Saturday, December 19: Home at Last

So. Some answers to the obvious questions. First, did I have a good time? Yes and no. I loved the travel at sea; it agrees with me. Being away from the chaos of our current world is quite soothing, the sea spread out all around me clear to the horizon, the ocean ancient and eternal, disturbed only by the ship’s wake, a trail of white foam churning out behind. And some of the people I met (despite my rather graphic descriptions of them) were, in the end, really nice. I will have fond memories of them, especially Lise and Libby, Mariella, and the Millers. But I found being a gentleman host not easy for me. As I’ve already said, it’s a very schizoid role and switching back and forth each day between being a guest and being a host required a psychological agility not natural to my personality. Furthermore, some of the Solos were just awful, vested as they were in their ego and their status. As the cruise continued, the initial veneer of pleasantry began to wear off and these ugly, embedded traits became more obvious. This one didn’t want to sit at a table with that one. That one wouldn’t sit at a table of more than six. No, I don’t want to sit at that table; we sat there last night. No, the seamstresses shouldn’t be involved with the Solos; they’re workers, not guests. They shouldn’t have meals with us. Don’t put her next to me; she’s boring. You get the picture. Although this chore of dividing up the group (in the end, of about 20) for dinner became increasingly difficult, I enjoyed trying to meet their sometimes conflicting demands. After all, it was simply management, like much of my career. If I could manage a company, I thought, I can manage this. And I grew to love the social aspects of the job: saying hello or good morning or good evening to everyone I met, smiling all the time, steering conversations away from controversial topics. But, oddly, I didn’t love the dancing. Sasha and Olena taught in international style, which meant starting the rumba on a different beat and a different foot, or waltz with only left turns. And I was unprepared for salsa and tango. The routines were complicated and the music often too fast. Each day, we had lessons in a different dance, which meant never really nailing anything down. I never did get that routine in quick step. As a result, this made my major responsibility difficult and I often felt inadequate, not a happy combination. And dancing every night from eleven o’clock until midnight (when any sane person would be in bed) while making sure I wasn’t slighting anyone, became a definite chore. Now, let’s see; which Claudine have I neglected? Have I danced tonight with Margot (with the T)? I learned to adjust my dancing to the steps and skill level of my partner, often just really walking around the floor while Claudine #2 was twisting and turning and spinning like a crazy gyroscope. Still, I took the gig because I thought it would challenge me. And it did. So, in the end, I’m glad I did it.
But will I accept the offer to cruise again on the first leg of a world tour, from San Diego to Singapore? No. A clear and unequivocal no. First, it’s much too soon; the cruise begins in January. I need some time and distance before I might try this again. But more important to my decision to decline the offer is that Heinz is already scheduled to be the other host on that gig. Despite my best intentions and efforts to accommodate his Nazi personality, I just couldn’t go through that another time. I would never serve with Heinz again.
So would I go again? The past has taught me to never say, “Never.” But any future cruise where I was a host would have to go some place in the world I wanted to visit and there aren’t that many places left on my list. And, I would want to have a suite (read stateroom [read cabin]) of my own, a condition I doubt any cruise line will meet. So, no. I probably won’t be a host again.
Despite my emphasis here on the ordeal of my cruise, there are some aspects of it that I will remember, and miss. I will miss that great bacon at breakfast, the ripe papaya and the sweet pineapple. I will remember Henry, smiling at his table by the window in the morning and drinking his Southern Comfort Manhattan at the bar each night. I will miss the gorgeous sunrises at sea. I will remember Sasha’s giggle when he flubbed a dance lesson routine and his lead-up to a combination: “five-six, five-six-seven-eight,” just like in Chorus Line. I will miss Libby’s explosive laughter and the Dragon Lady’s upraised little finger. I will miss wine with dinner and always carrying my camera on my belt so I could capture those unexpected vignettes. I will miss Gabriele’s naughty imperiousness. I’ll remember how Claudine #2 liked to spin and twist on first one foot and then the other and how I tried to speak to her in my high school French. How do you say, “Put your weight on your left foot.” I’ll remember Cary’s telling me his name was Cary, “like Cary Grant,” he said. I’ll miss the waitress outside La Veranda, announcing the morning special through her braced teeth. I will remember that you can still belt it out at 81. I will miss my Neosporin. And I will never forget Heinz.
Returning home, in all that means, was never better, despite my now being buried in almost two feet of snow. My thanks to all of you who’ve followed my gentleman host experience – I hope I entertained you – and my best wishes for a happy holiday and a healthy and prosperous new year. Over, and out.

Friday, December 18: Flying up to Baltimore

Since we were scheduled to dock in Fort Lauderdale at 6:00 AM, I was up and on deck at 5:45. But there was no sun nor, in the east, any effort toward a sunrise. In the west, the lights of Fort Lauderdale dotted the distant horizon and Eberhardt, the hotel manager, was squishing his way around the wet deck in his regular morning jogging routine. In the distance, I could just see the ghostly form of another cruise ship ahead of us, its lights in straight lines along its decks, making its way into port, and I thought, as I so often do when I see an airplane in the sky, about all those people going home and what that means. “Going home,” the title of my book about my mother. Yes, I, too, was going home, moving along in an endless stream toward the future and going back, at the same time, to that other me, the one I left a month ago. My melancholy musing was interrupted by the lady from Ocean City who suddenly appeared beside me, bundled up, as always, in her cargo pants, her photographer’s vest and a floppy khaki hat, the strings hanging down around her chin, four or five cameras of various sizes and shapes all slung around her. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” she said.
I thought saying goodbye to those I’d met on the ship would be a simple process of a smile and a hug and a “when you come to Baltimore,” but I was surprised at the catch in my throat and the smarting of a tear or two when I parted from Libby and Lise and the Millers. And what, Phil, was that all about, I wondered? Had I grown to like them more than I knew? Did leaving them represent the universal separation from which I think we all suffer in life? Or was I simply sad at happiness? Poor Henry, I thought, sitting alone at breakfast with his western omelet, his A-1 sauce, his star ruby and his gold and diamonds, going on and on, from one cruise to the next, moving back and forth through the Panama Canal for the umpteenth time. What kind of life is that? In my suite, I looked around to be sure I hadn’t forgotten anything and left without even saying goodbye to Heinz, who was busy elsewhere on the ship, his shiny metal suitcase with yellow stripes (like a yellow-jacket) and his black leather coat on the floor beside his bed. How appropriate, I thought, with a slight pang of guilt at being rude.
All passengers had been asked to gather in the theater and only go ashore when their color, coded to their luggage tags, was called. But after a month (or more) of leisure ease, many reverted to their otherwise herd behavior and crowded the gangway, rushing to be among the first ashore. It was so confusing that the customs officials stopped the process, delaying the rest of us. While we were waiting, Loraine tried to entertain us by showing the morning news on the movie screen but the news was all bad and the information about the massive snow storm about to blanket the east coast only made everyone, including me, more eager to be on our way. And the sound was out of synch with the motion so the lips of the newscasters moved to words we were yet to hear. Not a good sign.
When I finally got ashore, I couldn’t find my luggage in the mass of bags in customs. I tried not to panic but it wasn’t a good omen. Finally, a porter helped me find them, tucked way in the back, in the wrong color area. I passed customs without having to open anything, the customs official saying to me, “Have a nice trip back to Baltimore, Mr. Cooper.” That touch of humanity was very welcome. I waved good bye to Merriella who, with her purchase on the ship of a $2700.00 Judith Lieber bag shaped like a triangle, was being held up while she paid the necessary taxes. In the bus to the airport, people got very impatient with the dispatcher who insisted on waiting “just a few minutes more” for the doctor and his wife who never did appear. And the bus driver instead of taking us to departures on the upper level insisted on taking us to arrivals at the bottom where there was mass confusion in the rain. He finally let us all out at one stop and we had to schlep our luggage half a mile to a check-in counter. A tired and desultory AirTran employee checked me in and, as expected, my luggage was overweight. I had to pay more for the extra bag and the extra weight than the price of my ticket. By then, I didn’t care. Just get me home please.
In the line for security check, I ran into Marilyn May, the ancient cabaret singer from the ship who, with her carefully coiffed hair and fake eyelashes, was on her way to Kansas City for yet another gig. She looked great for 81. And I let her know I thought she was an inspiration, in many, many ways. The flight was delayed and I just prayed it wouldn’t be cancelled because of snow. I toyed with the idea of taking an earlier flight but gave it up at the thought of having to be “voluntarily separated” from my luggage, which would mean going back to the airport in Baltimore to retrieve it once my regularly scheduled flight arrived. The airlines will now do anything to try to improve their bottom line. The two and a half hour flight seemed endless and it was very cold in the plane. Blankets, of course, are only available at an additional price. I’ve gone, I thought, from the sublime to the ridiculous. I was relieved to find Freedom Service waiting for me at BWI and I got home just in time to dump my luggage in the living room and rush off to Eddy’s for some groceries before the store closed. As so often happens when snow is forecast, the shelves were almost bare. I got the last of the eggs, one of the last quarts of milk and the very last loaf of bread. I really didn’t care what kind it was. Peanut butter covers a multitude of sins.
So. Now for the questions. Did I have a good time? Will I accept the invitation to join the world cruise? Would I do this again? But enough for today. Stay tuned, for the answers. Tomorrow.

