The Only Constant Is Change

I’ve been onboard for a couple of weeks now. This is my first time onboard a cruise ship since the pandemic “pause”. The ship I am on has been sailing a lovely California Coastal cruise. Things are relatively normal onboard. I can go see a show and I can eat in a specialty restaurant. Some things are different – mingling with guests is slightly more limited than before and mingling with crew is different and a bit restricted, too. But, as much is different, much is the same.

Disclosure: My views do not necessarily represent those of my employer.

For me though I’m deciding that the relatively normalcy is the part that is not normal.

As odd as my life used to be living part of the year on a cruise ship and working on a cruise ship there was some sense of normalcy to it. There were differences between ships and contracts and differences between spending a week in the Caribbean and months on a World Cruise but there was some amount of normalcy to it. Then the pandemic took all of that and shattered it.

Yesterday was a home port day – one group of guests left the ship, and one group joined. There were people sad to leave their vacation and people happy to be starting one. The circle of emotions happening over the course of a few hours.

Change of Plans…

The ship I am on right now isn’t the ship that I am going to spend the bulk of this contract on. There are still ships that haven’t restarted in this post-pause world and the one I will spend most of my contract on has yet to return to service. So, they sent me to this lovely Coastal California cruise for a few weeks to train in my new job. (Yay new job! It’s going well, thanks for asking. 🙂 )

After sailing as spouse on board a bit and then being onboard for the initial layup -and as I was reminded last night, the biggest non-war time repatriation effort in history – this felt like the start of my next chapter in the book of my life at sea.

Oh, this next chapter isn’t going to be what I thought it was though. The normalcy of these few weeks is the odd-ball. It’s like an intermission between these unprecedented situations.

Last week it was announced that one of the ships from the Holland America Line fleet is going to be acting as temporary housing for Ukranian refugees for three months. Cancelling nearly two months of cruises to work with the government of the Netherlands to help these people going through a more horrific time than I will (hopefully) ever know in my lifetime.

I fly to join that ship on Sunday.

I don’t know what to expect. When I was 22 applying for cruise ship jobs there was no box to check for whether or not you wanted to work on a ship helping refugees of an unprovoked invasion escape their country.

I’m also so incredibly grateful that life and fate and whatever else you believe in with life has made it so I am going to be on this ship for this effort. I have no idea how to mentally prepare myself for the situation, just to think that it will likely be simultaneously heartbreaking and heartwarming. Big, huge, giant bonus – my husband will also be on this ship (he’s actually already there). Couples that go through ‘unprecedented times’ together, stay together? Is that a thing?

I’m in an ‘unprecedented times’ in life sandwich. (Is anyone else sick of that phrase? It’s felt overused but I don’t know how else to describe this.) My last time onboard was on a ship sitting nearly empty in Manila Bay with crew desperate to get home in uncertain pandemic times and now I will be going on this ship (a nearly exact sister ship) that will be filled to the max to provide housing to these people that’s homes have been destroyed in war-times.

And yet tonight I will get dressed up for Gala Night, go see a show, maybe sit and have a glass of wine. For the next few days I will enjoy my time onboard (and continue learning from my awesome trainer), in this moment of relative normalcy.