Pier
dollies were... And always will be some of God's finest work. What made them so
wonderful was their devotion, loyalty, and the ability to stand on a lousy navy
pier in weather unfit for dogs, Marines, and anyone in France. They never broke
faith with the ship and her crew.
They came
in a variety of types from devoted officer's wives to professional 25 & 7
working girls... PTA regulars and old barmaids fighting cellulite and varicose
veins... From starry-eyed sweethearts to veteran submarine wives who had met
enough incoming boats over the years to know that all you get at 2:00 AM after
all lines have been doubled up and liberty goes down...Is a smelly guy who
stinks of diesel and hydraulic oil... A sack of disgustingly dirty laundry...
And a raging erection looking for a home.
Maybe all
this has changed. Maybe the Salvation Army and the Singing Nuns meet the boats
that throw their heavies over in the middle of the night... Who knows?
The old
expression that all boatsailors used,
"Ain't
nobody up this time of morning but burglars and bad wimmin..."
Didn't
apply to pier dollies. They were saints.
There
were gals who used to call SUBRON SIX Ops on the Orion... Get your ETA... Then
drive out Willoughby Spit to Fort Wool and sit there drinking thermos coffee,
waiting for an old rust-stained smokeboat to come churning past Thimble Shoals
light.
As you
passed Fort Wool in 'balls and brass monkey' weather, in the pitch black
darkness someone would yell up to the bridge,
"Hey
Stokes, flash an Alpha-Alpha over to Wool."
You would
hear the shutters on the signal light bang away and see the light reflections
in the rising and falling swells. Then you would see the dual flash of
automobile headlights that told you several cars would be pulling into the gate
at DES-SUB piers and parking in the pier head parking lot. One guy's wife told
us she could sit out there at Willoughby Spit... Listen to the radio... Read a
paperback book and breastfeed a kid, all at the same time. We never could have
won the Cold War without gals like that.
It's nice
to be remembered. The lousy part of being a gauddamn boatsailor was that nobody
knew where in the hell you were or what in the hell you were up to... And
probably wouldn't have given a good gauddamn if they did. But pier dollies did
and there is something wonderful about standing topside waiting to toss a
heavie to some half-asleep sonuvabitch on the deck of the outboard boat in the
nest... And seeing the smiling face of a devoted fan whose panties past
experience told you... Were taking a rest break in the glove compartment of a
55 Chevy that needed new tires. Little unsolicited gifts like that made life
worth living.
If you
got in at a decent hour... 'Decent hour' is defined as 'Before Thelma secured the
beer taps at Bells'... You could take a dolly or two up to Bells and treat them
to a gourmet meal of Slim Jims and Rolling Rock... Breakfast of Champions.
Pier
dollies had the straight skinny on the information that E-3s needed... Sports
scores, what the new cars looked like, baseball scouting prospects, and what
supermarkets were running beer specials. The vital intelligence for anyone who
parked their boots in Hogan's Alley.
I have
always been disgusted with anyone who looked down their nose at a pier
dolly. Those wonderful women were the closest to angels I've ever been next to.
Where in the world would you be able to go and find a smiling, big-busted
bleached blond who would sit in a car for two hours just to wrap her arms
around a foul-smelling line handler, standing under a dim pier light in a
drizzling rain? They were saints and they were truly glad to see you at a time
the rest of the world cared less what you were up to. They gave or sold at
reasonable rates, unreserved, no bullshit love, to guys who weren't exactly
prize packages.
A whore
can sell her wares without stepping over fuel hoses and ration boxes on a cold
pier at 2300 Zulu. You can bet your thirteen-button blues on that, horsefly.
I am damn
near sixty years old and no one in my life ever welcomed me and made me feel
ten feet high and bulletproof like those gals did. In my book, they are and
always will be, shameless gals who did a helluva lot more in Cold War service
than a lot of the worthless sonuvabitches out there taking all the bows.
And you
returned to the boat... Dropped below, your foul weather jacket reeking of dime-store perfume... Cheap red lipstick smeared ear to ear all over an unshaven
face only a mother could love... And the coffee tasted great and all was right
with the world.
Sure, the
little woman out in the kitchen fixing your dinner would never understand. She
never lived on the snorkel for weeks at a time in a forgotten world. But you
did... We did. And the world was a better place when there were women who
waited to welcome worthless bastards on the bitter ends of heaving lines.
My idea
of heaven is a mental picture of Saint Peter on an ivory pier standing up to
his armpits in the middle of a bunch of perky busted pier dollies yelling,
"Put
your lines over when you can."
If any
woman reads this whoever stood out there on a dark pier waiting on incoming smoke boat bluejackets, God bless you, darling...
