The hills of Staten Island

Growing up on Staten Island, my best friend Erik and I made the hills above our homes come alive with the sounds of battle.  Some days we would don blue felt campaign hats and strap holsters containing cap-laden six guns around our waists and clamber up the steep slopes of the high rolling saddle back hills to the west called the Haystack, in search of Rebels as we re-fought the Civil War.  Most days we would shoulder our Mattel tommy guns, fasten World War Two surplus canvas belts adorned with canteen holders and magazine pouches about our hips and go kill Germans from 5 to 8 pm on weeknights.

On weekends we would battle enemy forces all day long.  Erik and I would traipse for miles through the hills and backwoods, laden with our toy implements of war.  There was a series of undeveloped high ridges up there so we rarely encountered a street or a yard once we crossed the street I lived on, Trossach Road, and got onto the Haystack. 

Usually we didn't see anyone or if we did,we skirted round them furtively.  I remember how annoyed I was when a man walking about up there came across us unexpectedly before we saw him and avoided him and, spotting the modern aspect of our toy weaponry, he thought he was playing along with us by saying that he had spotted some "Russians" back a half-mile and we should "go check them out."  This was even before the Vietnam war, and the nation's enemies were traditionally Germans or Japanese (or maybe Chinese in Korea), not Russians.  World War Two was a mere 15 years past, Vietnam from here is a distant memory compared to that. 

Erik was a swell best friend.  As a boy, he had a lot of similar interests.  If we weren't ensuring allied victory in the hills of Staten Island we were together literally wiping the floors in our respective bedrooms with Japanese or German soldiers.  We each had a few hundred little green plastic Army men, bought at the drugstore for 99 cents a bagful.  They were the enemy.  We also each had a few dozen painted lead soldiers, bought at the dime store for 19 cents each.  They were the Allied soldiers,  These lead soldiers, now called pod foots for their distinctive feet which enable them to stand, are now collectibles but back then they were our all-powerful American army and they always wiped out those little green Army men.

We read comics together, built model airplanes, had sleepovers sometimes and even had an occasional youthful fistfight.  But then I moved away and lost touch with Erik.  I knew he got into the Air Force Academy but didn't like it so he transferred to Wagner College on Staten Island.  After that there were four decades where . . . nothing.

Until a year and a half ago where through the magic of Facebook we re-connected.  Through instant messaging in quick order I caught up with him and he with me.  He is a successful administrator and he is also a pilot, fulfilling a life-long dream of his.  He has a wonderful family with several bright and capable children.  He came to DC a year ago and I had breakfast with him at his hotel, where I met his wonderful wife Jane, an accomplished woman in her own write.  We all had a great conversation, and I could tell that Jane learned a tiny bit more about Erik's childhood by listening to our animated talk.

I haven't been good about keeping up with Erik since then.  There's always time to rekindle a little bit later, right?

This morning I received a Facebook message from Erik, wishing me the best and wanting me to be aware of the news.  It included a link to a news article.  My heart sank.  The code in the article's link included the identifying words "plane wreck."

Erik was seriously hurt when a plane he was aboard went down on August 19th on Long Island.  Neither of the other two occupants of the plane, including Jane, survived.  Erik is still in the hospital, suffering through painful burn surgery, gradually getting better, as I glean from the memorial website set up by his and Jane's children.  The bandages finally same off his fingers last night, allowing him use of a keyboard, hence the message to me and, undoubtedly, many other unknowing but not uncaring friends. 

I am so sorry Erik's loss.  I can't imagine how he feels but his lost ones are in my thoughts and prayers.  I am so glad that Erik gave me the opportunity of meeting Jane, I could tell from our brief encounter that she was a special person and that the two of them were very much in love.  Get better, Erik. 

The hills of Staten Island, those wooded ridges ranging westward from Trossach Road all the way to Wagner College, which a long time ago rang with the youthful shouts of boyish triumphs, sit still and silent now.

A Small Step

JFK said, before he died, that America would put a man on the moon in the same decade.  It did. 

I remember July 1969 when the Apollo 11 mission landed on the moon, and Neil Armstrong descended the ladder from the module on live TV to set foot in the Sea of Tranquility to proclaim American dominance.  He said, "One small step for man, a giant leap for mankind."

