As you may recall, my father was born in Rotterdam and grew up in the Netherlands. 
Soon after the liberation of the Netherlands from Nazi occupation, my dad signed up to join the Royal Dutch Navy. He had turned eighteen, and was ready for adventure.Yesterday, as we sat around the table after having lunch together, Daddy waxed full speed ahead into a storytelling mood, and I heard one I hadn't heard before: The story of the sailor and the toilet brush. I think it's as good a story as any for ending the year 2006. Are you ready?
The Dutch are known for being very compulsive about keeping their ships clean. One day, as their navy ship was off the coast of Africa, the sailor in charge of cleaning the toilets went up on deck to clean his toilet brush. He was hitting it against a cable as part of the cleaning regimen when it suddenly bounced out of his hand and flew overboard.
"The toilet brush!" hollered the sailor. "It's the only one on board!"
The sailors standing around froze, horrified at what this meant, as they still had far to go on this tour of duty. Without further thought the sailor who'd lost the brush jumped overboard and started swimming with the current, singlemindedly going after the toilet brush.The intrepid sailor did indeed manage to grab ahold of his toilet brush, but then he turned and had to fight the current to swim back to the navy vessel. He struggled, making very little headway as the other sailors and the captain stood on deck, watching the drama.
"Shouldn't we send a lifeboat out to pick him up?" a sailor queried the captain.
"Why? He hasn't asked for help," replied the captain.
As they watched, a souvenir skiff approached their vessel from shore, bearing a local man who was coming out to sell his souvenirs. The sailor in the water, brush in hand, spotted the skiff and swam over to it. As he tried to pull himself into the little boat, he managed to overturn the boat, the man, and the souvenirs.
What a plight! Now there were two men flailing in the water, one with the toilet brush and one having just lost his livelihood."HELP!" cried the sailor in the water.
"Put down the rescue boat," ordered the captain.
So they did. The sailors rescued both men and the overturned skiff. But the souvenirs were gone for good, somewhere on the bottom of the Indian Ocean. The sailors took up a collection to help the souvenir man get started again.
"And that's how it is," finished my dad. "When you need help from the Captain, it's a good thing to send up a shout and ask for it."
