We rushed up to Aberdeen and demobilised the diving and mooring spread in record time. I’m glad we did because we’ve been sat here for eleven days off-hire, with another few days to go before it looks like we’ll sail. The Shetland job is cancelled now, so it looks like we’ll be ‘rock-bagging’ out of Hull next week.
‘Rock-bagging’, means we’ll be going out to an unprotected gas pipeline, which is currently floating around somewhere in the North Sea transporting huge amounts of gas with no shielding from anchors or fishermen until we come along and cover it with rocks. For all you Nordstream Pipeline aficionados, I’ll hopefully take some photos so you can see what kind of armour these pipelines are protected by. Basically, they’re big bags full of granite blocks, several feet thick.
Having powered through all of the stupid little admin jobs I have to do, I’ve had sufficient time to explore my former home city of Aberdeen.
When I came back to sea last year to take my first command, it felt like a lot of things lined up just perfectly, to make it happen. I have always taken that kind of alignment as an instinctive signal that I’m on the right path. And now, it seems, I’m at another natural crossroads. I don’t know what’s next, but that’s OK. We’ll figure it out.
I’ve come quite nicely full circle, in a fitting kind of way.
I started going to sea on HMS Archer in 2003, as an officer cadet in the University Royal Naval Unit. My first trip was a ten-day deployment in April 2004, and I really wasn’t sure about it. There were moments when I absolutely hated it. The discipline, the rough weather, the long hours, and being totally outside of my comfort zone at least ten times per day. But strangely, as soon as that first trip was over, I missed it. By the time I finished university, seafaring was more important to me than my degree.
Between finishing my degree and joining the Merchant Navy I worked for a Marine Risk Analysis company as an AIS technician. My first graduate job utilised my marine science degree and my naval training. I spent several weeks with an old, retired Merchant Navy captain, camped out on a cliff-top farm in the East Riding of Yorkshire. We set up a makeshift radar and AIS tracking station on the back of a truck and camped out in the farmer’s barn. The old man, Richard, and I used to take turns at six-hour shifts through the hours of daylight. We were conducting surveillance of fishing vessels in Bridlington Bay so that when an offshore wind farm was being developed, compensation could be paid only to vessels demonstrated to be fishing within the area of the wind farm before construction disrupted the use of the grounds.
Naturally, it being a rural community, word soon spread from the farmers to the neighbouring hamlets and villages, right the way up the coast to Brid. After about ten days of near silence on the proposed development site, boom! Suddenly, every boat owner and his dog within thirty nautical miles decided the fishing conditions were perfect in the exact little three-mile square patch in Bridlington Bay. Literally every little boat that could fish, and some that couldn’t, had gotten wind of the development, and our survey, and descended upon the surveillance location.
In the end, there were so many, I gave up trying to record their registration numbers through my telescope, and just took a walk around Bridlington Harbour when they got back to port and photographed them all.
I’m sure each and every one of them was fairly compensated for the loss of fishing grounds that they had thoroughly enjoyed for generations. Or, at least, for one day.
Twenty years after first sailing as an officer cadet, and fifteen years after that survey, I’ve come back to the same two locations.
We completed our subsea construction just a few miles up the coast from that same wind farm in Bridlington Bay. Only now, the offshore wind farm is operational and has been paying for itself (finally) for several years. I wasn’t a spectator, but a participant. I am no longer the cadet, but the Captain.
The arrival manoeuvre into Aberdeen was absolutely the easiest bit of ship handling I’ve done in years. It was a nice feeling, to be so comfortable in your own competence, coming back into the harbour where I started out so nervously all those years ago.
The Navy no longer sails out of Aberdeen, but the port is thriving after a recent expansion to the South. The world fleet is larger than ever, and despite covid slowdown and an oil price crash in 2015-16, this Scottish-Scandinavian city is slowly beginning to get back on its feet after a bit of a tough time.
My former employer, the marine risk analysis firm, called me up out of the blue and asked if I’d consider becoming their principal marine consultant. The two owners are retiring, and they’re handing over the business to an employee-owned trust. Their current principal consultant is moving up to CEO, and they asked me to replace her.
