, still waking, said people will see you in your underwear. The drowsy reptile said fine, hurry up and throw on some clothes. The human agreed and ordered my body to dress.
My body moved like a sloth grasping for a branch just out of reach. I could not simply throw on some clothes, and it didn’t help that I lurched with leaden limbs in an unfamiliar, moving, pitch-dark room.
I groped at walls where I thought I hung my coveralls, struggled to find where to slip in my legs, tried to balance on one foot while shoving the other one in, listed and capsized with a smack onto the rolling and pitching deck, scrabbled along the floor to grab my boots, and searched for the door scratching at the aft bulkhead like a blind rat.
I arrived on the bridge about ninety seconds later. A small fishing boat about two hundred yards off the bow turned away as our heading swung right, our range opening and the OOD panting wide-eyed on the bridge wing. Pretty damn close indeed.
I could have excoriated him for not calling me sooner, about why he didn’t see the boat on radar, or better yet with his own eyes on such a clear night. Even if he really didn’t see it, he should have ordered an online start of an engine on the trailing shaft and an emergency backing bell. There was no reason a ship as maneuverable as Johnston should have been in that situation. I could have laid the verbal smackdown, and hard.
But I could not make myself do it. I felt far more shame than anger. I’ve seen captains get to the bridge within ten seconds of a phone call far less urgent. And I knew that if the OOD says, “I need you on the bridge,” chances are they needed me five minutes ago and now things are really in the shits. He needed me right away and I stranded him for what seemed an eternity so I could – what? – save my dignity? Was my dignity worth smashing a small boat to pieces in the middle of the night?
I could make all kinds of excuses about what happened that first night as an underway captain, but one thing stuck out: My skill did not save us. Luck did.
From then on, I slept in a t-shirt, sweatpants, and socks and kept my slip-on boots right next to the door.
During that first week underway I rode wild swings from benevolent demigod to abject failure. There was the freedom and exhilaration of wind tussling my hair on the bridge wing at sunrise, fresh coffee in hand. And also the ever-present spotlight exposing all my flaws, highlighting each unmet expectation.
At times a single word from me would spark miracles. One night, when Doc reported a case of appendicitis affecting one of our sailors, a single phone call to OPS got him a MEDEVAC off the ship and in the hospital within two hours. I barely had to move. A captain could easily feel god-like with that kind of power.
At other times it was quite the opposite. On our second day underway, the oiler cancelled our at-sea refueling because their rudder failed – our fuel tanks stood at 62% capacity with no opportunity to refuel for the next month. We had to turn off the engines at night and bob around in the ocean to conserve every drop of gas we could. What if a fishing boat chose those nights to come “pretty damn close”? In those moments, the world conspired to remind me that I was but a small, weak sack of flesh ever at the mercy of greater, crueler forces.
And there were those times when my god-like power made me the great, cruel force.
This is a fictional post based on true events.
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