Insane time on a carrier - 2008-2011

After I got out of the Navy, I was resentful of my command. When I told people what happened, many either acted like it was taboo to talk about or simply didn't believe me. The stories sounded too absurd to be true. So I stopped telling them. But every one of them happened exactly as I remember. You don't forget experiences like those.

I'm going to tell two stories as succinctly as I can. ​These are nowhere near the worst things that happened to me, but they paint a good picture of the day to day.

I was in an incredibly violent department. Anytime you had an issue the training command would tell you to, "go handle it." Which meant go fight the person. But I wasn't going to fight people over every little thing.

On my first deployment in 2008, they told us to stop cutting our own hair in the head at one point. I forget exactly why but it was just like a temporary ban of cutting our own hair or each other's hair.

I somehow found time to go to the ship's Barber Shop. I'm white and the guy cutting my hair was a black man who had gotten to the ship the same time as me. Once he had finished cutting my hair he just started lining me up without even asking me. And I didn't want to be a jerk or stop him mid way so I just let him do it. There was one other "barber" in the shop. I would look over and he would be sneaking glances out of the corner of his eye because it was shocking/unusual to him that a white guy was getting a lineup.

The moment I stepped out of the barbershop I was terrified to go back to my berthing. I was afraid that people would think I was trying to be funny and that a group of people were going to beat the crap out of me. So I turned right to walk aft and then I said to myself I've got to go back sometime. So I just turned the other way and walked straight to my birthing.

I go up the stairs and I walk to our lounge ready for a physical fight with a group of people. But instead, everyone formed a circle around me and said that it was the best lineup they had seen on the ship. They wanted to know who had done it. Then the funny thing was, a month later one of the guys said, "Remember when Sam had that fresh-ass lineup?"

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On my second deployment there was a period where we were on port and starboard watches. This meant that you had watch every 5 hours.

On my ship, for some reason people didn't treat it like we were deployed and dropping bombs on people

They didn't factor in that a subset of people were standing watch and working 24/7 and didn't have time to really eat or sleep or shower or do laundry.

So I was having to shave three times a day because if I had one piece of stubble on my face I would get screamed at for 35 minutes by some officer on the bridge at the top of their lungs. I'm not saying that I was growing facial hair super fast. I'm saying that if I had the tiniest bit of stubble on my face like one little hair it was game over. So to be safe I was having to shave three times a day.

My face was red, raw, dry, just f***** up. You could only get a no-shave chit between 9:00 and 9:30 on a tuesday. Which it was very difficult to get down there at that time when you have watch every 5 hours.

So I get down there one day and I explain my situation to this guy who happens to be another race than me. And he says, "But you ain't got no hair on your face."

And I explained to this man that I do not have hair on my face because I just came from watch and I was obligated to shave everyday if I do not have a No Shave chit. And then he just repeats himself, but you ain't got no hair on your face. And I explained myself again. I just came from the bridge where the captain is, I also am obligated by the rules to shave everyday that's why I'm here right now.

But all he would say was but you ain't got no hair on your face. He wouldn't say anything else. So finally I start to walk out all defeated when this man walks in past me who happens to be the same race as the other guy. The corpsman asks a guy what are you doing and the guy says, "aw nothing just chilling ".

They do this kind of hand slap and then the corpsman gives him a No Shave chit.

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People just didn't factor in what your day today was. I once had a 2am to 6am watch. I had seen an anchor immediately after. I got relieved late so I didn't get any breakfast and then I went to see an anchor and got yelled at for being late. Then see an anchor lasted hours so the galley closed for lunch.

It's like 3:00 in the afternoon at this point and I'm walking through the hanger Bay carrying some heavy ass equipment to put away. And this chief select stops me and just starts screaming at me because I had stubble on my face.

You could try to explain to yourself to people but they weren't going to hear you. You know but I did try to tell her that I shaved when I got up which was 1:00 a.m. but of course she cut me off and is screaming saying you didn't shave when you woke up. Because she didnt ever stop to tealize we werent all starting our days at 8am.

I had literally been going 14 hours Non-Stop and I'm standing in this Hangar Bay holding this heavy ass piece of equipment while this chief select just screams at me about responsibility. Which was totally ironic.