Roll with it

 On a perfect early fall day, why not fully embrace your own life and forget about the rest of the stupid world?  Nothing you can do about any of it anyway.  Time is racing on and soon enough you and I will be gone.  So enjoy the now for this brief time while we have it.

 

And now so long ago it does seem, working 30 hours on and 10 hours off.  I was so tired I would fall asleep standing up if I paused for even one minute.  I learned what ice fog was and how to deal with - 35°F weather.  I never thought I could survive it all.  But I did.  And now it is, for me, ancient history, scarcely remembered at all.  And what did the wider world, politics, social media, the daily news and all the rest of that crap have to do with it?  Nothing.  That's what.  Nothing at all. 

I don't remember

 "Do you want to live?  Or do you want to die?

"I've forgotten it, just to live. I may look all right to you, but that's just the outside of me.  Inside ...  if you knew what's inside ... it's terrible. It would scare you.

"Losing those you love: I suppose there is no greater grief than that, because the one who still lives is not only left with a great load of sorrow, but a load of love and nothing to do with it. Failure, rejection, poverty, illness ... these are all trivial causes for depression.  The profound sorrow lies in the loss of those you loved and will go on loving after they are no longer there to be loved. 
"Love and loss. Love and loss.  It is the metronome of life. And it is not always death which occasions the loss.  Jealousy, contempt, estrangement, even boredom can accomplish the same thing. But even then, the faint memory that love once lived and animated the world brings grief unutterable.
 "To receive love is a wonderful thing.  To give love is even better, but the fundamental, the most important thing of all, is to possess, and to know that one possesses, the capacity both to give and to receive.  To be deprived of this capacity is the greatest misfortune that can befall anyone.
"No one knows precisely what love is, though poets and philosophers have tried for centuries to define it. I doubt that any one of us has been satisfied with any of the definitions. Yet we go on trying, desperate to know, desperate to feel, desperate to find, because we sense that without it we are lost."

  Beyond Belief, first broadcast by CBS Radio Mystery Theater on December 17,1979.

Vermont delay and an old friend

"Most of my money I spent on airplanes. The rest I just wasted."

We had breakfast at the hotel, a pleasantly substantial American style meal rather than the crummy continental I was expecting. Dad had a Denver omelet with diced potatoes, toasted French bread and arugula.  I had scrambled eggs, bacon, hash browns and whole wheat toast.  Of course we had OJ and coffee, both of us drinking it black.  While we ate, we discussed yesterday's events. Although he hadn't made much of it at the time, and I didn't give it any thought, dad said that the service men's bringing the wrong grade of oil had shocked and worried him.  If he had not been there to watch what they were doing and caught the mistake, they would have poured it into our engines and we would never have known until disaster struck. The engines would have fried and quit or fried and caught fire.  Both of them.  At the same time.  And down we would have gone. We might have crashed on take-off or shortly after, or we might have flown some time into the flight and gone down over trackless forest or maybe into the estuary.  Most likely, we would have been killed and it's unlikely, should the aircraft have been found, that investigators would have been able to determine the cause, not that that would have mattered to us.

So, he said, waving his fork at me, take this as a lesson and do as I do when life and limb is at stake. Never leave anything to chance or to the competence of others unless you absolutely have no choice, and even then be wary.  He said I might think he was being overly cautious to always be on hand for refueling and servicing the plane -- I didn't -- but this time his caution had saved our lives. I could thank him by paying for breakfast.  I said, Aw, gee, pop, do you really think our lives are worth thirty bucks? Plus tip, he said.  Later, it occurred to me that breakfast was included in the room rate.

I recalled hearing petty officers demanding to know if a rating or seaman had done something and being told yes, but then saying, well, I didn't see you do it, so do it again while I watch you do it, and make damn sure you do it right.  I didn't like hearing that but now, if I hadn't before, I realized that that sort of behavior helped ensure the person so addressed made certain that whatever task he was assigned he did with full attention and care, with no sloppiness or mistakes, because if the PO found he had actually not done the job or done it poorly, he would discover that his ass was grass and the PO was the lawn mower.

