The Lone Bone Has Left The Building

Don,  I guess I totally don’t remember that his middle name was Don.  Not surprising, as I wasn’t the most observant youngster, even with people I called friends.

Anyhoo, he’s dead:  Tony Edly.  That's him as I knew him in eighth grade.  And he'll always look like that in my head.

I guess Facebook is good for something.  I get to hear that kind of stuff.

And don’t get me wrong, I’m glad she told me.  Yet another good classmate that I lost touch with in the passage of time. 

I can look back on my yearbooks, and see all the faces.  Some of them I remember well, and fondly.  Some of them I could live without certainly.  A few of them still make me wish I was a kid again, sitting next to them, causing trouble. 

Tony was one of those.

I remember a routine he did in class one day.  I can’t remember for the life of me why he did it. I think it might have been some kind of class assignment handed out by the wonderful ‘hippie’ substitute teacher we had for most of one school year, was it seventh?  eighth grade?  I don’t know. 

Just a sec.  I know where two of my St. Thomas Yearbooks are.  Lemme check.

Yes, the substitute that I remember, was Miss Schoder, pronounced as “Skoder” with a long ‘O’ sound.  She was fun as I remember.

And the thing Tony did in front of the class, was some sort of a western cowboy quick draw routine.  I seem to remember him and Steve Stelzer up there doing it for some reason.  One of them was a robot cowboy, that you’d put a quarter into, and he’d challenge you to a quick draw routine…..it’s coming back to me, sort of.

“First you take your gun, then you take your hat, then you count to three, and then you draw!” 

That was said in a robot cowboy type voice, of course.  One person would pantomime taking the things, and putting them on, then walk all bowlegged away and do the count of three and draw.  And I think the joke was, that one or two different people did the routine with the robot, and then the last person goes, and the robot repeats his speech, but then draws on the count of “one”, and wins. 

It’s kind of foggy.  But as I remember it was hilarious at that age. 

Somewhere along the line, and I can’t remember if it was tied to that skit he did, Tony started calling himself, “Tone The Lone Bone”.  Really really funny stuff.  I hope he wasn’t known as that the rest of his life though, it might be an unfortunate nickname for an adult.

I lived about a block away from him in grade school.  We did stuff pretty often for a time.  Although I don’t remember when that time started, or tapered off.  But it was always good fun.  Rode bikes, had a couple sleepovers, I think. 

He lived with his family, in his grandmother’s house.  His mother was there, as were his two older siblings.  They were all very nice as I remember. 

I had some strong opinions about his grandmother there for awhile, but as I can’t confirm any of it.  I’ll not mention specifics. 

I’ll just say that Tony was a pretty awesome kid, despite things being less than ideal sometimes. 

Just a few minutes ago, I Googled him, and found his Facebook page.  Not too many specifics to non-friends such as me.  I’d friend him, but I don’t think there’d be a response. 

Looks as if he might have been into tech.  Computers maybe.  I hope it went well for him. 

I’m sorry I wasn’t a better friend for him.  I’m sorry I lost track of him.  Along with all the rest of my classmates.  We were a really great class, even the stinkers among us were a hoot.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that I’m going to make close touch with everyone again.  I just can’t lie like that, not even to myself. 

But especially tonight, I’m thinking of them all.  And Tony Edly, the boy who was “Tone the Lone Bone”, once upon a time, and made us all laugh so much:  He’s right there with us still.

Cheers Tony, I got a quarter, wanna draw?

Tony Edly 1970-2012

There is no way I'll ever put Don between those two names.......

A Flag, a mask, and Differing Opinions

The role of symbols as a rallying cry cannot be overrated.

But the root meaning of some of these symbols can vary from person to person.

I’m thinking today, of the Confederate States of America's “Stars and bars” flag; and the now well known Guy Fawkes mask.

When I was younger, the rebel flag was a mystery to me. I saw it on the roof of the orange 1969 Dodge Charger that was a star on The Dukes of Hazzard on television. That was probably my first association I had of it. It represented fun, rebelling against crooked authority, maybe speed, cool cars. My introduction to this American symbol was not really based in any reality.