I went outside at that moment to look at the bright moon and exult.  I exult no longer, because America is no longer dominant, and that was almost half a century ago.

Armstrong died today at age 82.  So many hopes, so unfulfilled.

You Mean, Like, Right Now?

I recently developed a benign fatty tumor the size of an almond on my right forearm high up by the elbow.  I have one on my thigh too, they're not dangerous, they just . . . are there.

Except this one caused my forearm muscle to ache whenever I lifted something heavy straight up with my knuckles up, or carried something light for a long time, like a half-liter water bottle for forty minutes on a run.  So it impacted my lifestyle because it affected my running, you know?

The GP ($10 co-pay) at Kaiser passed me on to the surgeon ($20 co-pay),  I went in for a consultation with him one morning last month and explained the ache this fatty deposit caused me in my forearm.

Well, I could either live with it, he said, or have it cut out surgically.  He didn't mince words or hem and haw around.

Well, let's get it cut it out, I said, thinking of future arm-pain free running.  I started to pull out my appointment book to see when I could best schedule the outpatient procedure.

I'll do it right now, he said.  You mean right now? I asked brightly.

Yes, he said, now.  I immediately realized that I didn't quite have my mind wrapped around having a two-inch incision done right then, and then hopping off the table and going to work.

Or we could schedule it for later, he said, seeing my hesitation.  I started thinking of having to come back to Kaiser a third time, and having to pay another $20 co-pay.  I needed a moment to think and I considered asking, absurdly, Will it hurt?

Okay, I said.  Two Novocaine shots and three minutes later the fatty tissue mass has been wrested out of my arm through a long slit in the skin using tongs.

The yellow mass lay suspended in bloody liquid in a test tube while the doc put five stitches in my arm to close the incision.  The gently floating lump looked like a hocker somebody had spit into a puddle.

Don't do anything stupid to cause the stitches to come out, the doctor warned me, knowing that I was a runner.  I didn't ask him when I could go out for my next run after the surgery.

I went out for a run at noon that day, for four miles.  The wound was weeping a little by the time I got back but I think that was just perspiration being expunged from the site.

It's all healed now and the arm feels great.  I'm a big fan of proactive Kaiser, getting this done right away for only $30.

Grandfather Twilight

I was rummaging around in the basement, trying to re-order my cinder-block-and-wood bookshelf I have down there.  It's got three 12-foot long shelves filled with books I've read.  Only half of  one shelf is literature or fiction, the rest contain history, mostly Civil War or World War Two books.

I came across a slender children's book pressed between two huge historical tomes that I have been thinking about and searching for for years, Grandfather Twilight by Barbara Berger (c1984), which I used to read to my three kids at bedtime.  It's about a kindly bearded old man living in a hut in the woods who closes his book at the end of each day, takes a pearl from an endless strand in a locked wooden chest he keeps and, followed by his loving dog, walks to the edge of the sea to gently release the glowing orb into the sky at twilight where it slowly rises and enlarges until it becomes the moon.  Then he returns home to lay down and sleep, good night.

As I worked out the devastation bestowed upon my life by my ex when she parentally alienated my children during our interminable and obscenely expensive divorce litigation, which induced them to walk out of my life forever half a decade ago, I went over the countless wonderful things I did for and with my sons (yeah, that's right Jimmy, Johnny and Danny), and I thought often of the times I read them this wonderful book.  No matter where I looked I couldn't find our copy of it.  Not actually having it was frustrating, but divorce teaches you that possessions are mere things and immaterial and the real valuable "stuff" resides stored in your memories.

I actually have our copy of Grandfather Twilight now, after years of wishing that I had it.  The book, with its lush pictures and wonderful story, is as beautiful as I remembered.  I love this book, but not half as much as I love Jimmy, Johnny and Danny, who reside in my memory as three precious children still.

95%

I donated my 95th unit of whole blood today; I gave my first pint in 1982.  They like my blood because it's O+, which is secondary only to O-, which can be transfused into anyone.

In eight weeks I can donate my 96th unit, which will be my 12th gallon of blood.  Imagine 12 large chlorax containers filled with bright red fluid. 

The date is circled on my calendar, as I'm trying to get to one hundred, a little goal I set for myself.  I'm on track this year to donate six times, like I did last year and one other year. 

The absolute maximum amount you can donate in a year is seven times, but only if you donate right after the new year and right before the end of the year.  You literally have to carefully plan it out, and I've only done it once before.

