This is some stuff I know (or think I know) that I think might be interesting to my descendents. In most cases there is at least one other person that knows it too, but a number of them are now dead. The memory is a treacherous thing

First let me say ‘Fun’ is a noun, not an adjective. I squirm whenever I hear or read “We had a fun time.” Now, on with the tirade. As I have aged I have been more and more unsympathetic to ‘theme parks’, their brothers; the Disneylands, and their cousins; state fairs. I find them all artificially garish and phony. Especially off-putting a people in cartoon character costumes circulating to stun and amaze gullible children. I believe fun is best when it is spontaneous, not manufactured by the profit motive, laudable as that may be.

The extraordinary technical and mechanical measures taken to provide diversions for the visitors bring on painfully high costs. It just seems like one pays too much to end up having exactly nothing to show for it. Usually the rides and shows are eminently unmemorable. A good movie will stay with you; it’s a better investment and may even be fun to watch.

I admit that I had a good time on the Tilt-a-Whirl years ago, but that ride had a participatory element to it where one could influence the amount of Gs that pushed one into his seat. Also, parks that feature a swimming pool can be a source of fun when one has friends with which to enjoy the water.

Also, state fairs do have features that can be memorable and a good investment of time and wealth, but not necessarily fun. I recall my amazement at the sight of Black Jack, the giant steer; said to be big enough to produce 9000 hamburger patties if he were to be slaughtered. And there was the Belgian Rabbit, so big it was referred to as a ‘guard rabbit’

REALLY TOUGH

Football players suffer and exert brutally for 3 or 4 hours a week plus practices, of course. Basketball players exert mightily for 2 or 3 hours every other day plus practice. Baseball players run as fast and throw or swing as hard as they can every 5 minutes or so for 180 days a year plus practice. Race car drivers press or feather a brake and gas pedal and steer while tied tightly into a custom formed seat more properly described as a tub for as much as 6 hours once each week plus practice and qualifying. All are laudable activities, much to be admired when done well; and they are certainly paid well when they are professionals.

But for my admiration I submit the name of Lance Armstrong (what a name). This guy rides a bicycle in the Tour d’France. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Well he pumps pedals every day for 21 days. Not only that, he rides faster on average than any one of about a thousand people trying to keep up with him. He rides on paved roads, cobblestone streets, up hills, down hills, between mobs of spectators, around sharp curves. He goes to bed at night knowing that next morning he must arise, dress and mount up and pump that bike as hard as he can ALL DAMNED DAY, only to dismount, shower, pee, eat and get enough rest to do the very same thing next morning, for three weeks plus practice, of course.

To look at the man in spandex or street clothes you can see no evidence of any unnecessary body content. He must have a body fat percentage of zero. Think of what his diet must be like; all energy and vitamins; no fat. He is my idea of a tough man. Seven times he has won the Tour. Makes me want to buy a Subaru.

The death of music started when the vocalists took it over. Prior to that the melody and the rhythm was preeminent; the lyrics were fitted to the melody seemingly almost as an afterthought and the vocalist was only there to mouth the lyrics. The subject was almost exclusively related to love or longing... Slowly, the lyrics became more important and the vocalist was vastly more significant because of the quality of voice or delivery. He or she was no longer just a handy beautiful babe or some jerk pulled from the brass section. The lyrics ranged farther afield, into social commentary and philosophy, which enhanced the popularity of the music by titillating the audiences.

Experimentation with new rhythms and adaptations of older ones brought us rock and roll and the vocals were arranged to coincide with these new complex beats. The limits on what was acceptable language evaporated with the general fall in taste and moral standards within the population.

Electronic sound generators provided new unexpected ways to create sounds never before experienced by man. Performers and composers presented progressively more outlandish visual effects with the music because TV and video tape created a new market for their wares and audiences tired swiftly of what they had already seen and heard. Audience attention spans regressed as swiftly as their standards of decency.

It has come to the point now that concerts are sound and light shows as lurid as a multi car highway accident and Fourth of July fireworks combined. There remains no melody and the rhythm is a banging crescendo of assaults on the hammer, anvil and stirrup.