Thursday, December 17: Late in the Day

This will probably be my last communication from the ship. I’m packed, except for what I have to wear this evening and the clothes I’m now wearing, which will most probably have to be jammed into my carry-on. While I haven’t bought anything bulky, dirty clothes always seem to take more room than clean ones. And I have a lot of dirty clothes. Tomorrow morning, I leave the ship early so probably won’t have a chance to bring this up to date, which I can do when I get home. Some summary is probably in order.
I had morning duty at the Coffee Connection where, sitting alone at a far table, I had an opportunity to take one long last look at this population. I’ve probably not said before that I’m surprised by the age and infirmities of so much of it. There are many people in wheelchairs, some electric, and some on canes and many, like Henry, too proud to signal their infirmities with devices and need help just moving from place to place. I suppose it’s really true that a luxury cruise like this one is about the same price as a good nursing home but a lot more fun. And the elderly feel safe here, nestled in the breast of good food, good service and a hospital on Deck 3. Getting off an elevator, I overhead someone say, “I don’t know whether I’m going up or down.” Someone on the elevator said, “There’s a lot of that around here.”
At the opposite end of the spectrum are the women traveling alone, of a certain age, some looking for a man, preferably rich and handsome. Marcy’s sister came into the Coffee Connection this morning, slumping along on her cork heels like a cheetah, her eyes focused on any possible prey. She gnawed on her yogurt and Raisin Bran before giving up and slinking away to another deck.
I had coffee with John, the Bridge instructor, whom Marcy’s sister eyed hungrily before abandoning. He has a red face, the squinty-eyed smile of a lecher and vodka breath that would knock you over. He and his wife, Mel (yes, his wife), are off the ship tomorrow and to Ft. Meyers where they have a home. After Christmas, they’re off on another cruise, with yet another one lined up behind that one. They make their living traveling and teaching people to play Bridge, an occupation that has occupied them for eight years. I can’t imagine.
Gabriele stopped by to thank me for dancing with her last night in the Voyager Lounge. We had gathered there for cocktails and I was putting together the tables for dinner when she grabbed me from behind and dragged me onto the dance floor for a rumba. She said she was meeting friends for dinner and it was time for her to go but the later she was, the grander her entrance. What am I doing here with these people?
Libby had breakfast at the Solo table in La Veranda where she ate with Heinz and Shirley. She told me Shirley said she didn’t like dancing with me because of my ugly shoes. I couldn’t help but wonder if she feels I can’t dance properly in them – I’ve had no trouble – or worries about what others will think of her when she’s dancing with a man wearing what she considers to be ugly shoes. And I wonder when she’ll return the Neosporin I gave her for her blister. Not!
In my packing, I found two hangers missing from my luggage, the kind that fits it perfectly? I can only wonder what happened to them. Meanwhile, Heinz has stopped talking to me except when I ask him a direct question. No matter. We’re through with each other.
Would I do this again? Will I accept the invitation for the 47 day segment of the world cruise? More on that when I get home. Stay tuned.