We also discussed the fuel burn on the trip, which had been excessive.  I figured we were running rich for some reason even though I had the mixture set to either auto lean or manual lean during the cruise portion of the flight. I suggested a stuck linkage that could easily be unstuck. Dad thought so, too, although he said we might have a fuel leak. We hadn't smelled gas fumes or noticed any puddles of fuel when we were pre-flighting the aircraft, so hopefully that wasn't the problem and it would just be a stuck linkage or something easy to fix like that.

After breakfast, dad took the hotel shuttle to the airport to get the airplane sorted out, as the Brits say.  He told me he would meet me at the airport restaurant and we could have a snack before departing.  Our plan was to fly to Eu Claire, Wisconsin, refuel, grab a bite, then fly on home. It would be a long flying day again, but both of us were anxious to get the trip over with.  As he was about to climb in the van, he paused and said that I shouldn't check out of the hotel until he called and told me everything was okay.  

It was a good thing he did, because when he called it was not to say everything was okay but to tell me that he found no fuel leaks but we had definitely burned a lot more fuel than we should have. He thought he knew what the problem was.  When he found out for sure, he would let me know, but we weren't going anywhere today and maybe not tomorrow, so I should extend our stay at the hotel.  He would try to get back in time for us to have dinner but if not, he would just grab something at the airport.  He was going to stay until the problem was solved or he knew that it would be tomorrow or the next day at the latest.

Well, rats, I thought. That plane wasn't going anywhere till the problem was found and fixed. I hoped it was something simple so we could be on our way soon.  But in the back of my mind I figured it would be something major. Isn't it always?

I took a walk around the city, which was really a quite pleasant town, strolling down Church Street and walking out to the waterfront park.  By lunch time, I still hadn't heard from dad and I was getting anxious.  I walked back toward the hotel and told myself if he hadn't called by the time I got there I would call him.  I knew he wouldn't like being interrupted if he was in the middle of something and I knew he hadn't forgotten about me.  But still....

When I got to the hotel he still hadn't called so I decided to go up to our room and freshen up, then I would call him, but as I entered our suite he called.  Whew.  He had located the problem. It was not the bad news I feared, but not good news, either.   

The type of Stromberg carburetors on the Wasp engines in our plane use a back-suction type mixture regulator that reduces the fuel flow by lowering the pressure in the float chamber.  A small nozzle in the venturi leading to the float chamber produces the suction.  When the mixture control is in the full rich position, the float chamber is vented to the air intake.  As the mixture control is leaned, a valve closes off the float vent, lowering the float chamber pressure. Got it? (I think I explained that correctly, but I've probably completely garbled it.) Dad carefully described this to me over the phone as if it were something it was vitally important that I understand. Actually, it didn't make any difference if I understood it or not; he could have just said the carbs were kaput. What he was really doing was clarifying things in his own mind by explaining them to me. 

Anyway, he said that the valves in both carburetors were not closing properly and there was wear on other components. The FBO had located replacement carbs in Manchester, NH, and sent a CFI looking to build time to fetch them. He should be back by evening.  Dad was going to wait for their delivery and inspect them to make sure they were the right type.  He'd install them tomorrow.  Then he would test fly the plane for an hour or so to make sure they were working properly, filling the fuel tanks before taking off and on landing, then measuring actual fuel used and making adjustments if needed. So we weren't going anywhere today or tomorrow, and he wouldn't get back to the hotel today until late.  He might decide to stay at the airport, sleeping in the plane, so he could get an early start on things in the morning.  He'd let me know.  

I unpacked, sat down for a minute to think how I would spend the rest of the day and tomorrow. I could souvenir shop for my kids and mom, and I decided to buy myself some decent city clothes, considering the mess my traveling clothes were in -- grease, oil and hydraulic fluid spots and splotches on them all: if you fly in an old airplane sooner or later you get this stuff on you. All I'd brought with me were traveling clothes plus some glamor-puss negligee stuff for el jefe's viewing pleasure.  I'd bought sweaters, wool skirts and a wool cap in the Shetlands and Iceland: not of much use in the humid heat of Burlington.  So I thought I'd buy a summer dress and some comfortable shoes to go with. I felt bad for just idling away the day while dad was busting his knuckles, but there was nothing I could do to help him.  The FBO had A&P mechanics.  They would be the ones doing the actual work, I supposed.  Pop would probably have a game of poker with them while they yarned about their airplane adventures.

