Month: May 2017

Calm Down, Pat

During the 42 years I worked as a newspaperman I made a couple of wrong turns into editing, once for eight months, once for 18 months. I thought it was time to try to start working my way up the management ladder. I had done all right at reporting so they pretty much had to give me a shot.

I didn’t like editing and, truth be told, I wasn’t all that good at it.

As a reporter it got to the point where I rarely had to work with anybody I didn’t respect, who couldn’t carry their end of the stick. As an editor it wasn’t that way, I had to make do with the reporters I was given — some of whom were excellent, some of whom were, I’m being generous, pretty average.

There wasn’t anything I could do about that. It was frustrating. I couldn’t fire them or discipline them. And I didn’t have the temperament for holding someone’s hand, coaxing good work out of them or, at least, better work.

This is what one reporter said I needed.
A reporter told me I needed less of one and more of the other.

Maybe I was a little too intense.

I got into a dispute in The News & Observer parking lot one afternoon with another N&O employee who had parked in my spot twice.

“You better calm down,” he told me, “before you have a coronary.”

A reporter who worked for me, at least in theory, told me the same thing, but more gently. He said I ought to get a dog and quit drinking coffee.

Coming Friday: A Language He Understood

 

The Ice Cream Officer

The officer in charge of the Executive Division on the USS Los Angeles was a mustang, a commissioned officer who began his career as an enlisted man, and he was as drunk as could be.

His last name was Lemorande. His first name, at least as far as I was concerned, was Lieutenant. He was a good officer.

Lt. Lemorande
Lemorande. His first name was Lieutenant.

It was close to midnight when he stumbled into the compartment where JO3 Gary Greve, my boss, and I were hanging out, drinking coffee, smoking Crook cigars, and listening to the sweet sound of the Percy Faith Orchestra.

The lieutenant joined us. For a little while, at least, it seemed like he wanted to be an enlisted man again. He told us he wanted some ice cream and didn’t we want some too?

Well, sure, we said. But there was no way for us to get ice cream. The enlisted men’s mess deck was closed.

The officers have ice cream, Lt. Lemorande said. Let’s go get some.

Enlisted men were not allowed to wander in officer country, but Lt. Lemorande ordered us to follow him, so we did.

Their wardroom was closed too, of course. But there was a hole in a half door through which food was passed out of the galley and Lt. Lemorande, in full uniform, wiggled through it. He found bowls, silverware — and ice cream — and soon the three of us were on our way back to our compartment.

The ice cream was good but now Gary and I had a problem. What were we supposed to do with the spoons and bowls, which obviously belonged to the officers’ mess?

The lieutenant looked at me like I was an idiot.

“Throw them overboard!” he said.

And we did.

Coming Monday: Calm Down, Pat.