Wednesday, December 16: It's Time to Get off this Ship

When I went to bed about midnight last night, the entertainment crew was schlepping hefty, well-worn cartons out onto the atrium floor. When I came down to the computer room this morning, the atrium had been transformed for Christmas, with garlands and bows everywhere. Most of the public spaces – the restaurants, the theater, the lounges – have lighted Christmas trees. The one in La Veranda even lists to one side, appropriate, I thought for a tree on a ship.
On the door to my suite (read stateroom [read cabin]), in the slot where we receive all communications, I found a preliminary statement that, on examination, showed that all of Heinz’s charges had been posted to me. Wonderful! I gathered together the slips I’d retained from my clothes’ trips to the laundry and tried to straighten this all out at the reception desk where I’d left an imprint of my Visa card. They couldn’t follow my simple arithmetic – these charges add up to, and my laundry credit is – so I put it all in writing and gave them a copy. (This morning – Thursday – I stopped at the desk and they seem to have arrived at my same conclusion. I owe $1.90.)
I had breakfast with Terry (the bookie from London) who told me that a proper English breakfast would include kedgeree, a Scottish concoction of flaked haddock and mashed potatoes, buttered and lightly baked, which sounded just awful. And, he said, the English frown on anything that might be covered with syrup, like French toast, waffles or pancakes. These are far too American. We also discussed English terminology for various situations and I learned that a minor official who’s insistent of some petty policy is known as a “Jobsworth,” which translates into something like “I have to enforce this because it’s what my job’s worth.” Don’t ask.
Jim, whom I described to you yesterday, was also at breakfast and once Terry left, he told me more about himself and his life than either you or I would ever want to know. Delivered in a thin grin, he described, in avid detail, his medications, his operations and his experiences with women here on the ship. Apparently there are two girls traveling together with one husband and when the husband is away, Karen and Kristen play. They torture Jim with lurid suggestions meant to tantalize him sexually. One of them (according to him, of course) asked him late one night if he wanted to stay at the bar with the other one, or go with her to the ladies room and watch her pee. It’s really time to get off this ship.
In dance class today we worked on the quickstep, a dramatic and swoopy dance that consumes large areas of dance floor. The Dragon Lady loved the drama of it all, the little finger of her left hand poised for effect, her head turned and tilted to the side – she told me one should never look at one’s partner – as though she were in a competition for the tango. She and her husband make an odd pair. She’s totally dramatic, about everything, and he’s totally placid, about everything, moving her through her routine (and maybe her life) with quiet servitude. “No, no,” she’ll say, as she corrects him while he just grins and bears it. Anne (who breathes superior air) concentrated so hard on the steps she couldn’t smile no matter how much I kidded her. And the French Claudines insisted on twisting away, swiveling on their chicly pointed shoes no matter what dance they’re doing. I had a lot of trouble with the routine, a combination of six different steps, without a clear rhythmic pattern. Some steps are slow and some are quick: “slo, qvik, qvik, slo, slo, slo, qvik, qvik; no, back on yo-ore left,” Olena would prompt me. Heinz knew the steps, of course, and his disgust at my inability to perfect the movements was more than obvious. Or maybe that’s all in my head. Or maybe not. While Sasha and Olena dance beautifully together – all Russian posture and distain – they don’t make good teachers. They try to teach too much in too short a time and when 11:15 rolls around, no matter where we are, they’re out of there.
Later in the day, I ran into Rozanne and Leon. He, who was lost, was found in the shower. Rozanne was apologetic for her strident insistence that the ship locate him and grateful to me for having tried to assist her.
Around the edges of dance classes – one in the morning and one in the afternoon – I tried to find something to do. I had finished the book I was reading, a bit of worthless Sidney Shelton froth where I knew from the beginning how it would end. I tried a Gwen Ifill lecture and although she’s very bright and makes a good impression as a speaker, she could have said in five minutes what took over an hour. And the questions from the audience – “What’s Michelle really like?” – were painful. I abandoned Gabriele in the balcony and went back to my suite (read stateroom [read cabin]) for a welcome nap.
At cocktails, Heinz got the pick of the Solo litter and I, as usual, got stuck with the rest: Libby (the talent manager), Terry (the bookie). Wanda (the costume seamstress) and her daughter, Cathy. I didn’t really mind; I like them all. But it became obvious that Terry has moved in on Cathy – people treat each other differently once they’ve been to bed together – and that Wanda disapproves. She sat sternly over her chateaubriand, which she cut up into mouth-sized pieces before she ate any of it, glowering at her daughter across the table. Terry went blithely on, grinning broadly and telling Cathy stories of his bookie past, touching her arm occasionally in what seemed a gesture of possession. Cathy seemed mildly amused by his attention and when he said, “Well, my dear, we’ve had a go or two,” she smiled tolerantly. When the handsome grey-haired wine steward seemed to have forgotten us, she said he was mad at her. I commented that I had tried to get his attention but to no avail. She said, “What? Did you turn him down, too?” It’s time to get off this ship!
If you think AOL is difficult at home, try getting to your email here. It takes forever. And I seem to have to ask for the mail at least twice before any of it appears. Consequently, I haven’t been too loyal to email because I’ve wanted to save my computer time for the blog. But today, I finally retrieved some messages and found among them an invitation from the company that screens gentlemen hosts an invitation to join the first leg of a round-the-world whoop-de-do on this very ship, leaving in the middle of January. It embarks from San Diego and goes directly to French Polynesia, then on to Australia, Malaysia and finally, after 47 days, to Singapore. While I don’t think I want to repeat this experience, no matter where the ship might go, I was nonetheless complimented by being asked. Beverly and Tim, my new friends from London, thought I should say yes immediately, conditional on having a suite (read stateroom [read cabin]) all to myself. “Tell them you’re incontinent,” they said. But when I asked Heinz about his next gig, he told me he had accepted a position on this very cruise. Would I room with him again? No way. Goodbye Polynesia. I’ll have to visit you another time.
Lorraine, the cruise director, approached me at the captain’s farewell reception to tell me I had been doing a great job. I’m not just sure how she knows that, but she does have eyes in the back of her head and so sees everything. Although her official demeanor is always smiling and pleasant, I expect that underneath that mild exterior lies one very tough cookie.
Ron Shapiro stopped by on deck today to tell me that in his niece’s email to him, she said she’d heard the ship had lost an engine. The only way she could have known that, he surmised, was through reading my blog. I guess I have at least a few followers I haven’t met. Several people aboard, including Bev and Tim, have asked me for the blog address but I’ve told them it would be better to wait until I leave the ship. I’ve been pretty honest (and sometimes a little raw). I don’t want the Voyager to dump me short of Fort Lauderdale.
Rachael Carson picked the perfect title in “The Sea Around Us.” Sitting out on deck, contemplating the future, I could see how, with the sea all around us, early explorers might worry about sailing off the edge of the world. There is something very spiritual about all that water, as blue as the Microsoft tool bar on this page, but I can’t quite put my finger on it. Maybe later, at home, amid the mail and laundry, I can find the answer. It's time to get off this ship. Stay tuned.

Tuesday, December 15: San Juan

We arrived in San Juan right on schedule just as I was finishing my blog post for the day. Fortunately, we cleared immigration here rather than later, in Fort Lauderdale. Unfortunately, we had to stand in what seemed an endless line before we got our passports, which had been taken away from us when we boarded the ship, and made the perfunctory pass by the immigration officials. No one could go ashore until all had made this trip. It took several hours. During this time, two more cruise ships docked next to us, one of them a Princess behemoth with thousands of passengers. I have been to San Juan many times and not needing to visit it again, I decided to just make it a lazy day and stay aboard. Besides, it was very, very hot, so hot that later in the day, when I decided it was foolish to be here without going ashore, I left the ship, passed through the necessary check-points, reached the street and then with the prospect of exploring among thousands of tourists rapidly losing its appeal, turned around and came back.
Jim, from Los Angeles, joined me at breakfast. A very thin, nerdy-looking guy, about 45, with a thin mouth and thinning hair, he very early in the cruise latched onto Maryella and Marissa, who tell me he was eager to let them know how stud-ly and rich he is. His thin eyebrows are arched in a permanently querulous position and he swallows his words, which makes talking to him almost impossible. I just say, “Right!” and “Un huh.” He’s a regular in dance class where his grasp of rhythm is thin at best. Even his pot belly has no enthusiasm. Each morning, he fills his plate to overflowing with eggs and fruit and muffins and bacon and brings to the table two glasses of orange juice that he posts, one on each side of his plate, like sentinels in the Valley of the Kings. Where all this food goes remains a mystery. This morning he insisted on telling me that his mom, who died a year ago (much like my own) had lived with him for her last fifteen years and that last night he had been invited to the suite of a couple of girls traveling together. These two topics seemed an odd combination for so early in the day. This last boast was far more information than I wanted. But, thin though he is, he’s also a Solo, so I shifted into host gear and tried to follow his very thin thread of thought while stuffing myself with fresh papaya.
Back in our suite (read stateroom [read cabin]), Heinz was just getting up and dressing for the day, primping his hair and checking himself out endlessly in the mirrored wall above his bed. I told him I had offered to stay aboard so he could go ashore but he dismissed my gesture by saying that he and his “group” were having dinner in The Veranda. So, he now has his own “group,” which consists of Margot (with the T), Brenda (the banker who no longer goes to the casino), Diane (from near Tampa), Rosalie (of the racy Margaritas), Ellie (of the emeralds) and critical Shirley (whom we had dubbed the Whiskey Sour). With the help of the maitre d’ in The Veranda, they had arranged for a very special dessert, a Grand Marnier soufflé. After dinner Brenda told me Shirley and Margot (with the T) had felt it needed more Grand Marnier (no surprise) and had asked the server to pour some directly into their dessert. Even that didn’t mellow them out.
During the morning, there was a simulated emergency aboard and service (of all kinds) was suspended for an hour while the crew participated. Shirley told me she was on her way to the laundry and just as she touched the handle to open a safety door, the captain blew the ship’s horn, making her believe she had set off some kind of major alarm. This became her “story of the day,” which competed with others’ personal anecdotes at Solo cocktails.
At my own dinner table was Libby (the talent agent), Patrick (picture him this morning waiting patiently on deck for the pool bar to open), Carol (whose luggage didn’t arrive with her), Rudy (from LA) and Dr. Rita/Ruth, who is so small that her head barely reaches above her plate. I had a hard time keeping the conversation light and flowing. Carol, who sat next to me, and who has brought up the topic of gay marriage with me several times, asked me about my past and when I told her, she called me a fraud and excused herself from the table. I have no idea what triggered this behavior. Libby said not to worry; Carol had just had too much to drink. Maybe so.
The show was a small, thick man juggling knives and plates and bowling pins, all while making jokes with the audience. He had a caustic edge that, while funny, soon grew tiresome and, as usual, I nodded off. Something about a big dinner, a couple of glasses of wine and the darkness triggers my momentary mini-escapes from this hostly environment. After the show, I escorted Dr. Rita back to her suite (read stateroom [read cabin]), which earned me points with Elsa who, grinning as usual like the Cheshire cat, was greeting people as they left the theater. “Did you enjoy the show?”
The theme for dancing until midnight was “Rock and Roll.” The Lounge was packed with guests. The orchestra played songs like “Only You” and “Hounddog” and Lorraine sang (and well; she must be a disappointed entertainer). Heinz and I danced. The two Claudines have become ravenously hungry for the dance floor, not even sitting down between numbers but turning to one of us at each song and then swiveling and twisting the night away to their own version of whatever dance they think they are doing. I just hang on, trying to remember that it’s not about the steps; it’s about showing them such a good time that they’ll buy another cruise. But tonight was a challenge. I was so hot and out of breath, my shirt wet with perspiration, that I reached a kind of nirvana, a weird feeling of separation from it all, as though being in this movie and watching it all at the same time.
As I was on my way to the lounge before dinner, I ran into Rozanne in the lobby, arguing with the Destinations Desk personnel, who didn’t seem to be helping her. (I’ve had my own problems with them.) Foolishly, I stopped to say hello (Rozanne is always as astonished as I am that I remember her name) and got involved. It seems that Rozanne’s husband, Leon, had gone ashore for a tour that included horseback riding in the jungle. He hadn’t returned. Rozanne asked what I thought were simple questions: had the bus returned to the ship and had her husband signed back in? The Destinations Desk didn’t seem able to answer these questions or maybe they knew the answers and just didn’t want to give them to Rozanne. I went down to the boarding area and asked the attendant at the door if Mr. Halio, in suite 833, had signed back in. The answer was no. When I went back to tell Rozanne, she was, again, asking the desk if the bus was back. If not, there might be no reason to worry. If so, then her husband could be lost somewhere in the jungle. It wasn’t a happy time. I decided to get uninvolved and wished Rozanne the best, urging her not to worry and to let the ship solve the problem. I heard later that the bus had returned to the ship and that her husband was not on it.
For comic relief, I stopped at the bar to talk to John and Ramona and Henry, who was having his usual Southern Comfort Manhattan. Ugh. Big busted Ramona, who refers to John not as her husband but the man she is traveling with, was nursing her usual martini and whining about not being a good mother to her wayward son. John wasn’t paying attention to her – he’s probably heard her lament a thousand times – but intent instead on the audience for his jokes. “Drinks are like breasts. One isn’t enough, and three are too many.” I moved on.
I must admit that my reservoir of bullshit is running out. I’m tired of coddling up to all these tiresome people – the idle rich – who have nothing interesting to say and spend their time one-upping each other with their nights aboard and their equivalent privileges. I long for my Levis and a T shirt and my own agenda for the day. I’m satisfied that I’ve done a good job at being a host (even if Heinz would not agree) and had an interesting experience but it’s time to be home again. I’ll be happy to get there.
Picture this. A tall, thin woman, probably 75, still with a remarkably good body and daringly dressed in a bikini. She’s sitting on the pool deck in one deck chair with all her paraphernalia – her bag, her book, her lotion, her chic coverall - arranged carefully on the chairs on either side of her. Her diamonds sparkle in the sun. Her gold bracelets dangle from her stick-like arm. She has bleached blonde, shorter than shoulder length, straight hair parted in the middle and which she keeps putting back behind her ear with an expensively manicured dark red nail. She’s wearing heavy yellow sunglasses that proclaim Gucci or Chanel on their temples. She has a little palsy and like Katherine Hepburn, shakes her head slightly as she concentrates on the cell phone in her hand. She arranges the pillows behind her and spreads out to worship the sun. Her phone rings – in Puerto Rico, we’re back in America and cell phones are now working – and she answers it. She speaks briefly. Then she lies back down. But she keeps her cell phone in her hand. It rings again. She answers. She lies back. She sits up. She focuses on the phone, which never leaves her hand, even when she decides she’ll read a little. She changes her mind and lies back in the sun. Her husband, all hairy back and overweight and tanned like turtle hide, brings her a cappuccino. She sits up to take it, drinks one sip and puts the cup down on the deck. Her phone rings. She answers it.
You get the picture. When Fort Lauderdale finally appears on the horizon, I will be so ready for it. Stay tuned.