So off I went shopping. I bought maple syrup candies for everyone, for the boys a copy of Aaron and the Green Mountain Boys by Patricia Gauch as well as The Dangerous Book for Boys by the Igguldens, Good-night, Vermont by Michael Tougias and a big Raggedy Ann doll for my mini me and a Vermont-themed charcuterie board for my mother. I bought two green sweatshirts each with a picture of a maple tree and the slogan, "I'd tap that," on them for el jefe and my dad.  I bought a cute straw hat, a maple-leaf-patterned sun dress and some comfortable flats for myself. I lugged everything back to the hotel, dumped the goodies on my bed, changed into my new duds and sallied forth again.  

It was hot so I went back to the waterfront park to catch a breeze.  While sitting on a bench watching sailboats and wondering what to do next, someone tentatively called my name, not "Wanda" but my nickname when I had been in Afghanistan (you don't want to know, haha).  The name, coming out of nowhere, and not having heard it in so long, gave me a shock.  I almost got up and started walking away from the voice.  I didn't.... No.  Just no. No....  But I couldn't do that. And the voice was somehow familiar. So I turned to see who it was.  I didn't recognize the guy.  He could tell I didn't so he introduced himself. As soon as I heard his name -- I'll call him Joe -- I remembered him.  He had been deployed with the Marines in Helmand Province, when, climbing over a low wall, he had been struck by a large-caliber round which shattered his leg. Subsequently, it was amputated above the knee. I had spent a lot of time helping him deal with what had happened, and for some time after he left the service he would call me, usually late at night.  He just needed someone to talk to.  And no civilian would do.  It had to be someone who was in the 'stan, too, and knew. And he couldn't have opened up to a guy.  He had to maintain the facade.  So that left me, to whom he had already revealed so much, who had helped him come to terms with his new reality.  And now here I was and here he was, after all this time, seeing each other again. 

Joe was not the old Joe I had known.  He was, of course, older, but mentally mature in a way I didn't remember him being, quiet, almost subdued.  When I mentioned it, he said that he had moved on with his life, although it had been pretty rocky at first.  His girlfriend had left him, but, he said, not because he was a cripple (his term) but because he had taken out his resentments and anger on her, though nothing was her fault.  She tried to deal with him but finally he had driven her away.  The shock of losing her, realizing the only person who cared about him was gone, had made him get control of himself with the help, he said, of a book I'd recommend he read, Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning, but that he hadn't bothered to until then.  He recited Frankl's key conclusion:  You may not be able to control what happens to you, but you can control the way you react to it.  He remembered that I had also had him recite with me and memorize Henley's poem -- "Out of the night that covers me/ Black as the pit from pole to pole/ In the fell clutch of circumstance.../ Under the bludgeonings of chance.../ I am the master of my fate/ I am the captain of my soul."

He'd suffered phantom pain seemingly coming from his missing lower leg for some time, but that had largely passed and he could use his prosthesis naturally and easily to do whatever he wanted.  He now volunteered with an organization helping disabled veterans and he passed on what I had  taught him as well as what he had learned himself about dealing with the bad hand Fate had dealt all of them.

After filling me in on his life, he asked what I had been doing and if I lived in Burlington. So I sketched the details.  He said he wasn't surprised that I'd stayed in the Navy, seeing as I was a Navy brat, but he was surprised that I was now living on a cattle ranch "out west."  He figured I'd probably be living in southern California.  I said sometimes I wished I were.  

He asked if I had eaten and I said I'd missed lunch so he invited me to a place nearby that he had been to before and was pretty good.  I ordered a BLT sandwich on toasted Italian bread, potato salad and ice tea and he said he'd have the same.  Talking with Joe was relaxing and enjoyable.  It was as if no time had passed since we were eating box nasties, or vacuuming up grub in a dusty impromptu chow hall, playing imaginary strip poker and exchanging harmless lewd banter, gossiping, talking about what we planned to do after we left the service, what we had done before.  I remembered Joe and the guys talking sports and I having no idea whether the Packers were a basketball or hockey team, to which they were incredulous.  We shared so many memories, so many old companions, had gone through so many things that others never had and could never understand.