In middle school, I think it was, I learned that the "rebel flag" (though not the actual official flag of the CSA) represented the Confederate States of America. I learned a little more about the American Civil War. But I didn’t clue in at all on the actual situation that brought about the civil war. I just figured they had wanted to form their own country, because they didn’t agree with how Washington DC ran things. Which, is basically true, if a simple reading of it.

But that doesn’t take all the facts into consideration.

.- EDIT: Rather than bullshit you with a bunch of half-wrong talk:  Just reference the Cornerstone Speech, given by the Confederate Vice-President, in 1861.  Slavery, and the subjugation of the black race, is the correct answerto that question of "Why the Civil War?" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_Speech

But I didn’t let it worry me. I was a self centered person. I still associated that flag with the Dukes of Hazzard, and fun, and the whole concept of being a rebel. And since I was into my long run of defying any authority, just for the sake of it, I still liked the flag.

Fast forward to when I was twenty-two. I’d moved up north to the family cottage, so as to live closer to my new career oriented job of aviation maintenance. I’d become a bit of an alcoholic, I’d bought a few guns, a new Jeep, and an old Harley. I bought a cheap Rebel flag at a flea market, and ran it up the flagpole in front of the cottage. I thought it declared me as a “rebel” for all to see. At the time, I liked it.

We are going to ignore the whole picture of me as a beer swilling redneck I just painted there. It hurts to look at that image of what I used to be.

Then my father came up north. He lost his temper when he saw that flag up there. Because to him, it meant something completely different. To my father, born in 1939, he associated that flag, that symbol, with the Ku Klux Klan, racism, segregation, as well as the Confederates. All bad things.

I didn't put it up again. By then I was at least smart enough to know that if something made my father that angry, it should at least give me pause.

I eventually came to the conclusion that as a symbol, the flag did not mean the same thing to all people. And that my view that it was a simple, fun image of being a rebel; was not the most common one. I found the truth of it. That it was heavily associated with the South, and racism. People who wanted racism and separation, tended to use it as one if their rallying symbols. People who wanted brotherhood and unity, looked down on it as a symbol of things opposed to those ideals.

I felt bad that I had offended people in my ignorance. I wanted to hide my face.

And if I had, I hope I would have chosen a Guy Fawkes mask.

This mask should be familiar to people these days for several reasons. The underground hero called V, wore it in the movie of the same name with great success. The group called Anonymous has adopted it as the "face" of who they are; and the occupy movement currently going on also uses it as a strong public persona.

But what is that mask all about? What does it mean?

To myself, who first saw it in the aforementioned motion picture; it represents power, vengeance, and mystery. The character called V, was avenging certain horrible wrongs. He did so grandly, and with style. Few things grab my emotions more than righteous vengeance.

A scene at the end of that movie, captures a hint if why it appeals to both the Anonymous organization, and the Occupy protesters.

It's when seemingly thousands of people, all wearing the guy Fawkes masks, black hats, and capes, converge on the police, guarding The house of parliament I think it was.

The power in that image, of all those people, standing together, against oppression, under the anonymity of the same face, making them even more unified and one: it was breathtaking.

I certainly cannot speak for Anonymous, although I am them and they are me, I understand the imagery. And it is powerful. They are everywhere, they are everyone, very effective.

Occupy Wall street movement uses it for much the same reasons, although with the added benefit of concealing your identity for awhile, avoiding needless reprisals hopefully.

I had to look up the Wiki on who exactly Guy Fawkes was though. Not growing up in Britain, I only knew what the movie had hinted at. That he was a revolutionary "terrorist" who had tried to blow up the British Parliament, but had gotten caught.

I learned he was a great deal more than that, and less, all at once. I won't bore you with everything. But in a nutshell, he was very Catholic, in a time when the Church of England was the only game in town, so to speak. He sold everything and fought for Catholic Spain in the Eighty year war. Returning from that (he wasn't there the entire eighty years), he hooked up with a group that wanted to bring a Catholic King back to the British Throne. Papalists, as they were called. Their idea was to blow up the Parliament building with gunpowder, lots of it.