I went to their office while my ship had some downtime and had a lovely meeting. Captain Richard, my old survey companion, passed away recently. However, before he shuffled off, he produced a historical document recording all of the surveys he’d done for the company. It even included a photograph of me, complete with a ridiculously full head of hair, and minus the 35-inch waistline! I think I was only an A-cup back then, too. One of the owners and I indulged in some serious moments of nostalgia for a good while.
I had noticed among the student bubble that nostalgia is back in fashion. The clothing is deeply inspired by the 1980s, and mullets, mohawks and moustaches are back in. Even Noel Edmond’s jumpers appear to have made a comeback. The kids are longing for the last era within living memory when masculinity and femininity were unashamedly part of the culture.
Richard was a gentleman, also a bit of a poet, and he offered me some great advice when I was first starting out. It was nice to see a company that has grown steadily over the past 20 years had not lost its ability to care for and remember its people.
One of the owners, who will be stepping back, said he’d followed my career and thought very highly of me. He said ‘We found you very disruptive when you worked for us. I remember you being very blunt, asking about costs and pricing, and so on. The company was very new back then, and we were still insecure about sharing that kind of information with employees, but you didn’t care. But looking back, you clearly had a commercial mind. We think you’d be good for us now. Disruptive can be good, and I think we need that now. And the guys would frankly be in awe of your knowledge and experience’.
What can you say to that?
Each evening we’ve been alongside, I finish my dinner and take a four or five-mile walk along the beach. Sometimes rounding off up the river Don, back through Seaton Park, and down Old Aberdeen High Street, where I went to University. That evening, after I met with my former colleagues, I had an interesting moment of insight.
My wife has been having the hardest time with the kids recently. My eldest daughter is eight years old and is now becoming quite active in after-school activities. Our youngest daughter is two, with the physical strength of a chimpanzee the same age and the attitude of a 1930s Romany gangster from Birmingham. Our four-year-old son is caught in the middle, an artistic soul, with no dad around to channel his natural male destructive power into constructive outlets. (At least when I’m away).
Some evenings I’ve spent talking to my wife, as she narrowly fends off a panic attack. Other nights, she doesn’t want to talk to me at all because she just needs some silence during the fleeting moment she gets between putting the kids to bed and her own early bedtime, in anticipation of interrupted sleep and a 5 am start.
The coastguard wrote to me and confirmed that I only need just one more trip, and I can apply for my unlimited Master Mariner license.
A test is laid before me. As clear as day.
Will I sacrifice the health and well-being of my wife for longer than necessary? Will I care more about my ego, than my wife and kids? Or do I have to sacrifice a passion so that I can actually practice what I profess to believe in?
Ah, but! We also want a bigger house. And those aren’t getting any cheaper. An unlimited ticket opens more doors, it’s true.
Truth be told, it’s not a very tough decision. I’ve told them how much money I want. If they don’t give it to me, I have other business projects I want to pursue. I’ve offered them some dates as a freelancer before we commit to anything serious. However, I can see the story.
One of the biggest criticisms of the symbolic is that to engage in symbolic thought is just as reductionist as the materialist purism that it critiques. That symbolism ‘explains away’.
The rebuttal?
Symbolism actually happens.
I started in Aberdeen as a catechumen of the sea. Nervous, naïve and partially uncommitted. I started in Bridlington on land, as a novice. I have returned to Bridlington by sea, and to Aberdeen as a Master. I have been recognised by the people who sent me to Brid as a novice, returning as an authority. And they have invited me home to share and teach and build.
I cannot think of a greater compliment. Santa has asked me to lead his sleigh, tonight. I was really touched by the sincerity of the conversations we had, and the respect afforded me by people who took a chance on me back when I really knew nothing.
What I have recognised is that any extra credibility I might get from obtaining a higher license is held in higher esteem largely by people who don’t have a clue what they’re talking about anyway. The British Coastguard is a shadow of its former self. Nearly a laughingstock. Entirely resented by the average British seafarer and shipping company. Their licensing system is so antiquated as to be a joke and held in contempt by other nations who now view Britain’s pandering to corporate interests as akin to a flag of convenience state. Big ship skippers do hee-haw anyway. 90% of their manoeuvres are done by marine pilots, and not the skipper. Unless you’re on passenger ships, I do more ship handling in one trip than some captains do in an entire career. The rest of it, on some ships, can just be about filling out stupid spreadsheets on a boat and being legally on the hook for things that are outside of your control. Yes, emergencies happen, and you have to do the action man shizzle. But not nearly as often as you might try to convince your wife or favourite barmaid.
