Tara

By Daniel J. Decampo

Waking up is hard to do for some reason. I always manage to wake up and relieve Kim a couple of minutes late for the watch. Luckily he’s a super chill dude and is never in a rush to really go anywhere and I do cover for him if he needs it. I just feel shitty about the whole not waking up thing.

I definitely do not get enough sleep. I try but, my mind is a whirlwind of crazy thoughts. Last night I went a little crazy thinking about Tara and what the fuck ever happened to her. She was nice and I definitely took her for granted.

I first met Tara at a place called the Soundview in the lovely town of Everett, WA. We met sometime towards the end of the summer and the year was 2011. I don’t recall meeting her. I don’t even remember making the decision to go to the Soundview, being there,  our meeting, or the walk back to her place. Needless to say, I went pretty hard back in those days but, that doesn’t matter right now.

I have vague memories of fucking around with her back at her place but, no idea what time it was or anything like that. When I woke up and was aware of my surroundings, I realized I was on a mattress, on the floor, of a living room and her mentioning getting up and getting ready for work. At this time I realized that I did not remember her name at all.

The only thing I could think to do was look for mail. I found a letter with her first name on it and I was good to go. She ended up quizzing me on her name later.

We sat around for a few and she headed to work. I meandered to Starbucks and had some coffee, went back to the ship, changed and went back out for more debauchery.

We went on date a few days later. It was a restaurant called the China Girl in downtown Everett. Had a super Asian feel to it and they served really good food. The date went well, we both had a good time and I sent her on her way.

Thinking of Tara always brings up painful regrets. This was a girl totally into me, she liked to have fun, she liked to drink, she liked to fuck. She was smart and had a good job yet, I only ever went to her place to crash and fuck around. I guess I was always looking for the next best thing and that, sure as shit, did not happen in Everett.

When I left that town, I totally broke contact with her. She texted me some kind words before I left and I deleted her number. A few days later I arrived in San Diego and had a text from her, although I deleted her number, I still recognized it. It was a pretty simple, “I miss you” text; I just deleted it and carried on. I don’t know whatever happened to her but, wherever she is, I sure hope she’s doing well.

To change the subject, the morning has consisted of CSOOW watch, 0900 to 1200. Combat Systems Officer of the watch, one the “milestone qualifications” of a Sailors career on the briny blue.

In a nutshell, a CSOOW is trained to be a super knowledgeable, intrusive asshole when it comes to the maintenance of a warship’s combat systems. Getting qualified is hard and staying qualified has proved to be hard as well.

I don’t really mean a CSOOW is supposed to be an asshole, just have the attitude of not taking any shit from the technicians. Have procedures; don’t do anything dangerous, blah, blah, blah. It’s not a bad thing; I just don’t feel like writing about now.