I would like to wish a very special Christmas to all of those that will be away Home.
Those of us that made the choice to earn our living by going to sea, made this decision knowing that we would miss out on a lot of “Special” days with our families, but we made this decision knowing that we were doing it to make a better life for our Families.
As I never had children, I volunteered to work many times on Christmas to allow those that did have young Kids at home to spend the Holiday with their Families and to me those were some of the nicest Christmas’s that I had. Just knowing that by doing something as simple as working for someone made some child’s Christmas special was well worth being away from my love ones.
I’d like to wish a very special merry Christmas to all the opposite/relief crews who are out there working so that all of us who get to be home can sit around in our underwear with our beer bellies hanging out. Sorry it was you guys and not us this year but I hope you at least have fair winds and calm seas and whatever holiday cheer you can muster. Merry Christmas guys, and thanks again.
Again the Ghost sped on, above the black and heaving sea – on, on – until, being far away, as he told Scrooge, from any shore, they lighted on a ship. They stood beside the helmsman at the wheel, the look-out in the bow, the officers who had the watch; dark, ghostly figures in their several stations; but every man among them hummed a Christmas tune, or had a Christmas thought, or spoke below his breath to his companion of some bygone Christmas Day, with homeward hopes belonging to it. And every man on board, waking or sleeping, good or bad, had had a kinder word for another on that day than on any day in the year; and had shared to some extent in its festivities; and had remembered those he cared for at a distance, and had known that they delighted to remember him.