I do want to keep my license, and I’ll probably upgrade at some point. But it can wait another year. I have scratched the itch of ego enough for now. And if this summer doesn’t pan out, I’ll just go back to sea when the little terrors all start in school and nursery.
But, really, I think, I’ve learned what I’m going to learn. I’ve gotten the gist of it. It would simply now be a matter of scaling up or repetition of the pattern. My growth in this area is at something of a plateau.
I already felt like something needed to change. This outfit is not for me. Their safety culture is atrocious, by European standards. Recently I did some teaching, and it truly surprised me. There was beauty in that.
The beauty of youth lies in potential. The beauty of age (or at least, of mileage), lies in building something to serve that potential.
As I strolled through the grounds of St Machar’s cathedral, I heard some loud yelping over my podcast. ‘Help! I’m locked in’! The Church of Scotland Wifeys had neglected to do a headcount as they locked up for the evening and had incarcerated one of their fellows in the church.
Postgrads aren’t nearly as smart as they think they are.
Having a stroll around the old campus, and having a ‘hauf an’ a hauf’ at the old St Machar bar, reminded me of the discomfort of youth.
How much weakness, folly and failure are driven by the youthful need for approval? The insecurity of neglect, that asks, Am I enough?
Am I smart enough? Am I strong enough? Am I good enough? Will I find love? Will I find success?
(BTW: Yes, you can. Just have the kind of faith that says, ‘We’ll figure it out when we get there’).
The stoics and the materialists in the current men’s movement online would essentially say, no. The inflationary world we live in has become a philosophical driver, and homo-economicus has evolved to mirror the ‘continuous exponential growth’ spoken of by Tim Price this week. We are never enough. Our goals are not big enough. Our mindset can always be better. Who dares in his affirmations, wins. Supplements, rise and grind, affirmations, crystals, cause and effect.
The bleached teeth, six-pack abs, Navy-Seal worshipping fraternity of Bro-ship exported from the failing state of commie-California is near pornographic in its idolatry for material and external markers of success. The narcissus mirror of the smartphone and social media cleaves this clump of Californian emptiness to us, permanently pressing through our pockets. A ceaseless companion of comparison and neuroticism. Influencers and followers are cult terms. Likes, cancellations, keyboard combat. Hollow hallows.
The constant stream of novelty, photoshopped perfection, and limitless optimism, glowing from the five-inch edifice of the edited world vibrates our dopaminergic dose to shower us with Pavlovian promise and bring us sliding back down into its insufferable grip on our attention like a spider failing to escape from a slippery bathtub. When nothing is sacred, there is no anchor. Entertainment and fashion capture all of our attention, like methamphetamine.
Vanity is vanilla. I like Tabasco. Ugliness is honest.
Aberdeen is the opposite of California, despite the beaches. Or at least, the California I remember before the fentanyl, sanctuary city, homeless, pride and porn problems hit their recent highs.
Aberdeen also has its fair share of recreational spoon-burners, but it retains an air of longevity and endurance that has a real beauty to it. A tortured and grey beauty, but a beauty as solid as the granite cobbles that line the roads.
The harbour authority dates its origin to the year 1136 when King David the First of Scotland – who from memory is the one who built Edinburgh’s Royal Mile to the length of an ancient Egyptian mile and used Holyrood Park to hunt deer in – granted the right of the Bishops of Aberdeen to charge a tithe to ships using the harbour. The Shore Porter’s Society, also based here at the harbour, is one of Britain’s oldest continuously running companies, founded in 1498. That’s three years after the University was founded, and six years after Columbus landed in America. They’ll help you move house for as little as £300, and there isn’t the slightest Tony Soprano vibe that longshoremen in the States have tended to cultivate.
The town has changed a lot since I last lived here, fifteen years ago. There is a lot more melanin in the skin tone of the average person you encounter on the street. Although, as I walked past Mounthooly roundabout, and recalled being mugged by a junkie who tried to kill me with a twelve-inch bread knife, just half an hour after my girlfriend of 3 years dumped me at the end of term, I thought, it feels a lot safer round here.
