On a ship at sea, time is extremely relative.
There is only “work time” and “sleep time” and very little occurs outside of the strictly scheduled events to differentiate one day from another. While on deployment, the days drag out and blend together, until entire weeks feel like one long and excruciatingly boring Tuesday afternoon. You find yourself questioning what day it is all too often, and even the small respite of Holiday Routine (stingily dolled out by your superiors like porridge in a London orphanage to Oliver Twist) does little to alleviate the monotony of the all-consuming routine.
Then, all of a sudden and with no warning, it is Friday again.
There is no change in the schedule, the day’s list of activities and the ever-regenerative to-do list remains the same, but as the morning turns to afternoon there is a palpable feeling of excitement in the air. On the face of every passing Sailor in the passageway and in the voices echoing out of compartments and offices throughout the haze grey city, there is a lively and apprehensive electricity. Something different is about to happen.
Friday night is pizza night. Pizza night is, without question, the one thing most looked forward to by deployed Sailors except perhaps for the ultimate salvation of a port call.
The smell begins to waft though the ventilation system around 1400, distant and teasingly faint at first. Then, by 1530 and the quickly approaching beginning of chow time, it has crept into every compartment and ladder well on the vessel.
1600 arrives, at last, like a pristine and beautiful Christmas morning remembered from a picture perfect childhood, and the lines begin to form in earnest and the cooks begin to carve up and dish out the doughy slabs of happiness slathered in a rich sauce of hope. You will sit with your friends and enjoy a slice, joking about whatever silly thing happened in the shop recently.
Inside jokes build around shared experiences, until you and your tribe begin to speak in an almost secret language, gibberish to those at the next table. Then, just for a little while, you could easily be sitting at a bar together, it is Friday night after all, maybe going to see a movie. On Pizza Night everything is OK and all is right with the world.
Time lends perspective.
Looking back I know that the ship pizza was average at best. If I am completely honest with myself, I knew it then too.
But it is through the small reminders of real life, be it a slice of pizza or a favorite movie, that deployed Sailors remind themselves that the situation is temporary and only part of the job, and that maybe just one more week won’t be that bad.
They will make it through the next week, as they have all of the previous weeks. And then, just when they begin to think they can’t possibly stand another day of the routine, it is Friday again.
And Friday night, as everybody knows, is Pizza Night.