Saturday, July 29, 2017

Japan Story 6

The Six Month Leave.

My father worked as a passenger agent for the Canadian Pacific Steamship Company.   Every five years he was allowed to take his family on an extended vacation and free first class passage on any Canadian Pacific or other reciprocating transportation companies, anywhere in the world.

I do not remember the first trip the three of us took, since I was twenty months old.  We must have stopped in Hawaii, since there is a photograph of me running towards my father on the deck of a big ship.  I am wearing a lei.  We traveled on to England to visit my grandmother, who by that time was a widow.  We visited her near a beach, Ainsley, I seem to remember.

Five years later my parents had planned to visit her again.  It was the summer of 1940 and I was turning seven.  I loved any kind of travel, big ships being my favorite.  I slept on an upper berth, and read my Shirley Temple book about how she studied her lines for the next day's movie shoot.  The gong would sound outside the cabin door announcing dinner, and my parents, dressed elegantly, would bid me goodnight and head out for an evening of dining and dancing.

Every morning in the little hammock by my berth there would be a doll, a Norah Welling character doll sold as a set of six.  I have one of the originals left.  Crossing the Pacific took ten days, and I loved every moment.  I would sit on the window seat in the first class lounge and watch the enormous waves as the ship heaved and tossed.  I do not every remember being seasick.  I would hang over the rail on calmer days and watch  the wake boiling aft, and the endless empty horizon.

My mother was no stranger to long ocean passages, having worked as Lizzy Mint for two years, on the passenger ship The Mauretania.  A Lizzy Mint was the nickname for the Captain's personal secretary, a coveted position, which required multiple skills.  She could type at astonishing speed, take dictation using Pitman shorthand, could keep books and was never, ever caught in a spelling mistake.  The daughter of a literary man, the Chief Librarian of the Liverpool Library, she was possessed of a deep understanding of grammar and syntax, and like most educated British, an enormous vocabulary which I was able to absorb.  She also had beautiful handwriting.  She dined with the Captain every night, and met the likes of Charlie Chaplain, and other famous people who  were invited to his table.

to be continued.....