Several industrial buildings, and a hardware store now house halal shops. The TSB bank branch is now a Polish supermarket. The Khyber Pass takeaway next to my old halls of residence looks identical but has changed ownership. Not only did my chicken pakora not contain any human teeth, as it once did, but the new owner and I had an excellent theological discussion about the acceptance of the resurrection of Christ while I waited for my pizza.
And when I got the bus back to the beach and walked down to the harbour, everyone was Black, brown or foreign in some way. And that meant they were all sober. And I didn’t even once, remotely, feel as though I was about to get involved in a knife fight. Underwater or otherwise. Which was a pleasant and unfamiliar feeling in certain parts of town. And in nearly two weeks here at the harbour, I haven’t even seen one prostitute, in what used to be a literal ‘safe-zone’, where the police granted amnesty for all such activity and the streets were positively rammed with them. Perhaps that’s one positive result of the recession.
Tonight, despite temperatures of about 10°C, the beach was alive with joggers, windsurfers and wild swimmers. The Pakistanis were playing cricket next to Codona’s amusements, and Seaton Park had a perfectly maintained rugby field and goals, where our navy unit team used to practice in muddy squalor.
Normally I detest the politicisation of the rainbow symbol. A rainbow does symbolise love, as it shows unity and multiplicity in the shape of a weapon laid to rest. What I hate is the way that this amazing symbol of universal love has been hijacked to mean only one form of radical political ideology, in a way that picks up the bow, instead of leaving it at rest. But in the case of the grey granite city, the home of the dreaded ‘Har’ (a thick fog that encases the city in harrowing horror-movie gloom, even at the height of summer), the rainbow-painted benches and graffiti actually brighten the place up a treat.
When I was here the people of African heritage tended to be Angolans, Ghanaians and Nigerians involved in the oil industry. They came here to study Aberdeen’s world-class energy engineering. Now, they mostly seem to consist of nice English people, fleeing the council estate hellscapes of inner London and Birmingham, seeking work for their families.
My Granny once wondered if what was happening was that the British went out across the world to try to teach and spread Christianity, so that one day, when we lost it, those people would come back to us, and remind us of the way.
In the case of Aberdeen, she might have been onto something.
But many things are still the same. King’s College. St Machar’s tomb. The High Street. Johnstone Hall’s turrets. Marischal college. The Bridge of Don. The Hobbit World of Rocky Shore. The surging strength of the river Dee. The commercial spirit of the energy crossroads of Europe.
The character of this city tells a story. And that story is one of countless storms weathered, and unending challenges to security. A story of survival.
I don’t know what beauty is. I don’t know if it can ever be contained in a single idea. But some elements of beauty that I have noticed include temporality and potential. A built landscape still only half emerged from an unconquered nature is beautiful. A city that speaks of ancient solutions to modern problems. A city of seafarers.
The beauty of a sunrise over the sea is temporary. The colour, the promise, the horizon. The meaning of the adventure of life is presented to us artistically in a fleeting image of the miraculous power of the energy and inexhaustible complexity of this world. The meaning of matter is what matters to us.
There is a beauty that only belongs to ineffable places of refuge, that exists only in the lee. We know to appreciate the beauty of our own home; in the way that moss knows to cling to the rock.
I’m full of joy as I walk down memory lane. And yet, I am at the conclusion of my journey that started here. Now, I care more about the kind of man I want to be than anything adventure. I appreciated the compliment of professional recognition. But I hate my ego for wanting more for myself.
I know my own failings far better than anyone who stands on the outside looking in. Not only am I always failing my wife and kids in companionship, but I necessarily have to fail people around me at sea. Simply going for my walk alone means I’m not giving myself to people who want my attention on the boat.
I have one sailor on board at the moment, who is borderline, I don’t know what it’s supposed to be called in this stupidly over-sensitive age, but what we used to call ‘special-needs’. (Please advise of the current, politically-correct Marxist terminology in the comments below).
The man does not belong at sea, but he has one of those government-issued licenses that I mentioned before, and so he’s here to make up the government-defined numbers.
Nobody likes him, and nobody can tolerate him for much longer. He is an absolute hazard, and old enough to know that he doesn’t belong here. Particularly not on a small ship, where there is no room for passengers, and his every inadequacy means extra work for the people who are actually competent. Every moment has been an excruciating burden, and an effort to find made-up busy work to keep him out of actual harm’s way. I’ve asked the company to remove, and not to re-hire him, ever. He will be gone on Tuesday. But until then, I have to give him the same attention and courtesy that all of my crew need as a minimum. And he is clearly desperate for it.