Joe told me what some of the guys I'd known were doing now.  Several were married, working good jobs, solid family men, not the randy rowdies and hell raisers I had known.  Others had not done so well.  Some had passed on. We didn't dwell on negative things but talked about all the goofy stuff that had gone on, the legendary shower incident among others, and how when I had volunteered to go outside the wire I was reminded that I had always claimed to be a happy fobbit and intended to stay one.  He said everyone who knew me appreciated my spunk and grit. I blushed -- an 0351 Marine combat veteran said this to me.  It was such a high compliment I couldn't say anything for a minute. Silly me.  But that was about as far as we got into discussing the actual war. Who wants to remember that stuff?  What good does it do?

Joe complimented my ensemble, which surprised and pleased me because most guys wouldn't have noticed what I was wearing.  He said it showed off my figure well, especially my boobage, adding that I had great legs.  I guess Joe hadn't got the news about sexual harassment and "me too."  Fortunately.  I just ate it up.  Yeah, yeah....  But it was a delightful distraction from worrying about the stupid airplane and wondering if it would hold together long enough for us to get home, or becoming glum involuntarily recalling the bad times in the 'stan, the ones I had dreams about and that sent me into periods of depression even all these years later.  So, pulling up the hem of my dress, I stretched out my leg for Joe's inspection, turning my ankle first right, then left, wishing I were wearing heels, just for him. I said that I made an effort to keep in shape for el jefe, not only working out but doing a lot of dancing, which I really enjoyed.  I always wanted to be the girl he married and not let myself go like so many women do, especially after childbirth, and I appreciated being appreciated by the male of the species.  Joe then asked if I'd like to see his leg and pulled up his trouser leg revealing his prosthesis and stump, and I realized what a jerk I was.  I smiled awkwardly and tried to think of something to say that wouldn't sound lame.  I couldn't.  I should have just joked that his leg was sexier than mine or something, but I just froze, embarrassed, ashamed, maybe a little frightened, seeing what he had to live with, had learned to accept.  The memory of freshly dismembered limbs...and bodies...flooded my mind.

Joe tried to change the mood by asking why I called my husband el jefe and I explained that I had a Mexican friend who always mispronounced his name, Jeff, as Heff, so I just started calling him el jefe as a kind of joke, but it had stuck. Even his friends now call him el jefe.  As far as I was concerned, though, he really was the boss of me and I liked it that way. It was an off-hand comment, but Joe looked down at the table, lifted up his empty glass, set it back down and said, "Lucky guy."

After that, the conversation languished. We had so much to say to each other -- not kidding around but how we really felt, what we really wanted the other to understand -- but we didn't know how to say it.  Shortly, we said our good-byes, Joe saying he hoped he'd be able to see me again and I said if he was ever out west to look me up.  Outside, he offered to walk me back to my hotel but I said it wasn't necessary.  We stood for a minute awkwardly, not knowing how to let each other go. Then I hugged him and he hugged me back, whispering in my ear, "God, Wanda, God..."  I said, "I know." I watched him walk away.

