Gerald

Meeting the man you wrote a song about

I've been rambling around the Lake District in northern England recently, and for one night my companion and I decided to splurge and stay at the Borrowdale Gates Inn. It's a fancy place. Looking around at dinner, wearing my “POUTINE!” t shirt and cargo shorts, I got the distinct impression that I was not among my own social class. One of the poor overworked staff brought out this incredibly intricate multicolored fish dinner and the woman he brought it to, I shit you not, sighed and rolled her eyes at him. Sam, if you ever read this, man, I'm sorry you have to spend your days bending over backwards for barmy old bellends.

But one older fella seemed to lack all the finery and dress of the upper crust, and the morning we left he wandered into the lounge and said hello to us. This interaction quickly turned into one of those conversations that reminds you of how much you have to learn from older generations.

A sailor and a dockyard worker his whole life, Gerald regaled us with tales of steering through the Panama canal, endless drinking at ports all over the world, and of finally returning home to Newcastle to marry the girl he'd been “courting for years". And it was there, he told us, that he took up shipyard work.

Of course, just for the hell of it, I had to ask: “Did you do any work at the Wallsea or Wall End yards?”. And of course, of COURSE, he replied:

“Yeh sure… biggest boat I ever worked on was built there.” And my companion and I knew what was going to come out of his mouth before he said it: “The Esso Northumbria.”

You really can't make this stuff up. I wrote a whole damn song about these workers, and here one was, staring me in the face.

Gerald told me a few things I didn't know about the Northumbria. The first is that her propellors were so massive that they had to build a separate boat just to move and attach them. The second is that Princess Anne did indeed christen the boat with a bottle of champagne, as I sing in the song, but that she apparently was late to the launching and visibly uninterested in yet another ceremonial proceeding.

The third and most interesting was that the Esso Northumbria was so large that when they launched her, sideways, the huge bulk rolling into the sea created massive waves which swamped the streets on the other side of the harbor. This caused a great deal of damage and required the city to spend a bunch of money compensating home and business owners. A completely unforseen circumstance, and a reminder that even the sharpest minds don't think of everything.

Anyway, I offered to play the song for Gerald on my phone speakers. I was sure he'd be honoured that someone so many years his junior had made the effort to commemorate him and his comrades in song. His reply will be forever etched in my mind:

“Nah, that's all right lad, don't bother.”

Cheers, Gerald.