OUR CAPTAIN

An anonymous man is he
Who knows right well the sea.
Don’t know our captain’s name,
But we’ll have him to blame
If we sink into the sea.

Actually, I do know his name, but I only learned it this morning after writing this poem. First I happened to see the captain’s name briefly in fairly small print on a video screen. When I got around to writing it down a couple hours later, I had forgotten. So I asked the gal at the reception desk to write it for me. She had to call it up on her computer screen to spell it correctly. Our captain is Arnvid Hansen. Certainly sounds Norwegian, as it should.

This isn’t Love Boat. Nor is it like any of the other cruises I’ve been on in this respect.. No captain’s reception. No photos with the captain. The captain has never spoken to us or been introduced to us or mentioned or described to us or pointed out to us passengers. I’ve seen no photos of him. (It was the first officer who presided at the initial gathering where the rest of the crew was introduced.)

As we were docking at Port Williams, I looked up into the extended dock-side corner of the bridge and saw the captain. (One assumes the captain takes personal charge at such times.) I later saw him at lunch at the table reserved for the ship’s officers.

:-)