Monday, December 14: Antigua (not)

After Ding Dong had squeegeed the deck and I had captured the sunrise, I rushed to my post at the Coffee Connection where I remained, mostly alone, for the hour of Gwen Ifill’s lecture on the effects of Obama’s election on race and politics. I heard she was very good; I was disappointed that my responsibilities as host had robbed me of my opportunity to be a guest in her audience. Oh well.
Shortly after that, the captain told us through the PA system that the vessel – yes, that’s the word used, “vessel” – had lost one of its four engines and as a result, we couldn’t travel as fast as scheduled. There was no danger, he said, but in order to arrive on time in Fort Lauderdale, we would skip docking in Antigua and steam directly ahead to San Juan with all haste. He expected us to arrive there early tomorrow morning. No one seemed to mind. The cruise is approaching its end and most people I talked to were ready to be home. Over coffee, Linda told me that when she and her husband returned to their suite (read stateroom [read cabin]) after breakfast, the ceiling was leaking and there were buckets all over their bed to capture the water. Four of their neighbors had the same problem. She didn’t know if this was somehow connected to the engine failure but the ship was full and there were no empty suites (read staterooms [read cabins]) for any of them to move to. Keith, her husband, was working with the hotel manager to see if it was possible for them all to leave the ship in San Juan.
I’m ready, too. The Nazi has struck again, complaining to me in his most strident manner about some minor infraction of his rules about the bathroom. To prevent disharmony, I now simply apologize to whatever he’s raving about, without pointing out that because he dries his bikini underwear on the chairs on the balcony I can never sit there, or because he steals my wooden hangers my pants are now all wrinkled or that he hoards all the water bottles or now speaks to me only when he is forced to, or steals the solo women who have some semblance of rhythm, leaving me in dance class with the Klutzes. Have you met them yet? They trip and stumble and step on your feet. It’s too bad my Crocs don’t have steel toes.
I spent most of the day in a lounge chair in my secret location – no longer secret; I was lucky to find the space – on Deck 5. It was shady and cool and I watched as several islands went by in the distance. Shrouded in sunshine, they shimmered in the tropical sea like Bali Hai, their very remoteness beckoning to us all like some unattainable ideal. At cocktails, I introduced myself to Ron Shapiro and his wife. We each had known the other was aboard and he said he’d been seeking me just as I was seeking him. Until this evening, we were but names in the guest directory. The mini-world we temporarily inhabit here has made us friends. There’s a lesson somewhere in all that but it’s too early in the day (now 5:55 on Tuesday morning) for me to figure it out. Be my guest.
At dinner, I sat between Anne (from South Africa) and Carol (from Vancouver). I tried to kid Anne about taking our dancing classes too seriously – she never smiles – but she assured me her demeanor was only due to her concentration on Sasha’s complicated routines. We agreed that trying to cram too much material into half an hour, and playing music too fast, he’s not really a good teacher. But she pointed out that the women in our classes like to watch his butt as he twists and turns it through the salsa, cha cha, or rumba. Why, Anne. Shame on you! Carol, on the other hand, turned out to be very interesting. This is her first – and she said, last – cruise. She said she’d either had very bad luck in meeting people or always seemed to plug into a group she didn’t want to be with again. We agreed that this ship’s passengers, many of them swaddled in their moneyed privilege, make for a very closed and conservative society. One of her dinner companions had called Obama a “high struttin’ spade.” She was horrified and had to leave the table. I would have done the same.
While in Barbados, a beautiful, large yacht joined us in the harbor. Named the Octopus, it belonged (according to Google) to Paul Allen, one of the founders of Microsoft. Google also said that it had a crew of 70, two helicopters, a mini-submarine and cost over $200 million. Travel in style.
The food and wine manager of the ship approached me during the day for some clarification of what facts I wanted for a potential article on being a gentleman host. Later he sent some data to my suite (read stateroom [read cabin]). Would you believe that since Rio, we’ve eaten over 5000 eggs? Stay tuned.