Back to Basics

So I went to church, and listened to a sermon about Jesus knowing how he would handle the 5,000 ravished hopefuls coming to listen to him preach but as the horde approached, he tested his apostle Phillip,.  What should we do, he asked?

Phillip bemoaned being able to feed the advancing hungry horde but Andrew said there was a boy who had 5 loaves and two fishes and that's a start.  That's Andrew's Way, that you have more than you think for starters (we know how Jesus was able to make the loaves and fish be enough for all).

Interestingly, afterwards as I walked out of the building I encountered an Eastern Orthodox woman from Russia who wanted to attend a service in the historic Falls Church.  I introduced her to the reigning priest and went home.

With all that exhausting work behind me, I settled in to watch the Olympics on TV.  Women's cycling, volleyball, swimming qualifying heats.  I could care less about that stuff, so at 11:30 am I bestirred myself, turned off the boob tube, changed and went to the curb.

There's a five-mile loop around my greater neighborhood that I used to run often, back in the olden times.  Back then I could usually break 45 minutes and I liked to get it around 42 minutes.

I started out in the noontime heat and humidity, thinking that was a good choice.  For the first mile, I went through all kinds of scenarios as to why I should make this a mile run, or a 2K run or an indeterminate run out the W&OD Trail.

I got past those negative thoughts however and my breathing regulated and got less ragged as I committed to the run.  At two miles I came upon a man standing by his fence line three feet off the sidewalk using a large watering wand to inundate his flowers.

"Hit me!" I cried out to him as I ran towards him, pointing to the copious water flow emanating from the hose nozzle.  He looked at me in confusion.

I gave him a circular motion with my hand, miming water cascading over my overheated body.  He didn't get it till I was past when he suddenly understood and held up the gushing nozzle but I was already heading away from him and not about to stop. 

At three miles I ran by the county golf course and the mini-golf range with its rushing-about children talking excitedly.  This was a hill up and this took me from the shade of the sidewalks to the sunlight of the road's shoulder. 

I was tiring by the fourth mile which I passed at 40:15.  One mile out, a large downhill in front of me fronted by and finished by a couple of short uphills, I tried to air it out a little so I could break 50 minutes.  I had to make up 15 seconds though to do this.

I turned onto my block and then sprinted the last 100 yards to stop my watch at the return to my driveway at 49:59.20 for five miles.  Yes!

Parking in Arlington

I'm having trouble with regulators these days.  Yesterday I enjoyed a lunch with a friend at a restaurant in Arlington. 

Arlington is notorious for its parking enforcement.  They make you want to never go there.

After lunch, I returned to my car and was standing there with my driver's door open, one foot inside the car, waiting for my friend to come get in.  He was lagging behind twenty feet or so on the sidewalk, coming and plainly in sight.

An Arlington Meter Maid swung by in the traffic lane on her Segway.  Vroom vroom look at me I'm an "Officer" and I'm bad.

While I stood there, standing with my car door open, one foot inside, waiting for my passenger who was in sight mere feet away and coming, she wrote out a ticket (they punch in or scan in your license plate, hit a code and out pops the ticket in seconds) and tendered it to me while I stood there, standing with my car, door open, foot inside waiting for my clearly visible passenger.

"This is my car," I said.  "And that is your ticket," she said smugly.

"I'm not parking, I'm standing," I said.  "There are no signs prohibiting standing."

"You're seven minutes over," she said sneeringly.  "$35 for seven minutes, five dollars a minute, three hundred dollars an hour to park in Arlington?" I asked while I still stood there with my driver's door open and my foot inside the car waiting for my passenger who was plainly visible a few feet away to get in the car.

"Take it up with the traffic board," she said.  "Do you know how hard it is to stand on this machine all day?"

I had no sympathy for her for her complaining, probably she should come down off her mount a little to address her prodigious frame.  She swirled around in the traffic lane on her Segway like the Lone Ranger rearing up Silver and roared off at twelve mph, swerving around the corner in search of quota fulfillment.

Welcome to Arlington, Virginia, friend.  My weekend running buddy who lives in Arlington assures me that Traffic Court in Arlington is merely Kangaroo Court where they'll just assess the printed penalty and then assess you 15% more in court costs for having the temerity to come in.