Greenland to Labrador and Vermont

We left Nuuk before dawn heading south by southwest for Goose Bay, Labrador, about 707 nautical miles away.  I'd never imagined a time when I would head south and travel hundreds of miles in that direction to get to Canada.  We encountered ice on the climb out, including on the windshield, but broke out of it as we passed through 6,000 feet on our way upstairs.  I wanted to get across the Labrador Sea as soon as possible -- I was sick of these long ocean crossings, deep down they made me anxious -- so I again set our cruise at 186 knots.  That would get us to Goose Bay with plenty of reserve and still provide a quick crossing.  There's no radar coverage between Nuuk and Goose Bay: the controllers rely on radioed position reports from the pilot and then keep track of the aircraft by hand-moving markers across a map. That must have been the way they did it back during World War II, when Goose Bay was a refueling stop on the North Atlantic ferry route to Britain.  Flying a World War II-era airplane over this sort of Oregon Trail of the air did encourage my mind to muse over that long-gone era.  I'd read that the loss rate of aircraft on this route was 10 percent, mostly due to weather-related accidents, which was not encouraging.  But then I recalled reading somewhere that the average new pilot assigned to a squadron back then had between 300 and 400 hours total flight time in his log, and it is well known that the danger range for pilot-error accidents is between 300 and 1,000 hours, apparently because pilots gain too much confidence after getting comfortable flying and get too cocky, thinking they are experienced and can handle whatever happens.  But after they've gotten a thousand hours under their belt and encountered a few moments of the legendary sheer terror, they become humble and cautious.  Me?  I was always figuring I'd lose the critical engine just as I was in a steep turn into it and planning what I'd do.  I also imagined what I'd do should both engines quit.
Looking down at that windswept sea, I could see white caps and patches of sea fog and now and then an ice berg, some with breakers tumbling against them sending spumes of foam and spray into the air.  It was kind of a relief when we flew over an undercast that blocked the view of the ocean below, and when it rose to near our height and we began flying in and out of clouds with the sunlight causing sparkling shadows (I know, a contradiction, but true) among the towering pillars and bulging battlements, I forgot all about the menacing deep below us.

Once we were well on our way, I noticed dad beginning to doze so I suggested he go lie down and have a snooze in the cabin. He patted me on the shoulder as he climbed out of his seat and stepped back into the cabin to settle in on the couch and wrap himself up in the wool blanket I'd bought in Iceland.  I turned on the cabin heat to get a little warmth back there for him and adjusted the trim a bit to account for the weight shift.  And then, once again, I was alone in the cockpit with the drone of the engines, my eyes in a routine scan of the instruments, listening to the radios for whatever traffic there was, watching our progress on the GPS,  keeping up the dead reckoning chart and comparing it with that, radioing position reports on the HF from time to time.  The minutes ticked away and my mind began to free wheel.

Gramps in England.

I wondered if my New England grandfather had flown this route on his way to Britain back in 1944 or had taken a troop ship.  He had been on a ship heading for the Philippines with his fighter squadron, which had trained on P-35s, when the Japanese attacked Pearl  Harbor and the convoy of the ship he was aboard was diverted to Australia.  He had been looking forward to meeting up with his brother, whom I've written about, who was already stationed in the P.I., also flying P-35s, but with a different pursuit group.  In Australia, the squadron was equipped with P-40s and sent to defend the Northern Territories against the Japanese bombing campaign, then sent up to New Guinea to fight the Japs there.  In late 1942, he was sent home and worked at a training command until, in 1944, being assigned to a fighter group flying P-51s out of England.  He participated in the first fighter-escorted daylight bombing raid against Berlin in March of that year.  I've written about the rest of his career in earlier posts.  My other grandfather, about whom I've also written, was also at sea when war broke out, aboard the Lexington (CV-2), and, flying an F4F, participated in raids against the Japanese in New Guinea early in 1942 and later flew during the Guadalcanal campaign, so my two grandpas at one point in the war almost had their paths intersect.  They also both fought against the Japanese Navy's Tainan Kokutai, probably encountering the same pilots, guys like Hiroshi Nishizawa, Toshio Ohta, and, famous thanks to Martin Caidin, Saburo Sakai. Of course, they didn't know each other at the time, or know that their children would meet and marry.  My New England grandfather, flying his P-40E  battling Betty bombers flying out of Timor to batter Australia, never got shot down but, as I've written about before, my other grandfather, his F4F torn apart by 20mm cannon fire from Zeros, was shot down at sea and not rescued for 37 days.  But not before he had put some hurt on Mr. Moto.  Well, that's what my men do -- fight. 

They are warriors.  Isaac Coates, General Winfield S. Hancock's surgeon, met one of my northern Cheyenne ancestors in the 1860s and wrote of him, "He is one of the finest specimens, physically, of his race. He is quite six feet in height, finely formed with a large body and muscular limbs. His appearance was decidedly military. A seven-shot Spencer carbine hung at the side of his saddle, four large Navy revolvers were stuck in his belt, and a bow, already strung with an arrow, was grasped in his left hand. Thus armed and mounted on a fine horse, he was a good representative of the God of War, and his manner showed plainly that he did not care whether we talked or fought." My boys are hellions, too, and will doubtless grow up to be just like all the other men in the family. 