Sunday, December 13: Barbados

As soon as we docked at Jamestown, Barbados, I went ashore to the pier terminal to find some souvenirs. It was very hot – about 85 degrees – and the terminal, like so many buildings in the tropics, has a tin roof. The only air conditioned spaces were in the shops that sold jewelry – keep that Sugar Daddy happy – and I was soon drenched with sweat. (Whatever I suffer from is only getting worse. When I get home, I may just wear shorts and T shirts for a week!) Even though I understand, at least intellectually, that Christmas comes to the tropics too, it seemed incongruous that “Silver Bells” and “O Come All Ye Faithful” should be playing softly in the background while I was sweating profusely.
As it turned out, I was unsuccessful in my bid to get a seat on the tour called, “Barbados by Photograph.” The Destination Manager told me they were seriously overbooked and had tried to get another bus, and a guide from nearby Antigua, but this was not possible on such short notice. So, not wanting to stay on board the ship, even though in air conditioned luxury, I took a tour called, “Where de Sugar Come From.” As we were boarding and I had taken my seat about halfway down the aisle, a large man with an imperious air loudly declared that he didn’t like the seats on this bus and if there was another one going to the same place, he and his wife would get off my bus and take the other one. There was some discussion while the man held up the progression of others trying to find a seat and when told, yes, there was another bus, he pushed his way back down the aisle toward the bus door, scattering others as he went.
Our bus driver/guide provided a running commentary on what was on each side of the bus as we made our tour through Jamestown. On the sea side were mostly resort hotels, many of them new. I guess money thinks Barbados safe, unlike Jamaica from which money fled some years ago. On the other side of the road were small houses, some of them painted in a very bright orange or turquoise, along with houses that didn’t look so prosperous. The driver said they weren’t painted because if the house looked too new, it would be taxed at a much higher rate. Un huh. (In Maine, a new house is not assessed for tax purposes until the stoop is added to the front door. That’s why so many houses have a three foot drop from the front door to the ground.) I learned from the driver that Barbados is a member of the British Commonwealth so the queen also has a representative here. (I wondered what happened when these two officials have conflicting opinions about where to go or what to do about some problem). The island produces100,000 tons of sugar each year (and honey, that’s a lot of sugar cane; it’s everywhere). The island is limestone coral, not volcanic, which filters the water and makes the sea around the island “…the clearest in the world. They’ve been making rum on the island for over 300 years. Some sugar cane plants are cut into “knuckles” like the joints on your finger and these are used to replant after a harvest; you just stick the knuckle into the ground and it automatically sprouts.We drove a long way through the countryside to St. Nicholas Abbey, a still working sugar plantation that was founded in 1650. The house is in typical British country style, with fireplaces that were never used. It’s furnished in slightly seedy, 1930’s British style; nothing extraordinary except the china, all hand painted, set on the dining room table. The plantation is now owned by a local architect who opened it to the public. We soon discovered that its main purpose (and the main purpose of the whole tour) was – surprise, surprise – to sell plantation products: molasses, chutney and a 12-year-old rum in a fancy bottle that could be etched with your name, for about $60.00. I passed all that up. My idea of souvenirs runs to baseball caps. I can’t imagine schlepping home a fancy bottle of rum etched with my name on the bottom. We took the road that runs along the Atlantic shore of Barbados (as opposed to the Caribbean side of the island) and stopped for some photographs of Bathsheba, a beach known worldwide for surfing competitions. It was very pretty and the water – our guide told us that waves here can reach a height of over 50 feet – looked uninviting and dangerous.
But the most interesting feature of the tour came at a round-about (in the wrong way round) when the back of the bus exploded with a loud bang and smoke enveloped us completely. Many of the passengers jumped up from their seats and rushed for the door. As might be expected, those seated in front were the handicapped and their inability to get down the steps quickly, quickly panicked the crowd behind them. I was afraid they would be trampled, like so many Thais in a burning night club. But we finally all got out. The driver lifted the door over the engine in the rear and he, and many of the men, stared into the exposed mechanisms as though just looking at it might make it work again. But the best part of the whole episode was a big billboard behind the bus that advertised auto repair. “Free 24 hour service,” it proclaimed. “On the road or at your home.” Needless to say, I got a picture of that: a disabled bus with tourists crowded around it and this sign above. The driver called the other bus in our two-bus caravan and after it had delivered its passengers to the terminal, it came back for us. I was very pleased to see that the seats were far less comfortable than the ones on our original bus. Karmic justice for the complaining man, I thought.
Because there was a cabaret act going on in our usual lounge, the Solos gathered in the Observation Lounge on Deck 11. The directions were a little confusing and a few of them didn’t show. Still, we had Diane (from near Tampa), Rosalie (more about her later), Anne (who breathes superior air), Brenda (the gambling private banker), Ellie (of the emeralds), Maryella (the Afghan Hound), Marissa (her roommate from Croatia), Terry (the bookie), Heinz (and you already know enough about him), Elsa (with the Cheshire Cat grin, her teeth clamped firmly together), Margot (with the T), Lise (who has a wandering eye and has five cruises already booked for 2010), Shirley (a former airline stewardess who loves to dance, mostly with Heinz) and little old me. Diane had asked a number of these fascinating guests, including Heinz, to join her in Prime 7 for a fancy dinner and Maryella and Marissa were off to a Public Television event. Elsa had promised to join Henry (of the meandering diamond ring; he’s been through the Panama Canal 17 times) so that left Terry and me to host a table for six that included Ellie, Shirley, Brenda and Rosalie. On the way to the dining room Shirley, who has become very particular –she’s a Gold – told me that if Libby joined us she would have to be seated at a different table. She couldn’t stand Libby. And she (Shirley) would not sit at any table that included more than six. When we got to the dining room and the nice Maitre d’ took us to our table for six – Libby never showed – Shirley didn’t like the location. But the dining room was crowded so Shirley had no choice.
Rosalie, form Medford Oregon, looks like she has just escaped from a Grandma Moses painting. She’s 84, prim and proper, her becoming hair of no discernable color fluffed around her face and with carefully painted lines for eyebrows, her blouse pulled up all around her neck, the kind of woman who should be a retired librarian, with a proper gold pin at her throat. But when her margarita came, I realized I had to take her more seriously than that. We had a really interesting conversation about her life. She sat next to me and to break the ice, I asked her where she was from. Well, she said, she was born in Canada but her parents divorced when she was six and her father went back to England, from which he had migrated. So she was educated in England. Her mother moved to California where Rosalie spent the summers. But then, in her adult life, she spent some time in Mexico and once lived in Hawaii but she guessed that now living in Oregon meant she was an American. Terry, the bookie, said he was surprised (as was I) that Rosalie drank margaritas and he soon dubbed her, to her delight, Racy Rosalie. This brought on a discussion of what drinks most fit each of us. We decided that Shirley was a whiskey sour. No surprise there. Ellie got the vodka martini (which she favors at cocktails) and Brenda was a Singapore Sling. We decided Terry, who doesn’t drink alcohol, should be a Cosmo. The table had a lot of trouble with me, finally settling on a Manhattan. You can see that after almost 30 days at sea, we’re running out of dinner conversation.
I skipped the show and went instead to my suite (read stateroom [read cabin]) where I lay down for a half an hour, trying to summon the energy to go to the Lounge for dancing. Heinz wanted to be in the Voyager Lounge, one deck below where, he said “..evry zing is happenink.” I told him to go; I would hold the fort. We had lost some time at port in Barbados and the captain was driving the ship pretty hard to make it up so the dance floor was quite tipsy. So was Maryella, who’d certainly had her share of whatever they were serving at the Public Television dinner. We tried to dance several times but the floor always seemed to be some place other than where our feet expected it. We laughed a lot and sat down. Even the Dragon Lady, resplendent in filmy white pants and turquoise sequined shoes – I couldn’t help but notice – had trouble keeping her footing and seemed, for the first time, to enjoy herself as she and her compliant husband stumbled around the floor. Marissa asked me about my gig and if I would do it again. I told her I didn’t think I was very good at it. She disagreed, saying I was far more approachable and social than Heinz. But comparisons are unfair. Still, I was happy to hear that I’d made a good impression on at least one Solo. I’m sure Margot (with the T) would disagree with Marissa, if only because she is disputatious about everything. So onward we go. Tomorrow is Antiqua. Stay tuned.