Tipped off anonymously (how ironic!), the authorities searched the building, finding Guy Fawkes in the lower level, guarding the gunpowder cache. He was tortured, confessed, and sentenced to death. But threw himself from the platform, breaking his own neck.

EDIT: That apparently may be a myth, as official records indicate that Fawkes was hanged until "half dead", then disemboweled, and quartered. That's what i get for trusting in the convenience of Wikipedia.

Going with the legend, I'd like to think he was attempting escape.

So somehow, by my innocent reckoning, he went from religious fundamentalist homegrown terrorist, admit it, that's what he'd be called today; to a symbol to be burned in effigy once a year by the British; to dark hero in the graphic novels, and movie "V for Vendetta"; to a symbol of nameless strength; to a symbol of the common people, Anonymous.

What a long road that image took.

What a variation on what people's feelings there must be about that symbol, that image, the white mask with the fabulous 'stache.

Symbols mean different things to different people. A face that is one's hero, is another's villain. One person's flag of rebel fun, is another's flag of hatespeak.

Cheers to the differences, and learning to see them.

Disbelief Hanging Suspended by Wires

The suspension of disbelief, is a very important concept.

Doing it properly, can enhance any leisure or entertainment experience. Be it a movie, a book, a play, or a story around the campfire.

In the latter example, when someone is telling the scary stories around the campfire, even though the rational and logical you, knows that it's pretend, and there will likely be a "BOO" moment at the end. If you suspend that logic and rationale, you will have an immensely better time. Your tension will build with the story, to be cathartically released at the climax of the story. Much like sex.

Whereas, if you sit around the fire, with a nasty hipster attitude, as if you've been there and done all of this before, and pick apart the details of the story for their plausibility or factuality: not only will you make it a lousy experience for yourself, but you'll detract from everyone else's experience.

Don't be that person, don't be Buzz Killington.

The same concept obviously applies to other forms of entertainment. Really good to have in Magic shows, and plays. Places where either the angle on the show, or the scenery and costumes, aren't as perfect as in movies.

But I love going to them. Even if it's a cardboard cutout backdrop, painted by teenagers. As long as their acting can suck me in, I'm all in.

But, there is a backswing to all of that.

Sometimes, I suspend my disbelief too much. I hang my logic right up, and odn't participate in the mysteries right in the story. I just take it in as it is presented.

It's irritating to sit next to someone who doesn't do it quite as much as I do, and have them get the story twist about ten minutes before I do. all because they interpreted some early clue properly.

Dang it. But that's just sour grapes.

I am trying to get my kids to do it, or rather, keep doing it. It's a sort of childlike thing, the whole concept. I don't want them to get all jaded with things like I did. Which we now think of as being a Dirty Hipster.

I had to recover my suspension of disbelief. I was tired of not enjoying shows and stories as much as when I was a kid.

Maybe that explains why I've gone overboard with it. I just need to get my concept to mature a few years. Not to the hipster teenager phase, but arrest it's development just before that.

That's when it's at it's best. When you can ignore the fact that it's all fake, and enjoy it on it's face value; but still apply logic and learning readily when it helps you along with the storyline or concept.

I'd say I'm too old to change. But now that I know better, I'll keep working on it.

After all, you're never too old to think young.

Cheers, to the tweenager inside all of us.

Patellar Despair

I've got no business being upset.  But there it is.  I'm not perfect anymore.

I should provide the caveat that I never really was actually.  Just as far as general health and functionality goes, this body has been a real workhorse for me. 

I've historically been extremely healthy.  I seldom have, or ever have, had a decent reason to call in sick.  Maybe one day a year, I could be called 'sick'.  The rest of the time, it's just a headache maybe, or I'm wicked tired from doing something.  Or I just plain didn't want to go into work that day. 