From these thoughts, my mind drifted to Vikings and their voyages in open boats over these waters more than a thousand years ago, comparing their difficulty to that of the South Seas cruises of the Polynesians to discover lush, tropical paradises. They're often admired while the Viking explorations across a cruel sea to make landfall on forbidding shores girded with ice and backboned by active volcanoes tend to be taken for granted. I also thought about how the characters of nationalities change.  Scandinavians once were the terrors of Europe, looting and pillaging across the continent.  But today they are total patsies, victimized by so-called refugees, lesser breeds without the law, as Kipling would have called them, that their ancestors would have cleaved in half with broadswords.  And pretty much the same is true of Germans; only a few generations ago the saying in Europe was, I've been told, that one German was a tourist, two a factory and three an army.  No more. At least not the third part. 

 The weather cleared as we neared Goose Bay.  We dropped in on Runway 08 well before noon, wind 8 knots at 60 degrees, gusting to 15.  All routine. The airport is much smaller and much less used than that at Gander, with, concomitantly, fewer amenities.  But it did have customs, which we cleared quickly.  We had lunch at Le Airport Cafe.  I was surprised to see tonkatsu on the menu so ordered that. It was okay.  Dad ordered stirred-fried chicken and said it was good.  I was going to spear a piece to try but he smacked my hand away and told me if I wanted some to order my own.  Meanie! Then he relented and let me try a piece and I let him try my pork. We both said at the same time that we should have ordered what the other had and laughed.  The counterman smiled at us. After lunch, we took a walk to stretch our legs, and, having seen the vicinity from the air and feeling no desire to linger, we decided to take off for Burlington, Vermont, once the Beech was gassed up and the oil topped off.  So I took care of the planning and paperwork for that while dad went off to supervise the refueling, which took longer than expected because the service guys brought the wrong grade of oil and had to go back and find what we needed...always something.  While he waited, dad took the opportunity to give the plane a thorough once over.  When I had finished filing our flight plan and getting the latest weather, I went out to the flight line to see how things were going.  Dad didn't need my help for anything so I just paced around, expecting soon to be on our way.  It was in the 50s and the uninterrupted breeze on the ramp was cutting right through me. I finally decided to go back to the cafe and get a cup of coffee and wait there, telling dad to come and get me when everything was done.  I was glad I did, because I waited there for well over an hour. For much of that, I was the only customer. The counterman was French-Canadian and friendly, probably a little bored.  We chatted in a mixture of English and French, then switched entirely to French.  I thought it interesting that in Europe I'd had no opportunity to speak French, but in Canada, I did.  We talked about the current world situation and he said that in recent years Montreal had gone to hell and he had left to get away from...well, you know....  I told him that when I was in England I had been told that there was a game the natives played in London called "Spot the White Man."  He laughed, then shook his head and sighed.  About that time my dad came in and, chilled to the bone from being outside in a light windbreaker for so long, ordered a coffee.  It was getting late in the day, the weatherman said scattered thunderstorms in the Burlington area, with high winds and hail possible, and we had 730 nautical miles to fly, making it a very long day in the air, so dad gulped down his coffee and, leaving a generous tip in American dollars, we trotted over to our mechanical Pegasus, fired that mother up and launched into the wild blue yonder heading southwest at our usual 186 knots, so with climb and descent, figure total flying time around five hours plus and it was already past five p.m.  So we'd be coming into BTV after dark and I'd have my first night landing on this trip.  I knew it would be okay, but I still wasn't looking forward to it.

In the cockpit, we were much more comfortable because -- finally! -- we didn't have to wear those clunky immersion suits.  Aside from crossing the St. Lawrence River estuary, we'd be over dry land from now on.  I felt a great relief.  I hadn't realized just how anxious I was about crossing all that ocean, but now I felt a kind of elation.  The worst was over.  This night I would sleep in a bed in the good old Estados Unidos.  We were practically home! 