He’s a burden, and I resent him. But he clearly craves the approval of his captain. A bit of a sad thing for a guy in his sixties, but here we are. It’s a minefield too, because the competent guys need to know that I value them more than I value him. At the same time, manners must be maintained, in order to maintain a culture of respect.
The thing about leadership roles at sea that differs from positions on land, is that we live together, 24/7. So even after a long day of work, you have to share your temporary ‘home’ with your colleagues. There is no downtime or escape. And you can’t maintain a fake persona for very long. So you actually have to change your internal feelings, so that your external impression is always consistent and fair.
I feel bad for failing this sailor in mentorship and companionship. But at the same time, I resent the structure of the credentialing system, the management of the company, and the state of the industry for valuing mere credentials over competence. This can be a dangerous job, and people like this are statistics waiting to happen.
In his book Next Generation Safety Leadership, Australian occupational health and safety psychologist, Clive Lloyd defines a trustworthy manager as displaying:
1. Competence
2. Integrity
3. Benevolence
He quotes Steven Covey on Trust in the workplace:
‘There is one thing that is common to every individual, relationship, team, family, organization, nation, economy, and civilization throughout the world. One thing that which, if removed, will destroy the most powerful government, the most successful business, the most thriving economy, the most influential leadership, the greatest friendship, the strongest character, the deepest love.
On the other hand, if developed and leveraged, that one thing has the potential to create unparalleled success and prosperity in every dimension of life. Yet, it is the least understood, most neglected, and most underestimated possibility of our time. That one thing is trust.’
That is right.
How many of us will never trust our authorities or institutions ever again, after the betrayal of the covid lockdowns? Is there any trust left in our culture? How many of you would have been willing to let Philip Schoefield babysit your kids last week, but not next week?
Quite frankly, not enough of us have clear criteria for trust and distrust. Once lies are discovered, there can be no going back, without repentance.
I have seen first-hand the effects of the sickness of our society manifest in the maritime industry. Our ‘authorities’ not only persist with anti-scientific and counter-productive safety policies, but they also enshrine them in regulation and enforce them. Shipping companies treat their employees like ‘parts’, not people. Disposable, interchangeable, and as a nuisance or hazard.
Almost all self-help literature and corporate or safety management literature takes a similarly materialist, behaviour-based psychological-conditioning approach. The ‘human element’ is treated as the defective component, rather than the sustaining purpose of the enterprise.
‘Leaders, owners, influencers, managers’.
The ego is the consumer. The product is promised emancipation from mediocrity or the normal challenges of a life of responsibility. The solution?
Most of the literature in the management or self-improvement genre encourages the cultivation of a ‘cultural change’, without any acknowledgement of what a culture is.
I’m a great admirer of military leadership and organisation, but, perhaps this is an obvious point to make, the military mindset is not always directly applicable to a commercial environment.
Fundamentally, the military is engaged in a win-lose transaction. As is every government agency. So why do we look for them to regulate voluntary interactions in the labour market and workplace? They pay no price for being wrong and are rewarded for granting exemptions to the very rules they claim to be their raison d’etre.
Yes, your Navy Seal management gurus know how to run a tight team, keep their ethos cohesive, and get the job done. But their job involves closing with and killing the enemy. And their funding model does not require the consent or interest of the consumer. Additionally, their selection and retention processes are unlike anything civilian.
Creativity in military leadership and operations is bound by the advantages of a pre-selected team and self-assessment of success criteria. They don’t storm through a camp of Jihadists, butcher a hundred guys, and then ask them to fill out customer satisfaction surveys for the chance to win $100 in store credit.
The blockchain bros and the technocrats have a bit of envy in this area. They will explicitly and excitedly tell you that we are moving towards a ‘Trust-Free’ transaction or a ‘Trust-Free’ society.
What they mean by this is that Bitcoin’s unhackable ‘proof-of-work’ on the blockchain means that ownership can never be fraudulent, if it is linked to their network.
They are holding onto the feeling that I had when my ex-girlfriend in Aberdeen dumped me, and that junkie tried to rob me. They feel betrayed by fiat currency and central banking that is ruining their world and robbing them of opportunities before they arise.