Don’t believe me? Well whistle a tune from the last concert you attended.

While I’m about it, let me say that generally the human voice in not much of a musical instrument, in spite of the fact that there are and have been many sweet and melodic voices. I was once told that all musical instruments were developed in order to mimic some aspect of the human voice; that this was especially true of the piano. I have my doubts. Beautiful and sweet voices are about as rare in the general population as NBA heroes without a rap sheet... However, I believe that Anne Murray and Johnny Mathis have the most musical voices of any I’ve heard. I didn’t say the most beautiful, that honor is shared by Maria Callas and Olivia Newton-John.

AN EPIPHANY OF SORTS

Virginia once asked me, “Do you believe there are evil spirits?” I gave her a sort of glib answer, but it got me thinking and that has turned into what might be considered a revelation; at least to me.

We humans live at the bottom of an ocean of air which is something more that 100,000 feet deep. We also are made of cells each of which have portals or receptors where foreign entities like viruses can get into our cells’ cores; the place where cellular activity and decisions take place.

Can it be that humans as a whole have receptors through which evil spirits swimming randomly in the sea of air about us can enter our body’s very core (or soul)? We who believe in the Trinity sometimes assume that the Holy Ghost or Spirit is inside us; is our very core. Can it be that the Holy Spirit in us is of varying strength from one person to another? Can it be that the size of the receptors on our bodies differ from one person to another, that where we take our bodies may make us juicier targets for those evil spirits? Can it be that in some of us the Holy Spirit is better able to fend off any evil spirit that may make its way into us? The theory could explain Hitler, Saddam H., Stalin and Jeffrey Dahmer et. al., couldn’t it?

Just think about it.

PRESS ON REGARDLESS

About 1981 John Lang and I decided we would take a long weekend vacation and fly to Xenia, Ohio, his home town. He wanted to visit his sister and brother-in-law and some of his in-laws still residing there. We would use the Cessna Cardinal that Al and I were partners in and stay at his sister’s home.

It was summer and the weather forecast was good for the flight and so off we went. First to RDU to fill the tanks and then northwest toward Xenia. On our way, John said he wanted to stop in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, as the airport there had fascinated him for years. He was intrigued by the nearby town of Gallipolis, as well.

We landed at Point Pleasant, where I explained to him that my ancestor, Mathias Kessinger died there in the first real battle of the American Revolution, and that his name was on the monument to the battle in downtown Point Pleasant.

When we commenced to make the final leg of our trip, the runup was normal until I checked the magnetos. All piston-powered airplanes have two complete ignition systems, and both should function normally to safely operate. If one ignition system should fail the second one will get you safely to an airport. There is a switch on the panel where one can select the ‘right’ or ‘left’ or ‘both’ magnetos. At the runup, each is activated independently to assure both are functioning normally. Our right magneto didn’t. When selected, the rpm dropped greatly and the engine ran raggedly with backfires and muffler explosions.

We looked at each other and I shut the engine down and restarted it. Trying the right magneto alone brought the same result. With the engine idling we discussed our predicament. To get service on this small field on a Friday afternoon was a loser. Everyone wanted to go home and there likely would not be a replacement on hand. Our weekend would be shot before we could get airborne again. On the other hand, if we made it to Xenia, the plane could be serviced by a larger fixed base operator and probably be ready to go on Monday.

We decided to go on to Xenia on one magneto. It’s the pilot in command’s decision. A magneto is comparable to a car’s distributor, except it requires no outside electric source; an internal generator of sorts creates the voltage necessary to fire the spark plug. I kept the switch on ‘left’ and we departed.

Though somewhat puckered on our flight to Xenia, and keeping a sharp eye out for suitable emergency landing spots, it was otherwise uneventful.

We spoke to the mechanic at the Cessna agency who said he would commence work as soon as he finished the plane with which he was presently occupied. That was fine with us, John called his sister and she arrived shortly thereafter and took us to her home and a great supper.

Next day, we drove back to the airport and got the word from the mechanic. We needed a replacement magneto; his shop was not certified to rebuild them. We gave him the go-ahead to order one and went back to Peggy’s place to visit.