The flight was uneventful but interesting, seeing all that green for a change, forest and forest and forest. There's a lot of miles and miles of miles and miles in that part of Canada.  As we got farther south we began to encounter thunderstorms. We were able to steer  around the worst of them, but we did hit some turbulence. Pop stayed in the right seat and did good co-pilot work.  I was grateful that he did, especially once the sun set.  I think I was getting fatigued at a deep level, all the flying of the last days finally catching up with me.  I knew dad must be more bone-weary than me, having flown over to Europe as well as back.  With darkness came lights winking on below us as isolated farms, towns and crossroad stores lit up.  As we neared the international border a solid overcast slid over the sky above us and scattered clouds appeared at our altitude.  Without the instruments to guide me, it would have been easy to get vertigo because the lights below seemed like stars while the blackness above seemed like the earth. I had the weird sensation that I was flying upside down.  I banished it by keeping my eyes on the instruments and checking our progress on the GPS.  Once, when I stepped back into the cabin to make us coffee while dad took the wheel I peered out the window and saw St. Elmo's fire glowing blue along the leading edge of the wing and on the propeller making it look like a blue disc.  As I watched, it faded away.  When I got back to my seat, I mentioned it to dad and he said there had been some electrical discharges flickering across the windscreen while I was in the cabin.  Just as he said that, a brilliant flash of lightning lit up the cockpit like a strobe light.  There went our night vision.  After that we saw more lightning flashes, but they were always inside clouds and sometimes their light appeared to be green with tinges of red.  The old Beech got tossed around quite a bit but shortly we swept out of the storm into smooth air, leaving the lightning and St. Elmo's fire behind us.  Suddenly, I felt hungry.

As we approached BTV we dropped through a solid overcast at 6,000 feet, then scattered clouds at 4,000 but otherwise it was clear, visibility 10 miles, wind out of the south-southwest, 220 degrees at 11 knots, gusting to 21.  I set down on Runway 19, dad singing out the numbers and handling the landing gear and flaps as I call for them, drifting down gently into the pattern, turning on to base at 800 feet with 15 degrees of flaps and 100 knots on the dial, then 45 degrees of flaps as I turn on to final.  I pull the throttles back a tad, push the prop levers all the way forward, nudge the nose down slightly and we're crossing the threshold, dad calling 80 knots. I pull the throttles all the way back and we settle to earth, the  mains touching the runway with the tail slightly down. I push the yoke forward a tad and hold it till at 50 knots the tail begins to settle, then pull the yoke back all the way into my lap, adding a little power on the left engine to keep her straight. I unlock the tail wheel, turn off the runway and taxi to the ramp, the Wasps rumbling at 800 rpm, brake to a halt, pull the fuel mixture levers from full rich to idle cut-off.  The engines stutter, the spinning propellers slow to a stop, then silence. "Nice," my dad says.  We look at each other and smile.

We cleared customs and immigration briskly, then arranged to have the plane serviced, gassed up and ready to go first thing in the morning. We'd reserved a suite at the Hilton and thought we'd get something to eat at the airport restaurant before calling for their shuttle -- I was famished and dad said he wouldn't mind a bite -- but the restaurant was closed.  On the ride to the hotel, we asked the driver if there was any place to eat because the hotel only served breakfast. He said the good restaurants in the area closed by 10.  But he did know a "greasy spoon" along the way that closed officially at 11 but actually stayed open as long as there were customers.  It was a family-owned joint that had been in business forever and catered mostly to locals.  We offered to buy him a burger if he'd drive us there so we could order take-out. He said our wish was his command and off we went.

I ordered two pints of fries (they came in not small and large but pint and quart sizes), a milk shake and a cheese burger.  Dad ordered a pepper steak and fries.  I wanted a small salad as well, but they said they were about out of the fixings and were saving them for burger orders.  While we waited for dad's pepper steak I munched on my fries and drank my shake.  I was so hungry I couldn't wait to get to the hotel before eating.  But I was saving the other pint of fries for a snack if I got hungry during the night.  The driver and I chatted desultorily, he, hunched forward, one arm protectively around his meal, polishing off his root beer float, cheeseburger, quart of fries and pint of onion rings in double-quick time, as if he were afraid we'd change our minds and seize his grub for ourselves.  He asked where we had flown in from and I thought about saying Scotland, but instead said Canada.  He nodded, inquiring no further. He mentioned that the tourists were coming back now that the Covid scare was over and most of the hotels were booked through Labor Day and we were lucky to have gotten a room. I asked how the weather had been.  He said hot as usual, it being summer after all. It was a little more humid than a typical summer, he did believe. Then the conversation petered out. Dad was talking with the counterman and laughed at something he said.  I looked out the window.