FYI, Not counting the day I was high on some kind of opiate pain killer after my kidney stone, I haven't called in sick for almost two years now. 

After I was laid off for that extended period starting in 2009, my work philosophy does not include sick days, where I am not actually sick.  Which is a good thing.  Way better than in the mid 90's, when I'd call in sick pretty regular, just to take road trips with my wife.  Or even just go home sick and watch midday television.

Once, I called in sick, but didn't tell my best friend ahead of time.  So while he was at work, my wife and I took his wife with us on some road trip adventure.  Boy was he mad!  He wanted to have gone too! 

Once again, I digress though. 

My point is, that I've always been healthy, and durable. 

Despite being pretty hard on this body.  Through physical activity via six years of football, and occasional track use, plus all the other dumb stuff a young person does:  I never broke one bone.  For Forty years. 

Never had to have an operation, of any kind.  For forty years.

Then, in my fortieth year, the kidney stone; stupid lump removal on my head; and a broken kneecap. 

What the fuck is going on here?

And now, my perfect body, isn't going to be perfect ever again.  It's the long slide to decrepitude.

The kneecap, seen on X-ray today, isn't healing well in my opinion.  Compared to the one taken the day after I broke it, now almost 10 weeks ago; the one from today looks not substantially different to me. 

Basically, it still looks as broken as the first day. At least to me. It depresses the fuck out of me. Will it ever heal together?  I'm walking around more or less normally now. Is that preventing the bones knitting?

A physicians assistant tells me no.

I get vague reassurances, that it seems to be healing well.  Or that, it's hard to tell, but there may be bone filling in the gap here, it just appears so much lighter compared to the surrounding original bone......

I hate it.  The broken off part of the kneecap (patella), is not lined up properly with the larger piece, and when it heals in it's current position, will be misaligned slightly, to the aft direction, as seen by looking down at it. 

Does that make a difference?  Probably not, as far as immediate functionality goes.  In the future?  Who can say? 

In my mind, the misaligned edges, that will be sticking out, in the direction of the joint (!!!) will be pointy little potential problems.  A weak spot to be exploited by every misstep or kneeling position I take in the future. 

And, immediately speaking.  Devastating to my psyche.  I feel crooked.  Every ache I feel in my newly released from restrictions knee, I imagine to be the bone piece, moving wildly against it's mate.  Grinding itself into smaller pieces, to be trapped in the joint, and leave me immobile on some future pedestrian train track crossing.  Unable to move from in front of the Polar Express, or an Amtrak Commuter train.

If it does not heal, then we are back to surgically removing the small loose piece. Which I am ambivalent about.  Without that piece of bone in there, the same crazy train death scenarios apply.

I know, it's all in my head.  I've had a good run of luck with health, and I need to get over it. 

But I just can't do it today.

Cheers?  I don't think so.

SOPA, PIPA, and me?

SOPA, PIPA, and me.

As I was looking at Scott Johnson's latest Extralife web comic panel, I realized something. Those internet pirate bills, could very well effect me directly.

I don't usually think of myself as a content provider, or anything. But I actually am.

And, I do use small parts of other people's work within my own occasionally. In my poems mostly.

Think of it like a musician recording and producing a single, and he chooses to insert a little five second snippet of another song or something. It can give things an extra zip, or add context, or a familiar touchstone for people to reference within your own original related, or even unrelated work.

99.9% of my work on the poetry blog is original, I'll swear to it. But if you read enough of them, you'll see the odd quote, or something thrown in there.

Gosh, I just had a tangent thought, do I need to add a reference section in the back of my poetry book, in order to give credit to any line or quote that I've borrowed? Holy crap, I hadn't even thought of that. I wonder what the heck is allowed?

As a rule of thumb, I've heard, mostly from Mr. Tom Merritt, that if what you do is transformative, then it's ok to use little bits and pieces of things. But that sometimes, it takes a court case to prove you right, unfortunately

NOw that I've dropped his name, I probably butchered his intentions or something on that. If so I apologize ahead of time, and will edit immediately if required. I don't do much research ahead of time before writing a Warthog entry.

