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NON F ICT ION
Battleships and Billfish By Stephanie Sellars
Pop-Pop took me to the Intrepid. The World War II aircraft carrier turned museum permanently in port in the Hudson River at West 46th Street in Manhattan. I always thought of the Intrepid as a battleship, probably because my brother and I used to play the board game “Battleship” with Pop-Pop and the tiny ships were long and gray just like the Intrepid. According to my mother, I was about eight years old, staying at her parents’ house in Brooklyn when Pop-Pop drove me to the Intrepid. The car was enormous to me, like a ship. I remember the color as gray, but it was a late 60s copper Chevrolet. I sank into the ash and mauve or tan seat and inhaled the cigarette and cigar smell that permeated everything. The smoke failed to mask his particular smell of public toilet and oily skin. I was glad to be in the passenger seat with the windows open. The ride seemed like hours, even though it was only about forty minutes. He had a cigar butt hanging from his mouth. He was wearing gray polyester slacks, a Cuban style shirt and beat-up loafers. I don’t think he wore a seat belt but he made me wear mine. We didn’t talk much. He kept changing the radio from one fuzzy station
