All posts by Jim

A Tale of the Sea and Me – Palma de Majorca

Sea Stories

It was 52 years ago, and unlike when i wrote my book, Steel Decks and Glass Ceilings, i do not have the ship’s logs nor pretty extensive notes to give me exact dates. i’m pretty sure this liberty port was before our other liberty port was changed from Venice to Naples (naturally).

Regardless, it was my first time to visit the Spanish island of Majorca and its port city of Majorca. It is, i think, the second place i decided i should move to overseas after being out of port in Sasebo in 1970. But Majorca was more entrancing. Even now, i think i could live there.

i don’t remember a great deal of that week. i remember walking the streets of Palma with the old and beautiful buildings surrounding me. i remember stopping at a tapas bar and drinking sangria (a lot of sangria) with four or so of my sonar gang. i remember one other officer (i can’t remember who) driving around the perimeter of the island. It seemed about every five miles or so, there was a different European country had established that beach as their tourist spot. There was Spain, Holland, Britain, Germany, France, and on and on. i remember the difference in the bars at those spots. Mostly, i remember gaping at all the beautiful beach women who went topless.

i remember buying a lot of gifts, mostly leather in the shops in the Palma’s shopping district. On Yosemite, i went back ten years later. And all of memories were justified and then some.

Palma is a Mediterranean dream of an island. i would go back again.

Unexpected Pleasures

A Pocket of Resistance

Been a bad week. Nothing went right. The list is too long to include here. Nothing serious compared to what others i know are dealing with. Besides, if i enumerated on my problems, we all could call it whining from a curmudgeon.

It sent me to a dark place, i admit. While i toiled away at pursuits that would only expand the work to get it done. i chased paper, only to find more requirements required to finish the task. The internet and its maze of technicalities of which i’m not equipped taunted me. A project only important to me continued to hit speed bumps like a Maserati in a “quiet zone” neighborhood demonically designed to slow you down.

Then, Maureen and i mutually decided to abandon our plans to go to dinner at one of our favorite places because we just didn’t have the energy.

So i set up the dinner trays, and set up the napkins and silverware in preparation of our watching the Padre games later. i poured a Martin (thanks again, Mr. Fraser), added the olives and sat down. Rather than turning on the idiot box to watch biased and the really bad, un-objective news or something else before the game, i turned on the Bluetooth speaker and selected Andrea Bocelli’s “Ciel de Toscana.”

Our next door neighbors have heard my music collection many times because i play it on my iPhone and Bluetooth speaker when i am outside, at least daily. When we went out to lunch Salvatore commented, “Wow, you sure have a lot of different music. We even heard you listening to opera the other day.” i smiled and explained i had been a deejay back home and had gained an appreciation of most music genres.

Still, i was puzzled by his comment about opera. Finally, it occurred to me he had heard me playing Bocelli’s album.

i could go on and on and on about my music collections, preferences, and dislikes. Everyone has their own preferences in music. But that is not what i’m getting at here.

i only wanted to convey after being frustrated, a curmudgeon in a dark place, when i put Andrea Bocelli’s music on my bluetooth, i relaxed. Calmness ensued even while we watched a snippet of news and turned it off when it was too difficult to bear.

Thank you, Andre.

For the readers here, you might try it. i would recommend Enya also.