NAVY #11 NATO Med Cruise 99

After the birth of my daughter I drew orders to the USS Peterson DD-969, a Spruance Class Destroyer homeported in Norfolk, VA. I was excited about these orders. I had started out my Naval career on a Spru-Can, the USS Arthur W Radford DD-969, and I would be finishing it on a Spru-Can.

We were scheduled to deploy soon as the flagship of a NATO Taskforce. This was to be primarily a Wine and Cheese cruise where we would spend the large majority off our time in various ports showing the flag. You can't do any better than this. I had just won the Navy lottery. I had landed a genuine pleasure crusie, except for a little war going on in Kosovo. Why did it seem that every time I had something fun planned a war or something equally annoying had to pop up and get int he way?

Before we left on cruise, we had to do all the normal pre-deployment workup and training like making sure that we knew how to blow stuff up and when we accidentally set the ship on fire that we could put it out again. (That's an important skill to have).

In 1999, Navy ships were just starting to get email access. We didn't have individual accounts, instead each ship had an email address and all emails came into a central account and from there would be printed up and passed out to the recipients. It was an amazing technical advance that 10 years later looks like Fred Flintstone technology,

Having access to email meant that I could stay in contact with friends. I started sending out a mass email chronicling our trip. It was never intended to be anymore than what it was, just a running travel-log sent to a couple of pals, Instead, it began to be posted around the internet and forwarded around to others. As a result, I got to meet some new people and make some new friends, many who are still friends to this day.

What you are getting ready to read are those emails.

This first one kind of sucks. It's a typical letter home.
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5/20/99

Hey everybody,

Not much going on here. I just finished annual performance evaluations on ten of my people, effectively destroying their chances of ever being promoted, with nothing more than a No 2 pencil. The hardest part was saying "You Suck" in ten different ways. That's one of the bonuses of being in charge, being able to indiscriminately destroy careers and ruin lives on nothing more than a whim. I love power.

We are still out here floating around in circles. My wife sent me a box almost a month ago with a new CD player (mine committed suicide) and four cartons of cigarettes. I still haven't received it. I'm down to four packs of smokes. I originally brought seven cartons with me. If I should run out of cigarettes before her box arrives, I would advise all of you to stock up on canned food, bottled water, and head for a cave somewhere. I WILL start blowing shit up. I'm already starting to get nervous and tense.

Packages are taking an average of ten days to get here so if you are sending one, make sure you include enough water and goatchow in the box to keep your kids alive that long. Letters are taking an average of five days to get here, not than any of you have bothered to mail one, but my sweet grandmother from Lebanon, Tennessee (culture capital of the universe and world headquarters of Cracker Barrel restaurants) wrote me. She just turned 85 years old. My folks took her to Uncle Bud's Catfish Restaurant for her birthday for all-you-can-eat catfish. Grandma doesn't get out much except to go to church. Uncle Buds is a big deal for her. Hell, it's a big deal for us too. Grandma is doing fine. She had one of her cataracts cut off and is having the other eye done next month. Her blood pressure is doing a lot better although her legs pain her some. She's old and frail, and about half crazy, but I bet she could still kick some serious ass. Grandma has spent most of her life on a farm. Farm life ain't for pussies.

My sister is still single. She's the smart one of the family. The contract for her software job in Knoxville is about up. She was starting to sweat not having anything else lined up because her major fear in life is growing up to be just like me. She just got word that Microsoft is interested in her. She has an interview with The Great Satan for a possible position as Junior Souless Demon in charge of Microsoft Customer Service coming up. Wish her luck.

Mama and Daddy are doing fine. Daddy is building houses and burying the bodies just as fast as he possibly can. Mama is just being Mama, taking care of the clan, making sure we are all saying our prayers, brushing our teeth, taking our Flintstones chewable vitamins and keeping daddies bidness all on the straight and narrow with the bank and IRS.

My brother Tim is working his ass off. He has about 15 jobs, His significant other, my fag-in-law, John is doing the same. All of you homophobes out there should hang around my brother and John for about a week. I've never met two people who are more loving. Not to each other, they fight like most married couples do, but the way they are loving towards other people is a sight to see. They take care of strays. Stray dogs, stray people, stray anything. They help the elderly, the sick, single moms, our parents, our grandparents, anyone they see who needs help, they help. They would literally give you the shirt off their back if they thought you needed it. The cool thing is that they do it because they think it's the right thing to do. They don't do it for any type of compensation, reward, or even praise. They do it because it needs to be done. I'm proud of them.

My wife Alesia is doing okay. It's really easy for her to get angry at me because shit's falling apart while I'm gone. The baby requires most of her time, the landlord is a semi-dick, the drapes need to be hung, the lawnmower won't start, our son needs help with his homework, the car needs tuning up, the water-heater's broke, and I should be there to help her do it. This is our first six month cruise since we've been together. She's actually being a real trooper about it. She's proving that she doesn't need me, she just want's me. I miss her. She's my bestest friend.

My son Marc is just about to turn 15. I remember when I was fifteen. I wonder if I can lock him in a closet until he turns 25? that was a very hard ten years for me. If he tries even half the shit I tried, I'm going to kick his ass. I miss him a lot. He's being a big help to his mama.

Baby Becca has learned how to roll over. Alesia says that you can put her down on one side of the room and before you can completely turn around, she's already at the other side. She's also started eating rice cereal. She's tried baby vegetables but think they all suck. Like father like daughter. It feels like she'll be starting college before I get back. She turns 7 months at the end of the month.

Speaking of birthday's, My mom and wife recently just had a birthday. In fact, they both have the same birthday. I'm not going to tell you how old either of them are because they would kick my ass and quit sending me boxes.

As for me, I've been teaching myself a bunch of Steve Young songs on guitar and mandolin, giving an occasional guitar lesson here and there, chipping paint, making sure we don't get shot in the ass by a cruise missile, playing babysitter to 22 kids, trying to make sure that they are all well fed, semi-content, and kept busy. I'm doing paperwork, waving a monkee's paw over an electronics cabinet hoping voodoo with fix the sumbitch because nothing else I've tried has, listening to some music, waiting for mail to arrive, writing letters, and doing damn near anything else I can do to stay busy and make the time go by quicker.

I have 376 days left until retirement. This is my last med cruise or deployment, my last war (hopefully), my last ship, and my last year in the Navy. I can't tell you how much I long to be surrounded by limestone, cedar trees, and red clay mud. Yes, if possible, and I can find a job, I'm going back to Tennessee. Which is kind of funny seeing as how I joined the Navy to get the hell out of Tennessee.

I don't know anything about the war other than seeing the occasional jet or cruise missile fly overhead. Those of you with CNN know far more than I do. I have heard that we are supposed to go back to Italy somewhere for four days. I just don't know where and I don't know when. Probably the same place we visited before. I have also heard rumor that the ship is supposed to visit Barcelona, Spain sometime this summer. If you have any twang contacts in Barcelona, let me know.

If I have your mailing address, I've sent you at least one lovely postcard from our little pleasure cruise. I might of also written you a genuine, hand written letter that gets delivered by a postman and everything (remember those?) If you want on the postcard mailing list to receive postcards,(offer no longer valid) email me with a snail mail address.

Sorry this letter ain't that funny. It's just a basic update on my life. There's big goings on here on the proud ship Peterson that I'll inform you about in a few days. Until then, God bless.

Jeff