Saturday, December 12: Steaming Toward Barbados

I was up just in time for the sunrise. Not spectacular but good enough for some digital space. My only companion on Deck 11 at the stern of the ship was the deck hand. Dressed in his white coveralls and yellow boots, he was with long deliberate strides squeegeeing the water used to clean the ship every morning toward the deck drains. His boots were prominently labeled “Ding Dong.” I wondered how he got that name and if his fellow mates called him that. Soon we were joined by the early-morning joggers, including Eberhard, the hotel manager, flinging themselves around the jogging track.
At breakfast, I told some Solos who had gathered at the table that the assistant wine steward had told me the night before that the ship calculated their wine supply based on three glasses per day per guest. Shirley commented, incongruously, that she never drank wine. “Why, I had only had three glasses at lunch,” she said, without catching the irony. Also at breakfast, I stopped to say hello to Dr. Rita who, slumped over her plate and wearing a bright blue sun hat that covered her face, looked lost in her chair. She thanked me again for helping her with her jewelry and said she needed another favor. It seems she had a run-in with the reception desk because she had asked to see the hotel manager, Eberhard, and they had refused to set up an appointment for her. Would I intercede? I went straight to Lorraine, who was far too busy to listen – she had a captain’s meeting in five minutes – but called the reception desk anyway and insisted that they set up Dr. Rita’s appointment. As before, I backed out of what I was sure would become some kind of controversy before I might get further involved. When I was in the Army, a lifetime ago, I learned that one never volunteers for anything. The more anonymous one is the safer one is.
At lunch, I met Judy and Herb who live in Cooper Village in New York. I asked them many questions about how they came to be on this particular ship and why they traveled (which they had done extensively) with Regent. They gave me the usual answers: the familiarity, the perks, the service, how pleasant everyone was. But Herb then recounted an experience only the day before when he left a book on his deck chair for only a minute to go to the bathroom. When he got back, a lady was sitting in his place, reading his book. He asked her for the book and she refused to give it to him, saying, “How do you know it’s yours?” He explained that the bookmark was his boarding pass, which had his name on it. She checked, found the bookmark, and returned his book. But she didn’t return his chair.
Chairs are very important to the passengers. Early in the morning – and despite pleas from the ship to the contrary – people reserve their preferred deck chair by placing a book or a towel where they want to sit. Then they go about their business until sometimes several hours later, they return to occupy the space. Long before the breakfast hour is over (around ten o’clock), all the chairs in the shade are so reserved, which is indicative of the age and competitiveness of the guests. No one wants to be in the sun.
In another chair episode, one guest told me that she and her husband, and another couple, were occupying four chairs around a table in the lounge when a man approached them and said they were in his space. The lady asked if the seats they were in were reserved. “No,” the man said. “But I’ve traveled over 120 nights with Regent and this is my space.” The foursome was astonished and told the man to go…well, you get the drift. He stomped away, infuriated that his rank didn’t pull.
When I stopped on my way into the lounge for the cocktail hour to bid a good evening to the Dragon Lady and her smiling husband, she gave me a once-over and said I cleaned up pretty good – I was wearing a double-breasted dark suit – but that my shoes were ugly. “You shouldn’t be wearing those ugly shoes,” she said. Maybe so, honey. But I have special permission to wear them because of my feet. Of course, I didn’t say that. I only hoped out loud that she have a pleasant evening and then moved on, smiling my public smile, even though her bossiness – she’s now telling Sasha how to conduct the dance lessons - makes me want to just slap her up side her head. I asked her husband, jokingly, if she treated him this way and he said, “Yes. Always.” Poor man.
At dinner with Libby (of whom I’ve grown very fond), Maryella and Marissa, we were talking about the lamb chops for breakfast and I told them about one of the passengers saying to me that I should live a little. Maryella said her mantra for that was, “If not now, when?” I like that almost as much as “Yes you can.”
When I snore (which, apparently, I do), Heinz wakes me up by smacking his hands together. I always hear the smack. So I wonder if he smacks twice and I wake on the first one and hear the second, or if the first one wakes me, and I hear it all at the same time. Is that even possible? You can see what trivia occupies my mind. It’s time to leave this gig and get on with my (real) life.
After dinner, I struggled to speak high school French to Claudine #1 while she struggled to speak her high school English to me. She beamed when I said, “Vous etes tres chic.” She was/is. It’s a little like my other mantra: “I’m just doing the best I can.” Tomorrow, Barbados. Stay tuned.