Peg and Bob were perfect hosts and we had a great time with them and with John’s in-laws Saturday and Sunday. None of them took us anywhere; we were left to go where we pleased in Peg’s car. I got to see the evidence of the horrendous damage done by the tornado that had leveled the town about a year or two earlier.

Monday about noon Peg took us back to the airport to find that the Cardinal had a fresh, certified right magneto and ran perfectly. John had a credit card with sufficient borrowing power to pay the 800 plus dollars for the parts and labor. I promised to repay him as soon as we got back to Cary. We called flight service and learned that there was a stationary front between Xenia and RDU that required IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) to get through. Neither John nor I were IFR certified and so we decided to call home and tell them we would not be coming back on that day as we had planned.

Peg and Bob were pleased to have us for another night and it was thus also possible for us to visit other friends and relatives of John and Phyllis.

Tuesday the front was still there. It was still there on Wednesday and Thursday as well. Peg did our laundry for us. We went to the Air Force Museum in Dayton and saw the downtown revitalization projects as well. I ate the thickest ham sandwich ever made. It was called the “Ham Stack” in a new restaurant in Dayton.

On Friday there was hope, the front had moved east and was expected to disintegrate over the Appalachian Mountains that afternoon. We loaded up and headed southeast for home. We were clearly catching up with the front as we neared Radford, VA. A radio call to the area Air Traffic Control Center allowed as how it was still IFR west of Radford. We radioed the Flight Service Center at Radford and they said it was marginal VFR (Visual Flight Rules) at Radford. Who to believe? What were the actual conditions? We saw the cloud layer ahead and it was below our cruising altitude (7,500 ft) and so we began a gentle descent to be below the clouds when we got to them. They were dark and roiling but had no rain falling out of them.

By the time we got to the clouds, we could see Radford airport in the distance. John was at the controls and as we passed below the cloud layer, the turbulence was about as violent as any our little bird was ever going to encounter and keep its wings. The squall line was narrow, blessedly, and so our arrival at Radford was made in the calm, hazy air ahead of the front.

We had a quick cup of coffee while the plane was refueled and departed just before the airport closed down because of the storm that was by then passing over it.

With the storm falling farther and farther behind our 140 mph Cardinal, the balance of the trip to Durham Skypark was uneventful. It took Al and me a week to gather up the money to repay John for the magneto.

Every flight by a private pilot should have a lesson in it. This one had several. One was that you can be foolish in an airplane and may still survive. Another was that if you intend to use a small plane for serious travel, you must have yourself and your plane IFR certified; weather is a capricious thing, and not usually a pilot’s friend.

CAMP SHAWMIDELECA

About 1944, I was treated to a two week stay at a summer camp. It was Mom

and Dad’s continuing effort to get my physique to develop. I was thin, flaccid and pale; totally unathletic.

The camp's name was derived from the names of four Indian tribes that populated the area near The Greenbriar, in West Virginia. The SHAWnees, MIamis, DELawares and SenECAs, see? It was totally woodsy, with permanent cabins holding about ten kids each, with a community latrine building, mess hall, and activities buildings. A river ran by it. Every couple of days, we were gathered after breakfast and given a sheet listing all available activities one could participate in on ensuing days. One would select one for each time period of the day. Many activities were available, horseback riding, archery, wood working, marksmanship, swimming, volleyball and so on. Some were mandatory, like swimming. Each day there was a swimming session where we were segregated by our ability, from non swimmers to those comfortable in the water.

The adjacent river had a low dam near the edge of the camp which served to raise the level of the river sufficient to provide a depth adequate for safe diving. Supervision for each level of expertise was always on hand, and we all had a grand time swimming. I was not a very good swimmer. My friends attributed it to the size and placement of my ears. I heard Dumbo a lot. The actual reason I could not swim well was that I could not kick my feet properly to propel myself along with my arm strokes and thus practically all forward motion was done with the arms alone. Don't ask me why. However, when swimming under water, I could give the 'frog jump' leg kick with ease along with the breast stroke arm motion and make good progress.