But let’s consider the difference between the proof of work in Gold, and Bitcoin. If I hold a gold sovereign in my hand, it is at least proof of possession. Regardless of the story of how I got it, that possession is proof of some kind of work, self-evidently. The coin’s existence and design are also proof of work, of mining, design, and minting. Also, self-evidently.
But the point of that kind of demonstration of capital is that those kinds of work can be done again. By their existence and possession, you demonstrate that the person holding the capital is actually holding the knowledge and/or skill of how to repeat this feat of wealth generation. Competence is demonstrated, self-evidently.
That ‘proof of work’ is proof of the ability to do, or to direct, future work of equal or greater value.
Blockchain on the other hand is useless work. The ‘work’ proven to be done is self-referential cryptography. It is not connected to any real-world asset. The bearer of BTC need have no skill or knowledge of the processes involved in its creation, storage or transmission.
Yes, smart contracts, etc, etc.
But to make blockchain useful, digital proof of work needs to be linked somehow to a recognition of actual real-world work. And the person who creates that link needs to be trusted.
Blockchain does not, and cannot ever, solve the problem of trust.
Only judgement or discernment can do that.
Good judgement involves thinking about things like trust in as long a timeframe as practicable. Yes, I need to be polite to this incompetent sailor in the short term, so that the rest of the crew can trust that I’m not the kind of person who will shout abuse at them if they ever make mistakes. If you lose your temper like that, that’s when people start to hide mistakes from you. Maintaining self-control is how the honesty that is required for a safe working culture is encouraged. Failing to keep your temper, and trusting that employees have good intentions at heart when they make mistakes, makes every interaction with you unpleasant. And that is how you insulate yourself from feedback. And before you know it, the rot has spread, and the leaks come all at once.
But, I have to get rid of this guy, so the good guys also know that I can see that this man is a hazard to their long-term safety. And if I failed to recognise that, or deal with it, then they would judge me incompetent as a manager, and would not trust my judgement in other decisions.
When managers in the maritime industry treat the human element as secondary, people get killed. No amount of money spent on proprietary safety management models, cultural change seminars, train-the-trainer coaching or safety officer audits can change that. The trust needs to be there all the time. Not just when an external auditor is looking.
So when political incompetence or banksterism are rewarded, everyone knows that there is no trust. Cultural rot sinks in, and it pervades every aspect of society. We have to trust in the consistency of our social rules, as surely as we trust in gravity and matter, in order to proceed in life.
Failure in most companies is aligned with failure in society in general. The attempt to ‘create a culture’ of x, y, and z, is partly a failure to recognise that we already have a culture. What you’re actually trying to do when you build a self-contained subculture, that is cut off from the rest of life and the world, is create a cult. Trying to nag your employees into corporate right-think, without addressing their underlying contempt for the capitalist enterprise, for example, simply breeds a class of employee that values being an ‘actor’, over being a ‘competent actor’.
Corporate sub-cultures, including political movements and fashions, will tend towards failure, so long as the importance of an overarching culture of virtue is ignored or undermined.
You cannot engender a ‘safety culture’ if you have no culture within which to stabilise that sub-culture. Culture is never safe, and cannot be taken for granted.
Businesses are struggling now in large part because the social contract has been abandoned by the state, and efforts are being made to actively destroy any real unity in our culture. We need to urgently reject this technocratic idea that the human being is an infinitely malleable creature, to be managed in a top-down authoritarian way. And we need to personally accept any and all consequences, and shoulder the burden of the receding and collapsing society within which we now live before dependency becomes our primary cultural value.
How many companies state that caring about safety is their overriding value? How many of those also list ‘diversity’ as a core value?
Those two things are often directly incompatible. Diversity of opinion is not useful when the ship is running out of fuel, the oil needs changed, and the gyro compass is broken, and you’re being asked to perform dangerous work that is out of limits. Sometimes there is only one right answer. In those cases, diversity is not our strength. If we applied the same logic to parliament, how different would our debates be?
When you hire someone, you need to trust that their aims and values are very closely aligned with your own, and with the interests of the enterprise in general. And that can only come from the heart. And that needs to be maintained, just as earnestly as you maintain your relationship with your spouse.
People are not just parts. They are precious. And so is our culture.
Start writing today. Use the button below to create your Substack and connect your publication with Captain Yankee Jock