But back on the SOPA, PIPA track.

If an artist, or author read one or my poems on the Google Blogger, and took issue with how I used their words, or even their name maybe, I'll have to look into that one. I did make Jessica Alba into an underbed monster in one poem.

Anyways, if someone had a problem with what I wrote that was copyright related, under those two proposed law packages, they could complain, and I assume my blog site would be blocked. I don't get a chance to say a word about it before hand either.

The BS part of it, is that it doesn't matter if what I did was perfectly acceptable, and legal. If someone complains, it gets censored. The whole thing.

How messed up is that?

I'd heard numerous bad things about these bills, but never associated them with my own published content. I just was sad that many sites I like to visit may be effected.

This though, this changes everything.

Down with SOPA, down with PIPA.

The internets need to have some freedom to express themselves.

I've mentioned it before, relating to issues like this. There ARE existing laws on the books, that could be either enforced better, or tweaked slightly to cover the problems that copyright holders supposedly have.

But that is never anyone's solution, it's always just to add something else to our already bloated legal code system.

Give it a rest. Stop coddling corporations over people.

Cheers, before I get too carried away and write all damned day.

Being a Better Person

In my youth, I would rail against religion given almost any excuse. Especially when I initially broke "officially" with the Catholic church. I think I was about nineteen when I did that.

It was a tweeny, immature soapbox session I held while standing in the doorway to the family den/television room. My parents were both sitting on the couch. I don't recall what brought it on. But there I was, proclaiming my definite belief in the ridiculousness of the Roman Catholic church, and my probable disbelief in god as well.

Thus began years of alternating anger and guilt associated with religion, and all it's trappings. I maintained a sort of 'face' with the family, by attending important holiday masses with them. This went on whenever I was in town for Christmas usually. I don't know why I bothered. All pretense was gone.

I do admit to a certain amount of the comfort food factor, especially around the holidays like that. After all, I had been an altar boy for almost ten years. I knew the mass scripts mostly by heart, as well as most of the hymns, prayers, etc.

I feel badly about all my preaching against religion. Mostly stemming from a comment one of my best friends made once. I may have mentioned it before.

He told me something to the effect of: I don't believe in god anymore, mostly thanks to you.

That stabbed at my heart. I had climbed down off the soapbox for the most part by that point, and to have him say that. Well, that told me I shouldn't have been up there to begin with. I feel like I raped someone spiritually.

It's just not up to me to tell people what to believe, or not to believe. If I do, then I'm as bad as the church.

Belief, or unbelief, should be very personal choices.

To murder a George Carlin quote: Whatever gets you through the day, rub blue mud on your belly, whatever.

And that's the point, isn't it? To make it through each day, with some semblence of sanity and happiness. Despite the fact that our time on earth here is very limited, and this mortal life is all that we know. Everything else, we have to take on faith.

Unbelieving is no less a faith than believing, believe me! You have to work at it. Annd I'm still not perfect at it.

The important breakthrough for me, when I was struggling with religion, morals, ethics, happiness. Was a quaint little argument I made up to 'defend' my so called atheism.

In a nutshell, it is thus: Take two people.

One is a devout religious person, who follows all the rules of his faith, and is fully expecting an afterlife in a good place, be it heaven, valhalla, what have you.

The other person is an unbeliever. This person lives a good life, following his own moral compass, with no expectation of an afterlife, or any reward in that place.

Which one is the better person? The one who is good because of God's rules, and the hope for an eternal reward after this life? Or the person who is good and decent because he/she chooses to be. Because that is how that person believes it should be done. With only this mortal life span to look forward to, no consequences after that.

It's a rhetorical question. You don't have to answer it out loud. The way that I couch it, a logical person would choose the latter individual. But logic seldom plays in faith based scenarios. So I gave up trying with that argument.

That philosophy did help me turn my life around. I feel I'm a better person these days, because I choose to be so. Not because I have to be, or there are some arcane rules to follow.