Friday, December 11: Fun at Sea

Today’s prime event was a ceremony on deck to initiate into the Brotherhood of Shellbacks those crossing the equator for the first time. All Pollywogs were encouraged to come forward before King Neptune for this ceremony, which involved ladling out spaghetti sauce over their heads, then rinsing them off in the pool shower, fully clothed, and throwing them into the ship’s pool. Despite a light rain, a huge crowd had gathered and the deck was awash in flash bulbs, recording this humiliation for the amusement of friends back home. I was very surprised at the number of guests – and the variety of types – willing to kneel and undergo this mild but messy servitude. It represented a true cross section of the ship’s guests and crew. To make cleanup easier, the area of the deck where the rites took place had been covered in plastic but I’m sure the deckhands still had a real job to get up the mess. I could imagine how spaghetti might clog the drains. But then, I’m sure the ship has its own plumber, not one of those back home who charges us $80.00 per call to wipe the sludge of whiskers and shaving cream out of our bathroom sink. Ugh!
Before and after this colorful display, I worked my usual gig, consulting the daily schedule I receive just before going to bed each night for the proper time and place. I mingled with the guests, especially Solos, in the area called the Coffee Connection, where Monica told me the little lady who had to be airlifted to Rio was still in the hospital there and, although stable, was now suffering from a hospital-borne infection. For our dance lesson, Sasha and Elena selected the tango, which made no sense to me. The tango is a swooping dance with long steps intermingled with short ones and to do it properly takes lots of floor space. Seven couples trying to remember and perform Elena’s routine on a moving dance floor was truly chaotic. Of course, any time we made a mistake, we could blame it on the ship.
Have I told you about the heat? Unlike some of my friends, I’ve never loved hot weather and some as yet undiscovered malady makes me sweat profusely. After all, we are in the tropics so I expect to be hot outside. But inside, even in air conditioning, and especially after concentration on the tango on a heaving dance floor, I have to go back to my suite (read stateroom [read cabin]) to change into a fresh shirt. Deciding to buy and bring a wardrobe of dark blue, dark green and black Polo shirts was a great idea. I can just throw all of them into the washer at the same time. Of course, my underwear is slowly darkening. But who cares? Do men have hot flashes?
The early show was a cabaret act by Marilyn Maye, a singer who appeared on the Tonight Show more than 70 times, and an age she will never see again. But she was done up in black, with silver spangles and she started to sing backstage so we heard her voice before we saw her condition. Although she’s lost her figure and now has at least two chins, she still can sing, in a powerful voice that reminded me of Ethel Merman. And she really knows how to deliver a song. At one point, a huge screen came down on the stage to show clips of her performances on the Tonight Show. Sometimes she sang with her former self and a couple of times, she just gave a dismissive wave of her hand and said, “Oh, just let her do it!” She used a music stand that I’m sure held the proper cues and some of her songs had such complicated lyrics, she stood by the stand to get it right. But what a trooper! The audience gave her a standing ovation. And why not? Still going strong, even over the hill, has resonance with this crowd.
My relationship with Heinz has settled into the DMZ. He likes to be right about everything, often saying, “Of course,” but then just as often being wrong. Each time he tells me where I should be, I think, “Oh, no,” and check the schedule just to be sure. Despite his inordinate dedication to organization – a trait often associated with Germans – he loses things and has intimated twice that I had “somehow” mixed up my shirts with his. No way. “And vat dit you doo vit ze Regent brochoure dat shoos my next cruis?” Nothing, Heinz; I haven’t seen either your shirt or the brochure. But I sense that he doesn’t believe me. Despite all this, he’s very good with the Solos and does love to dance, moving from one lonely woman to the next. I now understand why Sunny married Klaus von Bulow.
Shirley had invited me to join her group for dinner at Prime 7 and this time, she got Elsa’s permission for me to go. I got stuck between Margot (with a T), who seems to go everywhere, and Brenda, the retired private banking manager from Stamford, who likes to gamble. (Is that a contradiction? Or just an oxymoron?). Terry, the bookie from London, was the other man at the table and he’s very good company, helping me to carry the load. Still, it was very heavy lifting. The most interesting part of the evening was giving Margot (with the T) the floor so she could recount a story about her shipboard romance of many years ago. It seems she met a man on a short Christmas cruise a long time ago and they had a relationship – here, Margot (with the T) moved her hand from side to side over her plate, indicating that she wouldn’t go into the details of that “relationship.” He invited her to join him on another, 100 day cruise, but a couple of days before she was to meet his ship, he got sick and she flew to his side and returned him to his condo in Delray Beach. They went to the Mayo clinic and after a complete workup (for which the clinic is renowned), the clinic declared him hale and fit. But he suffered a massive heart attack two days later and died. He’d left Margot (with the T) his condo and enough money so that she didn’t have to go back to her job in San Diego running computer programs for the marines. His nephews contested the Will and Margot (with the T) described some close calls – and her lawyer’s exorbitant fees - but in the end, she won. So now, Margot (with the T) travels extensively, pushing her way through the world, her criticism out in front like a snow plow.
At breakfast, and under the category of “Small World,” I saw a woman I was sure Rhea and I had met on our cruise to Australia and New Zealand some years ago. (Was that 2002?) She stood out then because she was so beautiful, and was always beautifully dressed, almost regal in understated grays, which matched her lovely gray hair. (She also wore memorable diamonds.) Although obviously older now, she is still beautiful, and still wearing the diamonds. I approached her and her husband at their table and she confirmed that, yes, they had been on that cruise. Wasn’t Milford Sound gorgeous? And what a surprise to meet me here. They are Pam and Bryan, from London. She said we should get together and “catch up,” as though we lived next door. How does one “catch up” with a perfect stranger?
I’ve grown very fond of another couple from London: Timothy and Beverly, with the unruly red curls. I photographed them at the ceremony on deck and Beverly insisted I take enough pictures so that I could capture his soigné personality and her sexiness. It was easy. I met them again after dinner and enjoyed a Kaluha on the rocks, only my second cocktail, with them out on deck before going to bed. Since there was no formal dancing, I could retire early (if 11:00 PM is early). But I didn’t want Heinz to storm into the suite (read cabin) later and say I wasn’t carrying my load. Fortunately, I ran into Elsa on my way and she wished me a good night, which amounted to tacit permission to retire. I received an email yesterday from the editor of Style magazine who has apparently been following my blog with interest. She wants to discuss with me the possibility of a story about my experiences for their April/May issue and asked me to contact her as soon as I’m home. I’ll begin to collect some facts that might be interesting to readers. Can you believe the guests consume 2000 bottles of wine every day? And that the wine steward has to buy it four months in advance? It makes me wonder about the eggs. And the cantaloupes.
My sunburn is gone, leaving only a small patch of tan on each cheekbone, the only place I still have melanin in my facial skin. I feel a little like a clown. Stay tuned.

Thursday, December 10: At Sea without a Paddle

The internet has been down for two days. Apparently we were in a geographic dead zone where satellite transmission was impossible. When I discovered this early in the morning of that first day, Dennis was sitting very unhappily at the computer next to me. Common situations make for common bonds and he loudly lamented first the computer situation and then the situation of the world in general. A short, gnome-like little man with a British accent, he kept me occupied for the next twenty minutes with his complaints about the fall of the American empire and the rise of China, to which he’d been and, he said, “…had the power and the resources to do anything it wanted. Bulldozed the land,” he said, “just to build the blinking Olympic stadium. Displaced all those coolies, didn’t they?” I had trouble responding. And I had trouble getting him to stop so I could go on with my composing. Not only were there a lot of disappointed faces in the computer room that day but the Platinums were also unhappy: they didn’t get their morning paper. Quelle horreur. The first night the computers weren’t working, I passed the room on my way to cocktails and saw a man sitting in the room staring at a blank screen. I guess when you’re addicted to something, even the memory of it can be sweet. Once the computers come back on, I predict people camping out in the halls as though they were waiting for a Wal Mart sale or eager to buy tickets to a Bruce Springsteen concert. How we have become addicted to our communications. Personally, I prefer sugar.
Each day outside the Veranda, the restaurant where I have breakfast and usually lunch, a little Chinese waitress with braces on her teeth smiles and quietly announces to each passing guest the special for the meal. Today it was lamb chops. As I was finishing my fruit and scrambled eggs, with that best bacon ever, a couple at an adjoining table was just cutting into their chops. I asked how they were and she said, “Delicious.” I admitted that I couldn’t imagine having lamb chops for breakfast, and she said, “Oh, Phil. Live little.” Along with the “YES YOU CAN” taped up on the wall over my computer at home, “LIVE A LITTLE” may be all we need to get through life successfully. No. I’d add, “DO THE BEST YOU CAN,” something my mother always said each time I left her after a visit to her nursing home. “Be good, Mom,” I’d say. And she’d respond with, “I’m doing the best I can.”
I, too, am doing the best I can. After brushing my teeth (as a guest), I went back to the Veranda (as a host) to work the room, greeting the Solos and sitting with them for a minute or two so they wouldn’t feel abandoned. At some point in my life, I wanted to be a maitre d’, greeting the guests and helping them to feel included. Through the mists of fond nostalgia, I remember the old Avenue Restaurant – now long-gone – in Rehoboth, where a lady with a clip board clutched firmly to her breast would come out to the benches on the street and say, in her most commanding voice, “SMITH. PARTY OF FOUR.” What power she had! In my wanderings through the many tables in the Veranda, with my gentleman host pin clamped firmly to my own breast, I met Pat and Ben, who told me they were from Baltimore. “Where in Baltimore?” I asked, smiling broadly. “Oh, way at the end of Roland Avenue,” she responded, “in a place called Elkridge Estates.” We both shop at Eddy’s, in that “small world” phenomenon.
The Dragon Lady turns out to be a world-famous neurologist. She stopped me on our way to dance class and said I couldn’t ignore her. “You can’t pass without talking to me,” she said, in her most imperious manner. So what could I do? I talked to her. In the process, she recognized my Horner’s Syndrome – one of my eyes droops because of the condition – and told me of visiting Hopkins often for conferences. She dragged out her Blueberry and tapping madly away with a perfectly manicured red nail and her magnetic stylus as she was talking to me, she retrieved the date – late 2006 – and told me where she and her husband had dinner every night. She insisted on crowding my email address into her system and I agreed that the next time she and her doctor-husband are in town, I will introduce them to the best crab cakes in the world at The Prime Rib. Amazing how she can lift that little finger even when she’s entering data in her mini-computer.
Wouldn’t you know? Sasha and Olena do the rumba “international style,” said the Dragon Lady. This means that you start on the second beat, not the first, and you don’t work from a box step but from steps forward and back. I had to learn my favorite dance all over again. And spinning on a dance floor in Crocs is not such a good idea, especially when that floor is moving up and down. I never made it successfully through the whole routine because I couldn’t get my spin down fast enough from the chasse to be in position for open breaks. Oh well.
At some time around eleven, the captain came on the PA system to tell us we had just crossed the equator. “Did you feel the bump?” he asked. The captain is a joker. He laughed and said he couldn’t toast the group at the Seven Seas Society meeting – a cocktail party for those who’ve traveled with Regent before – because he was the designated driver. I suspect he just doesn’t like champagne. The dress was formal and everyone turned out in their finest. The Dragon Lady, resplendent in a spaghetti strap, red sequin gown, told me she was disappointed that more ladies were not “appropriate for the occasion.” But at my post, standing in the aisle and greeting couples as they stumbled to their seats – the ship is still moving – I thought the ladies looked great. The Afghan hound wore a black sequined gown with silver sequin stripes smeared vertically all over it, looking something like the sidewalk on Copacabana Beach. But the saleslady where she bought it should have told her that while her figure could handle the slimness of the shape, the open back was not becoming. Wrinkles are hard to hide. Libby wore a grey number with huge collaged flowers all around her neck. She looked a little like a walking garden. We learned that of the 600 plus guests aboard, 83% of them have traveled with Regent before. And fourteen of them are titanium, which means they’ve accumulated over 600 nights. Imagine. Almost two years of this. Not for me.
We had some trouble at cocktails and dinner. Shirley complained to Margot (with a T) that the seamstress team of mother and daughter should not be included in the Solo dinners. They weren’t paying guests, she said, and so shouldn’t share the largesse. Margot (with the T), who complains about everything, took the sentiment to management. Then Elsa called me to ask if the seamstresses were a problem and I told her, no; I was happy to accommodate them. “Well just be sure,” she said, “that when you’re making up the tables for dinner, they don’t get put at a table with Margot (with the T) or Shirley.” But given the desires (read demands) of the Solos, it’s very hard to place everybody where they want to be. And Heinz can never make up his mind, wanting to run everything but not running it efficiently. So I wound up at a table with the seamstresses – the mother is a slob and the daughter, while pretty, always exposes more of her breasts than strictly appropriate (which is why I suppose Shirley and Margot [with the T] dislike her – Patrick, who rambled endlessly on, licking his lips for emphasis and blinking his eyes when he thought he’d made his point, and Libby, the talent manager from New York. I agreed to take all the others so long as I could have Libby, who, despite her stern demeanor, is really bright and very funny. (Shirley doesn’t like Libby because Libby once extolled the virtues of Crystal – they even have a librarian, Libby said – and Shirley is very loyal to Regent. “Here,” Libby laughed and said, “I can’t bend over to look at the books at the bottom of the shelves, and I can’t reach the top ones, so I have to read what’s stored in the middle.”
On my way to bed, the couple with the huge library of dance steps they perform as gracefully as though they had skewers down their spines, stopped me to say they approved of my behavior. “Oh,” I said. “In what way?” They complimented me on asking Claudine #1, who was sitting alone in the lounge after dinner, to join Shirley and Heinz and me at our table. “I was only doing the best I can,” I said.
Early in the morning, I found Lorraine in the office and apologized to her for breaking policy by going to dinner in Prime 7 with Margot (with a T) and her group the night before. Lorraine was understanding and told me not to worry about it. “It’s a power thing with Margot,” she said. “And Margot is sometimes just a pain in the ass.” My sentiments, exactly. But I would change “sometimes” to “always.”
Heinz and I have reached one of those truces that never ends a war. He’s imperious and distant in his Prussian (although he’s Bavarian) way. And I just treat him as though I were his happy, but stupid, American puppy. It seems to work. But he can’t steal my last hanger with the wooden rod. That’s going too far.
If they play “Perfidia” one more time, I’ll scream. Stay tuned.