It happened that at the end of our stay, a swimming contest was held for all of us to participate in. Each camper would choose those 'events' he was to enter. It gave even the least well performing swimmers a chance to win something. I entered the underwater distance contest as surface speed was not in my repertoire, nor was diving or any other usual swimming competitions. For some reason I was blessed with an extraordinary ability to hold my breath for extended periods, an obvious asset to those who are submerged.

When the time came for those of us who chose the underwater distance competition, to do our stuff, I was in opposition to many youths who were athletic, who had competed in many other sessions with high degrees of success, the ones who played baseball, and tag football, and the other activities that are usually the domain of what has come to be called 'jock stuff'. On signal we all dived into the water and swam as far and as fast as we could. I proceeded to swim to the other side of the river, probably a hundred feet away, where I climbed out harboring the impression that some one of the other guys, an actual athlete, would be declared winner. I found myself alone. The others were climbing out of the water on the camp side of the river gasping for breath. One of the counselors spotted me on the far bank of the river. Consternation reigned. It couldn't be. No scrawny ten or twelve year old could swim that far under water. How had I cheated?

The ways I could have cheated were discussed. Did I pop up, take a breath and re-submerge without being noticed? Did I swim to the low dam, run across it and dive back in to the water without being noticed? I no longer recall if I was declared winner or disqualified. I only know that I swam farther under water than anyone else at Camp Shawmideleca ever had.

Since becoming a widower, I don’t have many visitors. I think the house smells too much like cigarettes for the young’uns. It no longer smells like cat urine; I’ve cleaned that room up pretty well and time has erased the last vestiges of that odor. From time to time Steve and/or John come by for a while and occasionally someone will want some help with a car question and drop in for a few minutes. I try to make everyone feel welcome. I can’t recall any adult ever coming to where I was just to be with me, you know, to make small talk or something. I must be standoffish or otherwise repellant.

However, I do have some regular visitors during nice weather. There is Rocky the Squirrel and his relatives. There is Christopher Robin and his gang. There is Home-r the House Wren. There is H2 the Humm(ing)er Bird. And Helmut the turtle seems satisfied to live on my back property line. He’s been there for two years now. How do I know it’s him? Why, I painted his name on his helmet. There is a very skittish lizard who runs when he sees me. He lives in the cracks of the old railroad timbers that edge my parking space. I don’t know him well enough to name him.

Rocky can climb a ¾ inch smooth pole 6 feet tall to get at the bird feeder. The feeder is all metal mesh which frustrates him. He has nearly chewed through the mesh near the bottom but it has thus far resisted his best efforts go get inside and eat every sunflower seed at once. What a pig! I have devised a means to further frustrate his efforts to starve Home-r out. The middle two feet of the pole have been coated with a particularly slimy type of wheel bearing grease. We’ll see.

And now I have an inside visitor/pet. Darling Beverly gave me a little clear plastic box the size of a recipe file box. Inside it was some sand, colored stones from an aquarium, a natural sponge and Herman the hermit crab. She included a small can of Hermit Crab food which smells like Juicy Fruit chewing gum but has nothing in its list of contents that remotely seems to be able to impart that aroma. I was also given a sea shell about two inches wide which I was told to put in there with some water in it for Herman. I did so and shortly Herman made his way to the shell, tipped it over and dumped the water into the sand. He squatted there ‘til I turned my back on him. He knows to move only when unseen; how? Herman is eating or otherwise disposing of the sponge. He circulates around it glacially and it is disappearing. I add water from time to time as I was told to do. I don’t know if Herman likes that or not. There is a lot I don’t know about the care and feeding of Herman and he ain’t talking.
THE LAST

Youth never considers it, but there will come a time when one does something for the last time. There are occasions when one will know they have done a thing for the last time, like when one quits smoking or drinking.

However, a multitude of things one does during a lifetime are done for the last time without the knowledge of the actor. Guys are going to shave for the last time probably without knowing it (unless it is a case of someone headed for the gurney journey at Central Prison.)

