Earlier I mentioned how destructive salt is to the ship’s exterior, so it was a joyous day indeed when our long-awaited order of paint arrived. During the preceding two months I had seen the mood of my staff captain go from downcast to downright ugly as the ship’s shiny well-kept appearance transformed itself into a grubby one, with more rust spots appearing every day on her hull and superstructure. Finally, he could paint and restore the ship’s beauty.
Looking down onto the dock from where I was standing on the bridge wing, I saw him hopping around several pallets stacked high with buckets of several colors of paint. Even from several hundred feet up, I could see his excitement. That very morning he’d shown me a stack of emails, each promising that the delivery, after several failed attempts, would reach the ship that day. I fervently hoped so, because I had the distinct impression that he was capable of harming himself if it didn’t!
His hair was in disarray when he barged into my office a half hour later.
“I can’t believe it!” he yelled, way too loud for the small space.
“Whoa, calm down. What happened?”
“They sent me every order in full! The idiots!”
I sat back. “So what’s wrong with that? You ordered it, didn’t you?
“Yes, but since they always cut every order in half, I ordered double! There’s no way I can store all that paint in the locker! You know how small that place is.”
I had to admit he was right. Looking down from the bridge at all that paint, I hadn’t made the connection that we’d have to store it all in the tiny locker we called the paint store.
“Maybe you should start painting the hull right away. That should take care of some of it.”
“Yes, he sighed, “but not nearly enough. It’s always feast or famine, but you’re right. I’ll start the painting tomorrow.”
The next day we were docked in the Anna Bay in Willemstad, Curacao. It was beautiful and sunny, and I smiled as I watched the sailors busily painting the whole side of the ship. Opened pails of paint littered the dock. Since it was such a perfect day, I decided to take a stroll on the dock to show the sailors that I was interested in their job. Walking to the gangway, I ran into Mrs. Carmain, one of the very, very few of our guests we wouldn’t mind seeking a cruise with any of our competitors. Her constant complaints alternating with implied lawsuits were a drain on our moods. Expecting another earful of issues, I braced myself.
It was a pleasant surprise when she actually smiled at me. I looked from her face down to a package she was holding with both hands. It was wrapped in the morning’s newspaper, but why was it so stained and dripping with grease? For a change, an almost apologetic look came to her face.
“They love them, the darlings, and they’re so hungry. Hope you don’t mind, they’re just hamburgers. You know, they never get them in this terrible place.”
Maybe it was because my brain could hardly cope with Mrs. Carmain’s sudden friendliness or because I was more than happy to leave her in a friendly mood for once that I nodded.
“That’s quite alright, Mrs. Carmain, I admire what you’re doing.” Then I turned around and quickly jogged down the gangway ahead of her. If she wanted to take hamburgers to some orphanage, that was fine with me. On the dock I found the chief watching his sailors paint. He had a satisfied look on his face.
“With a little luck, we’ll be able to do the whole side. We started right after we arrived. Doesn’t she look good now?”
I had to admit she looked great. The ship had gone from grubby to shiny, just the way a cruise ship should look.
“Tomorrow we’ll start with the superstructure. He turned around quickly, “Hey, what are you doing?” His sudden yell startled me, and I saw the subject of his concern. A sailor guiltily jumped to his feet while one of the many stray dogs that populated the dock ran away at the chief’s sudden bellow.
“I saw what you were doing!” the chief hollered. “You painted that dog’s feet white!” Frantically, he looked around to find the white-pawed dog, but instead his eyes popped even more when he saw another one.
“What happened to that one? It’s covered with pink dots!”
“It’s boottop, sir.”
Another ashamed sailor came forward. “We all did it.”
Speechless, the chief looked around and saw a zebra-striped dog crossing in front of him, followed by a mongrel proudly displaying the company logo in bright green on his side.
Suddenly, all the dogs spied a single figure coming down the gangway. It was Mrs. Carmain carrying her leaky package.
“Oh, my God!” I heard the chief mumble. “She’s been feeding them hamburgers all morning!”
He more quickly anticipated the things to come than I did, and he grabbed my arm. “We’d better disappear. Quick! Inside this shed.”
Before I could collect my thoughts, he pushed me into a decrepit building, once used to store freighter cargo but now waiting to be renovated into a cruise terminal. Just as we disappeared into the shadows, I heard Mrs. Carmain’s frantic scream and, peering around the corner, I saw that she’d dropped the package of hamburgers onto the dock and now she was trying to fend off the dogs. They were all small scrawny things, and their paws, painted in various colors, added multiple shades to the rather plain design of her skirt and blouse. The effect, in my opinion, was not altogether unpleasant, although I doubted she would agree.
Suddenly my cell phone started ringing. It was the hotel director.
“You should come to the bridge and look down onto the pier. You won’t believe what’s happening!”
Scanning the ship’s side, I saw him at his office window looking at the spectacle on the dock.
“The bridge? Man, I’m inside the shed on the pier watching it up close! Get down here as fast as you can and get her inside. If she sees me, I’ll get all the blame for letting her bring hamburgers off the ship.”
His face disappeared but it did take him a good twenty minutes to get to the gangway. I had no doubt that he didn’t look forward to facing Mrs. Carmain either. The fact that he knew that the chief officer and I were hiding in an uncomfortably hot and dirty shed on the pier must have played a big role too in his slow reaction.
It also took quite a few minutes for him to convince her to come with him inside, while at the same time he was careful to stay at a good distance from the painted lady. Finally they walked up the gangway, Mrs. Carmain all the while loudly reciting a choice list of lawyers and company executives she would contact and who she would sue. Her threats weren’t idle ones, because an aggressive-looking gentleman presented himself at the gangway a few hours later, armed with a camera. No, he didn’t want to talk to anyone. He was looking around to photograph evidence.
The dogs, of course, were still there, and he did take lots of photos, but all the painted paws, stripes, polka dots, and company logos had vanished. Frustrated, Mrs. Carmain’s photographer left after an hour of fruitless searching.
The chief gave a huge sigh of relief. “Glad he didn’t get too close to any of those dogs. With all that turpentine, they smell like walking paint stores.”
Despite all her threats, Mrs. Carmain remained a faithful passenger whom I’ve met many times over. She never knew that her ruined blouse was framed by the carpenter and hung as a trophy in the bosun’s store!
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