31st of May ‘10
Mon 12:55
learning
inspiration
a Navy man
The best part about my job is the people I meet. There is one older man in particular I feel compelled to write about. After spending just a few days in his company, I felt that this is the kind of person I want to be when I grow up. I’m not sure if I’ve ever felt this way before, even when I was much younger. I may have wanted a particular achievement or trait of someone I looked up to, but never in such an all-encompassing way.
I’m not very good at guessing ages, but he must have been in in his mid-to-late 60s. He was tall, but I could tell that he was even taller in his youth by the way his back curved into a slight hunch in his shoulders. He moved at a regular pace—never slow, but with purpose. You got the feeling that he knew exactly what he was doing at all times.
When he spoke, it was difficult not to listen. He had a pleasant voice, that rolled and rumbled from within him, the way it does with older people—just enough to suggest his age, but otherwise having all the power and energy of someone much younger. He was clear and articulate, and as confident in his spoken word as in his action, which served him well as an interpreter. Before he left, I told him that I admired him very much and hoped to be like him one day, though I couldn’t explain why at the moment. I don’t think I’ve ever been as honest and revealing before, but I could trust that he would understand. He explained that he was a Navy man. As the captain of a ship in the middle of the ocean, he had nobody to rely on but himself and God. He served for 19 years, and recalled them as the best years of his life. Without a hint of pride, he said that some of those who had served with him named their sons after him, and that it was a feeling he could not explain. If I had met this man sooner, I just might have joined the Navy.
That was about the only conversation I had with him. He thanked me for approaching him, which he must have taken as a compliment, and he greeted me at the end of the evening with a hug and a kiss on either cheek the way Italians do. He reminded me of my grandfather, a gentleman in every sense of the word.