Think about it, the last pizza, the last coupling with one's spouse, the last letter of complaint to a merchandiser, the last time you lace a shoe, the last blackhead squeezed, the last time you turn the radio or TV on or off. You are going to dress yourself for the last time and not know it until later.

I bring this up to tell about a "the last" that is meaningful to me. I had made a repair on Dianne Kirby's car. I had offered to deliver it to her and she accepted. I told Betty to follow me over to Dianne's house, a place we had visited pretty frequently. It was 1997, and Betty and I both knew she was having problems.

Betty followed me to the corner of Harrison Avenue and Chatham Street. There, we were to turn right and go west. On the green light, I turned and proceeded in the left lane only to find Betty in the right lane passing me, staring straight ahead, going like stink. I blew my horn. I accelerated to keep beside her. I shouted to her (the windows were down, thank goodness) and finally got her attention. She then realized that she had forgotten which car she was to follow and was trying to catch the last car that had passed through the green light on Chatham, far, far ahead of us both. She then fell in behind me and I drove quite slowly to the Kirby house. She was so shaken on arrival there that I could hardly calm her. I knew that she had had her last time behind the wheel. She didn't.

Something I found out that is pretty remarkable is that the half life (time it takes for a radioactive element to lose one half of its radioactivity) of Uranium 222 is only one microsecond, while at the other end of the time spectrum is Uranium 238 whose half life is 4.6 billion years. We think that's a long time until we consider Indium 115. If we have made any of it, it will lose half of its radioactivity in 440 trillion years. What I wonder is how we measured such a minute amount of radioactive decay to come up with a half life so unimaginably long. It is believed that the Earth is only about 4 billion years old. I'm not sure the Universe is 440 trillion years old, and so I wonder if some Indium 115 preceded our whole creation.

Alexander the Great was said to have wept because there were no more worlds left to conquer. Some guy. His amazing military success relied upon a revolution in communications that one of his alchemists developed.

This technological achievement was central to his victories as it still is today for us. Communication is at the very core of success among warring armies (ask Sadam Hussein) and the need to coordinate movements meant that leaders had to keep their subordinates fairly close by because voice and signal flags or flares were the only means in those days to signal when to attack.

Alexander's alchemist came up with a means to time attacks by widely displaced forces, an advantage not easily overcome even by superior numbers of troops when they were necessarily clustered closely together.

The alchemist had concocted a liquid which dyed cloth one color when wet and another when dry. Alexander had rags torn into strips and placed in the dye and then tied around the arm of each unit commander. He then gave tactical instructions to each, ordering them to make their move when the band tied around their arms changed color. Sending each on his way, he was able to know that each force commander would attack at precisely the same time though far removed from his voice or sight because each rag would dry out at the same time. The device was called Alexander's Rag TimeTime Band.
LAST PAL

I never made friends with large numbers of people, was never part of a gang or clique. I'd usually have one guy to pal around with. There was Virgil Pemberton in junior high (he taught me to drive). There was first Roydon Williamson and later, Jack Riddle during my high-school years. There was Hervey Ahlborn during my GM Tech years, and Bob Wilson in the army, and then Ron Plescia at Art Center School in L.A. There were, of course, others with whom I associated, and I was friendly with all of my pals' pals, but mostly I just knocked around with one guy.

The last of my pals was John Lang. We both worked at EPA and car pooled. We shared a love of flying, and things mechanical. He knew and fixed electrical and electronic stuff; I knew and fixed mechanical stuff. We fed off each other's abilities. He liked TV sports, and I didn't. I liked auto racing and he didn't. So what? I liked and admired him for his electronic brilliance, his flying ability, honesty, practicality, and acceptance of me. I don't know why he liked me. Just as I had lost my pilot's Medical Certificate to a heart attack; so had he lost his to a heart condition and mild diabetes. We were sort of disarmed comrades. Talk of politics was limited because we had opposing views on specifics and thought enough of each other to avoid conflict.

He passed away on February 18, 2000. Far too soon. He was only a year older than I. My last, best pal. So long, John. You've got your wings back. Maybe I'll see you when I get mine back.