One Saturday morning in late September 1967, i, as a fourth class officer candidate (OC) at the Navy’s Officer Candidate School (OCS) in Newport, Rhode Island. We had just completed our Saturday morning inspection and march on the parade grounds concluding with a pass in review. i wondered about the value of such regimen. That afternoon, i sat down and wrote this poem:

Magnificent Men Marching

magnificent men marching, marching
cadence bams the air;
regimen the compass point;
warfare learning fare.
magnificent men standing, standing
fit and pompous in your ranks;
green and growing
boys to military men,
a new dimension to your arsenal.
magnificent men tall and stately,
uniformed so proud;
don’t know where you’ll be going
yet ready for the call.

magnificent men commissioned,
saluting all the men
mother and father proudly nodding;
now you are now and they are then.
magnificent men departed
the parade ground desolate, cold and bare,
don’t look into the mirror:
you’re just you,
not magnificent at all.

This past Thursday, i was playing golf on the North Island Naval Air Station’s Sea ‘n Air course. The back nine winds around the south facing beach along the Pacific Ocean. The fourteenth and fifteenth holes looks directly at Point Loma across the channel into San Diego Bay. On the ridge of Point Loma is the Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. From my view, i could see the rows of basic headstones on the green grass sparkling in the Southwest corner sunlight.

The initial words of the following poem came into my head. i thought about how, over near sixty years, twenty-two plus years of Navy service, ten ships, and incredible time at sea, had changed my perspective:

Magnificent Men at Parade Rest

magnificent men at parade rest,
all in perfect rows in formation
on the ridge of green
looking down upon the channel
to the pacific;
they lie beneath that green
and alabaster tombstones
just like their brothers next to them
parade rest,
quiet,
at peace;
these truly magnificent men.

In the middle of my career, i spent two years as Chief Engineer, CHENG, or Engineering Officer of the USS Hollister (DD 788). It was an incredible, fun, interesting, and learning experience. It was as hard as any tour i had, and the responsibility weighed heavily upon me. It was my last destroyer tour. i split toured to an amphibious ship and never went back to the greyhounds of the sea.

The experience was invaluable.

It also had one of darkest periods during my service. It was called INSURV.

i believe the Board of Inspection and Survey (INSURV) came aboard in May. Admiral John Bulkeley had practically invented the board to inspect Navy ships to determine their fitness for full operations at sea. The inspection team was thorough and scary.

i was a brand new engineer, having spent all of my previous ship tours in weapons. My engineering department had just been designated a reserve ship when i arrived and my two master chief machinist mates, a master chief boiler tender, two senior chief machinist mates and one boiler tender senior chief had all been reassigned to other, active force ships. My engineering leadership consisted of one master chief boiler tender and first class petty officers. Shortly after i arrived in December 1973 and inspected my spaces and my equipment, i determined my goal was to get to our scheduled overhaul in September without missing a scheduled operation commitment.

The INSURV engineering team ripped me and my department apart for the maintenance and upkeep of our equipment. The scolding was deserved. There were a number of things we weren’t doing maintenance wise and one inspector took me under his wing and explained how we should be doing it.

i was devastated. It was the first real bad mark against my running a division or department. i was ashamed.

Much later in my career when i was conducting leadership seminars for senior officers, i discovered (through the help and guidance of my teammate Dave Carey) a study on outstanding leaders. The report noted those COs and XOs who didn’t quite make the grade of superlative looked upon inspections as pains, unnecessary evils. The superior bosses thought of those inspections as useful because they pointed out areas that could be improved and make their commands better.

i certainly wasn’t thinking of my INSURV making my engineering department better. i was in the survival mode. A boon was revealed when we had our first pre-overhaul planning conference. Surface Forces Pacific, our squadron material officer, and Supervisor of Shipbuilding (SUPSHIPS) attended. The INSURV had given me a perfect shopping list for all of the repairs that were required for the engineering department. It did make us better.

And it made me better as well. Over two years later, the USS Anchorage (LSD 36) experienced its INSURV inspection. i had cross-decked as first lieutenant. i was ready. The deck department past every aspect of its inspection and was given an outstanding grade.

first light:
the old mariner can sense it
because of hundreds of morning watches
stood on steel-decked bridges
beginning at 0345 when he announced “I have the watch and the con”
until 0730 when the watch relief showed up early
so the old mariner and his watch staff could eat breakfast
before officers call, quarters, and colors.

first light would vary, of course:
latitude and longitude have a bearing on such things
as well as weather
but
it comes as sure as day follows night
because
it is the harbinger of the change,
from. night to day.

first light comes subtly:
a new hand would not realize it was upon him
until it had flushed the sea
with grays or blues depending on the weather
while the stars vanished;
then it was too late
to shoot stars (in good weather)
but
the mariner would know,
have the quartermaster break out the sextant,
so the two could
stand on the bridge wing, port or starboard,
depending on the course, of course;
the mariner would shoot the stars
while the quartermaster logged the angles;
afterward, the two would huddle,
place the logged data into the forms
to arrive at the point where they really were
unless, of course,
the navigator deigned to wake up early
to shoot the stars himself.

the watch was accompanied by the aroma
of coffee, eggs, and bacon
wafting up from the mess decks
as  cooks and mess cooks had also risen early
to fix the morning mess
(which is why the old mariner found ways
to spend his time on the starboard bridge wing,
four decks above the galley);
standing there in the dark
with millions of stars and planets suffusing the sky;
he senses first light coming just before
the hint of change seeps onto the eastern horizon:
his world slowly waxes from dim to shades of grey,
about three-quarters of an hour before the orange ball
emerges from the eastern horizon
officially claiming sunrise: night for day.

Now five miles inland years later,
the mariner, now emeritus only,
will rise early,
not to stand the watch
but
perhaps because age heeds nature’s call
or
he just doesn’t sleep well after 0400 —
old habits of morning watches on the bridge —
he stands in the front room looking east,
drinking his coffee from his mug in the morning dark
as has been his habit for as long as he can remember;
he senses first light again,
watches the first inkling of grey
slink into the black of night;

after all, first light is still his favorite moment of the day.