The hotel was a pleasant change from the dumps we had been staying at, the suite like a two bedroom apartment. Dad's bedroom had a king-size bed and mine had two queen-size beds. There was a kitchenette and fully-stocked minibar, a honking big flat screen TV and some really comfy chairs.  The air conditioning was on and it was needed as it was around 80 degrees, quite a contrast with the weather we had been used to.  Dad and I sat down at the kitchenette table and chowed-down, microwaving our sandwiches and fries a few seconds to warm them up.  We talked about laying over a day to rest up and take a look around the town but we were so tired we couldn't decide.  So, after finishing up our meal, we said good-night.  I took a long hot shower and crawled in the sack. Oh, so comfy.  I closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, it was morning.

 

Born Too Late

 

If I ever get my time machine working (that darn fleem discronificator keeps shorting out), one time period I especially want to visit is the late 1950s -- 1957, '58 and '59 -- and especially the last -- 1959.   Those years may well be the acme of the American Century.  I could cite many reasons why I think that; some I have already in previous posts and I may highlight more in a future post. But, for one thing, just looking at 1959, consider the number of best-selling books of that year (many of which are still popular today) -- and what a variety! -- Man's Search for Meaning, A Separate Peace, Starship Troopers, Naked Lunch, The Sirens of Titan, A Canticle for Leibowitz, A Raisin in the Sun, Alas Babylon, Psycho, Hawaii, The Longest Day, The Manchurian Candidate, Good-bye Columbus, Henderson The Rain King, Time Out of Joint, Advise and Consent, Nexus, All You Zombies, The Hustler....  I could go on and on.  Does anyone even publish novels that ordinary people want to read today?  Does anybody even read novels?

I also adore the popular music of the day, especially the syrupy love ballads aimed at teenagers. So sweet and innocent.  I also like the cars of that era, in particular the Chrysler Corp. offerings.  My choice to drive on my visit would be a Dodge Custom Royal Lancer convertible.  The guys who designed it must have been drunk out of their minds on applejack and moonshine when they created it.

Oh, and how could I forget that the Barbie doll debuted in 1959!  My mom got one for her birthday. The original price was $1.29 (I looked it up!)  My mom watched Dick Clark's American Bandstand with her older sister when they came home from school and sometimes her mother -- my grandmother -- would watch with them.  They all had their favorite dance couples and were as much interested in them as the singing acts.  On weekends they would drop by the record store and buy their latest favorites. She recalls that her sister worked part-time as a waitress in a diner for 25¢ an hour plus tips and a 45 record cost 69¢, so she had to work an hour or so to buy one record that contained two songs. But she and her friends would share records, have record parties and that sort of thing so they always had access to the latest tunes from Fabian, Tab Hunter, the Diamonds and all their ginchy faves.

She was also crazy about horses and followed horse racing with a passion.  Her all-time favorite was Tim Tam, who won the Preakness and the Kentucky Derby in 1958 and almost won the Belmont but suffered an injury on the home stretch when he was leading and finished second, thus losing the Triple Crown.  His loss almost broke my mom's heart.  Little girls and horses, huh?  Her favorite book in those days was a Weekly Reader Children's Book Club selection, Old Bones by Mildred Pace, about the fabulous and beloved race horse Exterminator, who ran 100 races and won 50, including the 1915 Kentucky Derby, where he was a 50 to 1 long shot.  I've read that very same book that she did and loved it, too.  Who could not?  And about Old Bones, as Exterminator was nicknamed, author Abigail Anderson writes, "The great horse lived to the ripe old age of 30. A kind, gentle and charismatic individual, Exterminator was cherished by his fans throughout his long life. School children visited him on his birthday and a book was written about him for adolescents. He was part of the culture, part of what it meant to be American."  Over the top?  Not in the wonderful Old America that was and is now only a fading memory, to be reached out and grasped for in vain by those of us who have heard its siren call in myth and legend and do so long for it.