I always had a problem with authority anyways. This way, it's my choice. :)

But ultimately, I decided, it's not important.

It's not important why you live a good life, or make life better for others. It is only important that you do.

So when I see someone, who was in a dark place at one time, and they are now a changed person, dedicating their lives to helping others; all because they found the lord, or Jesus, or Allah.

I call it a good thing.

I praise them for it. Because they are a better person, and make the world better for everyone else by being that way.

When I was 19 I would have ridiculed them.

Now that I'm 40, I know better.

Cheers, to doing good things for a reason, or no reason at all!

Space Madness! Or: Writing a cheap serial.

I've broken form a little bit. I wonder should I be worried?

Should I tie myself to a so-called "poetry" format for my Fritz365 poetry blog?

Nah!

It started on January 8th, after I wrote a rather free form piece about some maniac testing out a highly, and questionably modified Lear jet.


After, or maybe during, writing it; I decided I should tell some kind of narrative about this guy. Why would he do such a mad thing?

I had to reason: Could a guy that was smart and talented enough to pull off such a feat, still be so delusional that he actually thinks that he has a chance at reaching actual Earth orbit, let alone the Moon?

Does it matter? Was it all just a fancy way to commit suicide for this guy from the very start?

So I gave him some motivation. A life long dream of being an astronaut, and specifically, reaching the moon himself.

I also gave him a disease. This was the motivation for him to sell all his worldly possessions and cash in any savings and retirement he had.

I gave him a timetable. He has a year, at most, left to live. And this unnamed disease has the bad form to get a little worse as it goes. So the last few months of it, are virtually useless for anything else other than sitting or laying around waiting to die.

I gave him no family. Or at least none that I mention. Did he up and leave a wife and kids behind? Taking all their money to fund this mad dream of his? I leave that up to speculation. But I suspect not. The character is too kind hearted for that. He'd never hurt anyone but himself on purpose.

I gave him a companion. Someone to talk to, and hang out with. A dog. Named Dog, of course.

So that's where the storyline has it's beginning. Not on that test flight, which actually happens chronologically towards the end of the tale. But in the desert. Somewhere within four hours of Las Vegas. Kind of a Groom Lake, Area 51-ish type place. Not specified. Good for doing things as you wish to do them.

I haven't yet posted the last three installments as I write this.

I got carried away and wrote the last one yesterday. An Epilogue that sort of wraps things up as far as the question of what was his ultimate disposition.

I'm satisfied with where it went. Although I have the urge to write more substance into the story.

As a matter of fact; looking at the fourteen installments, I have the bones of an actual story. Perhaps not a novel, certainly not THE novel. But I rather like it.

All over a crazy notion I had in my head five years ago, discussed breifly in a place we loved to call "The Room of Speculation".

The idea of going into Earth orbit with a Learjet having rocket motors tacked onto it, got me a sad strange look at that time. I can't blame them. It is a pretty daft idea.

Space actually begins (officially anyways, whatever that means) at an altitude of 50 miles. Get there, and you can persuade NASA, or the Air Force, or someone, to give you a set of Astronaut wings. Or whatever it is that they get. A little golden Mercury capsule perhaps?

I want one!

Know that even insanely bold airplanes such as the SR-71 in level flight, and various prototype aircraft performing what is known as a "Zoom climb", have not gotten over 100,000 feet (which is just under 19 miles). And all those aircraft, are specially built with high temp resistant skins, specialized motors and fuel. Plus the special life support systems for the pilot.

Plus the actual Earth escape velocity, pegged at somewhere around 25,000 miles per hour.

My best guess using Tennessee windage, would put a Learjet on either meltdown or break apart status at somewhere around Mach 2 or 3, given enough thrust. Assuming it could make it through the initial turbulence at the speed of sound, the air friction generating heat on the aluminum skin would eventually cause it to melt, fatigue, crack, etc.

You can see where the story would fall apart on technicalities if it went too far in one direction.