Wednesday, December 9: Forteleza

At sunrise this morning, which wasn’t much to see, I met Mary Jane who was walking around the jogging track, my favorite place for early morning photos. I said, “good morning,” as I do with everybody I pass (or who passes me) and she stopped to chat. She’s on her way home to the Los Angeles area from charitable work in Africa with some organization labeled, like so much in our time, by initials: DVD, EKG, HOK, NAACP. She had red hair, square, black glasses and intense black eyes and interrupted me to say that I had an East Coast accent. What followed was an interesting discussion of accents she associates with various parts of the US.
After the desultory sunrise, I came here, to the computer room to post on my blog but after writing my post for the day, I discovered (by trying to sign on) that there was no internet service. Later, signs in the computer room said (and still say) that we are out of satellite range. I have to wonder if the captain is now navigating by the stars. Without the ability to post to my blog, I saved the document on the computer I was using – and anyone, if he were curious, could read it, a risk I felt I had to take – and printed it out just in case I should lose it. (This is also true today; the internet is still down and I will save and print out today’s post as well.)
At about noon, the captain announced on the PA (see?, more initials) system that he would soon make a hard turn to port and that the ship would list. We should all sit down or be careful to hold onto something during the process. I expected this to be a big event but it was nothing, really. We were just slipping into a berth dockside in Forteleza, our last port in Brazil. And the last of our journey in the Atlantic Ocean. After Forteleza, we’ll be in the Caribbean.
Forteleza, now a city of over two million, was founded by the Dutch in 1649 but like so much of the new world, the ground was contested by other countries eager to make footholds. The Portuguese snatched the area away from the Dutch and by the early 1800’s, Forteleza was a prosperous port, exporting cotton to places all over the world. Today, it’s the capital of the state of Ceara and because of its beautiful, broad beaches, the Brazilian government expects it to become an important resort area. I took the shuttle bus from the pier into town and walked through the local market, taking a few photographs and trying, without much success, to find a souvenir or two to take home. I was mostly just pleased to get rid of my remaining reais. To become a tourist destination, Forteleza will have to offer more than soccer T shirts and woven baskets.
The days have been very hot – after all, we are in the tropics – and I felt a little faint and dizzy, a sure sign of dehydration. So, I took an early shuttle back to the ship and guzzled as much water as I could hold. Then, sitting in the very front row of the ship’s theater, I watched (and photographed) an elaborate presentation of traditional dances by a local dance group that came aboard for just this reason. They demonstrated dances by areas in Brazil and when they got to Rio, of course their presentation was all about the samba. The women in the group were dressed in feathers and heels (and not much else) and, at one point in their frantic presentation, one of them came down off the stage and dragged me into the act. All I could do was try to be a good sport and jiggle my feet as much, and as fast, as I could. Could that have been my fifteen minutes – it was more like three – of fame? “Dance host fails at dancing?”
Heinz is still cool but by serious effort on my part to be obsequious, he’s beginning to come around. (Although I’m unaccustomed to slavishness and have never been very good at it, it does work.) And then, at cocktails and dancing before dinner, I learned that Margot (with the T) had put together a group for dinner at Prime 7, the steak house on the ship. As you may remember, I’m not permitted to go to the two gourmet restaurants on the ship without prior permission from Elsa and her boss. This had not been obtained but Margot (with the T) was quite insistent that I join the group and since she’s titanium (as well as rather large), I decided to go. This did not improve my efforts to placate Heinz, who was left alone with all the Solos. I had to make serious apologies later when he said, “Yes, boot you’re supposed to get Elsa’s permission virst before goink there.” Oh well. And then he dismissed the whole episode with, “Vell, it’s none of my affair.” Right, Heinz; it’s not.
After dinner, I was exhausted but had to sit through a magician/comedian act in the theater and prepare to dance later until midnight. I found a seat next to Patrick, from Australia, who likes his wine. He fell asleep during the act and began to snore, irritating the Japanese couple – she of the lifted finger when she dances – sitting in front of us.
Claudine #2 was tired and went to bed. But Claudine #1 came for dancing and Heinz and I alternated between Shirley, who will dance even with blisters on her feet, and Claudine, for the rest of the very long day. Now for three days at sea before we hit Barbados. Stay tuned.