Glad to be Aboard Point Defiance

Watch #5

There are some things to be said about a sailor's ship.  First, you have feelings for it, all gray and metal that she is, and there will always be some things that you liked and didn't like but my friend from Pawhuska, Oklahoma, Bobby Green, who was a submarine sailor said that it's hard to understand the love a sailor has for his ship and especially for his first ship.  For many years, I had nothing I could wear that said I had been in the navy, let alone aboard the USS Point Defiance.  In 1997 I saw an old sea dog at the airport in Albuquerque, New Mexico with a blue ball cap on his head that proclaimed his ship information and I asked him about it.  Then I hunted a store and bought a cap similar to his but I was not comfortable with the cap.  In 2008, I found a source at www.soldiercity.com and I purchased the hat that appears in the photograph in this watch.  I ordered it in red, my favorite color, and I ordered a softer, lie down time of material, with which I am quite pleased.  I now have one in blue, green and a khaki and I surprised Bobby Green last year with a cap for his first ship, The USS George Washington (SSBN-598).  Now that I have a source for some of these things I shop on line there and I buy some things, such as my caps and then a Navy T-shirt in blue, which a photograph of it is posted on Watch #4.  I have always been proud of my service in the navy, always been proud to say that I was a sailor and that I was aboard the Point Defiance.  The truth is that some ships have names you're not sure you want on your shoulder patch but I loved the sound of Point Defiance from the moment I saw my posting and then had orders in my hand.  I did not know what to expect of her as the LSD meant nothing to me, but once aboard, and once I stood at some distance and looked at my ship, I was proud of her; of her name, of her look and the men aboard that I barely knew.  I was learning their names and some things about them.  Like any good radarman I had hoped for a destroyer because the rumor is that a destroyer is where our skills are best exercised.  But I found myself aboard a Dock Landing Ship, an LSD, and then, and even more so now, I was glad to be aboard the Point Defiance.

More on the next watch.

Stevie Joe Payne