So is it delusion? Or fancy, high tech suicide for the character here?

I like to think it's just like all good mysteries in life.

Somewhere in the middle, where it's all hazy and grey.

Cheers, to crazy ideas, and what puts us up to them.

Tahoma Guilt

As you may know, I'm an aircraft inspector. I've been working in aviation since graduating A&P school back in the summer of 1993. I've had good times, and bad, working for first a cargo carrier, then a research and development facility.

At this R&D facility, I was the lead inspector for six years. I was able to gain a lot of interesting experience there. As that job came to an end during 2008, I was hunting for a job that summer. One of the things I did was post my resume up on some aviation job sites.

One day that summer, while at work, I got a cold call from an air cargo company called Air Tahoma. They were based in Columbus Ohio, and the man on the phone was their Director of Maintenance.

He said he'd seen my resume online, and asked me if I might be interested in becoming the Chief Inspector there at Air Tahoma, Columbus.

That was quite a shock. Chief Inspector is pretty much the top dog position that an aviation inspector can shoot for. The next step up would be something corporate I think.

I told him I was interested. So we talked about it for about twenty minutes, while I sat outside behind our hangar.

What he told me of the position was interesting. What he didn't tell me, spoke volumes.

He told me a little bit about the company and it's history, the types of planes they flew, and the different places in the world they visited with the aircraft.

He told me that the reason he was looking for the Chief Inspector position, was that the current person in the position was an interim measure, and the local FAA was wanting a permanent person in as soon as possible.

Basically, when the feds tell you to get your butt in gear and hire someone, you should listen.

The person there now, I was told, was old and cranky. He didn't want to be a team player, and was always giving the maintenance side a hard time about everything.

The man on the phone told me he was looking for someone who would work with his decisions better, so things could go smoother.

He offered me a salary, right there over the phone. $50 K per year.

I told him I'd have to talk to my wife and think about it before I came for a visit.

He asked me to get back with him that same afternoon with a yes or a no, as he was in a time crunch.

I had to reflect on that phone call for a while.

This was an opportunity for me. To get experience in the top job in my current profession, inspection.

The negatives started adding up though.

Moving to Columbus would be another move to a place where my family had no support system. No relatives, no friends.

$50 K per year, really isn't that much money, especially for that job position.

The things he didn't say started to bother me. Why was he offering me a position, sight unseen, over the phone? The real reason.

What was the current Chief Inspector giving him such a hard time over, and why wasn't that guy going to take the permanent position?

Nobody else on staff had the experience or willingness to take the position?

What sort of things was I going to be expected to be going along with, in order to have things run smoothly?

All these things bothered me.

I talked to my current boss, and friend. We were all looking for jobs at that point, so it wasn't a breach of etiquette or anything.

He kind of came to the same conclusion I did.

Stay away from this one!

It turns out, we were both right. That September, a few months after I spoke with him, one of their airplanes crashed in a field short of the runway there in Columbus. All three crew were killed. The FAA and NTSB stepped in and investigated, found numerous problems, and pulled Air Tahoma's certificate. They were out of business.

I've had time now to think on that whole thing now and then. And I have to admit, I have some indirect guilt. I know it's ridiculous, you don't have to tell me.

Sometimes I play that what if game with myself though. What if I'd taken the job, I'd have been there at that time. What if I could have prevented that from happening?

Now, I'm no hero or anything, don't get me wrong. The problem that brought the plane down, was that the elevator trim cables were hooked up backwards. Easy enough to do actually, if you aren't paying attention. Hooking A to B, instead of A to A, and vice versa.

No inspector signed off on that installation before the plane took off and crashed. If an inspector had looked at it, maybe he would have caught it.

Maybe I would have caught it. Or maybe by being there, I could have worked with the Maintenance guy like he wanted, but still fostered a work environment that promoted quality, and conscientiousness. Maybe that could have helped prevent the mistake.

I'll never know. And since I took a different path, I wasn't involved.

But in another parallel universe, I made the choice to go there.

I have to wonder what happened when I did.