Open Letter to the Class of 1983

See you in September

I can’t decide whether I'm more excited about college football starting again, or the few weeks until my 30^th high school reunion. Thoughts go back to those years when your age seemed frozen and the future appeared far off in the distance; the way you feel when you have plenty of time before a flight, checked-in and ready—no pressure, no hurry.  We were comfortable back in the 70s & 80s.

My class graduated in late May 1983, and although we had no idea about Madonna when her album debuted that summer, we launched out from there; lives moving rapidly from one stage to the next, unevenly aligned with decades, but furiously reaching one road sign after the next. Most of us went off to college, many stayed in Texas, some even settled in Big D to raise their families. Won't a few of you from faraway lands come to this reunion?! It would be fun to guess who comes from farthest away. London, Hawaii, Australia?

How can we be at the third reunion? Each celebration so far has been unique in its theme:

• 10^th was just another big party like many of the weddings I attended; pretty nervous walking up to Winfrey Point clubhouse, I pondered why I hadn't given the concept much thought?
• 20^th was the “Vice-President Reunion,” as everyone climbed the ladder of success rapidly and came ready to show off their progress. (How could everyone in the room be a Vice-President?). I thought it a fairly insincere bridge from the early reunion to the upcoming milestone of 2013.

My impression is that with this class reunion, all who attend will feel lucky to be there, and everyone by this time has taken some lumps:  suffered through some bout of death, divorce, disease, disaster, and/or depression. It will be something from which we did not overcome with the same pride and fervor thought to have come so easily at our 20^th anniversary.

"That which tears open our souls, those holes that splatter our sight, may actually become the thin, open places to see through the mess of this place to the heart-aching beauty beyond." From Ann Voskamp’s quote there is encouragement to seek conversations and renew relationships in a sincere, transparent way; allowing friends to see through the thin, torn patches in one's personal tapestry, for they are the passages by which one sees the real insides of my being, and hopefully the beautiful light of God beaming through them.

I believe this time the grace of a group approaching their 50s outstrips our natural tendency to fudge, judge, or peacock in front of our classmates. This platform of life takes time and skill to climb onto; and so we welcome our friends to a wonderful point in which the pretense of success, status, and class, pale in comparison to the love and joy we will experience as we share each other’s foibles, struggles, and humility.

At first it will be difficult to peel the layers of the onion back; we’ll fall back to the natural, “I’m great, the kids are super; Yes, I do have it all put together just as it seems.” However, as we break through to authenticity, it's fortunate that we really made it here at all, considering what has happened; at this point there is hope for a renewed camaraderie among humble old friends. This reunion presents a rare opportunity to re-connect, review, and even de-construct some of the "archetypes" manifested in previous meetings. But how many of the graduates have the courage to show up and tell their (real) story?

My story certainly has some twists and turns too strange for fiction, and I know that your story will take my breath away at some point during its telling. It’s been such a long time since we thought of each other, but thankfully there’s still so much we have in common. There are strong mysterious links which enchain the heart to the regions where the morn of life was spent.

With all due respect to the writing of Gail Godwin in her novel The Finishing School, I am expecting to meet two kinds of people at my 30^th high school reunion:

“One kind, you can tell just by looking at them at what point they congealed into their final selves.

It might be a very nice self, but you know you can expect no more surprises from it.” These people are doing just fine with themselves and I say, “more power to ‘ya,” or to be perfectly frank, and to use the phrase so enthusiastically used in the South when we just don’t quite know what to think: “well, bless your heart?!”

Godwin’s character Ursula continues, “Whereas, the other kind keeps moving, changing. With these people, you can never say, “X stops here,” or “Now I know all there is to know about Y.”

“That doesn’t mean they’re unstable. Ah, no, far from it. They are fluid. They keep moving forward and making new trysts with life, and the motion of it keeps them young.”

“In my opinion,” Ursula says, “They are the only people who are still alive.”

One unambiguous characteristic of this second group of people will surely be that they seize life with gusto. Contrary to the self-doubt that creeps into my mind sometimes when I think of the ups and downs of my career path; at least I had the courage to change, when the time to change was apparent. I will likely gravitate to and appreciate those who took on life’s challenges with passion, and I look forward to reliving some of my friends’ most perilous moments. 

To quote Jack London’s credo as told by a reporter named Ernest Hopkins:

“I would rather be ashes than dust!

 I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.

 I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

 The function of man is to live, not to exist.

 I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them.

 I shall use my time.”

For those of us who make it back to HP in September, may that credo be the cry of the class of 1983.

©Mark H. Pillsbury

There Goes my Hero: Code Yellow (Part II)

Foo Fighters - My Hero (Live on Letterman) - YouTube:

'via Blog this'

There Goes my Hero: Code Yellow (Part II)

“Are you ready for the dance tonight, dude?” Lieutenant Harrington casually asked me as we climbed up on the Rhino, outside of the hearing of enlisted men, or “blackshoes” who checked all the tags and ordinance hanging off of the Hornet they prepared to catapult off into the ink-blue night.

As we both settled into the routine of pre-flight checks in the cockpit of the highly complex, computer driven F/A-18 Hornet aircraft, it stretched comprehension to think that this flying machine descended from the heavier than air model that the Wright Brothers flew at Kitty Hawk in 1903.

In just a little over a century, aviation went from analog to digital; the awareness of this complexity lost on the aviators, but not in history. The Hornet was so complicated, the pilots did not know what they did-not-know about this evolution from clothe and pulleys on the dunes of North Carolina to gigahertz and nanoseconds cruising on the Persian Gulf. Could aviation’s complexity eventually take human beings out of the cockpit? That question was not on the agenda tonight.

Idling on the deck of the USS John C. Stennis, they both knew in the far reaches of their “leadership grey-matter,” that possibly they could be one of the last crews back on the carrier. The chaperone waits by the door until everyone makes it home safely from the party. That is just the gentlemanly thing to do.

“Hope the Texaco jocks are warmed up and sharp tonight,” I said partly to myself. If this was a long ordeal, many of the jets would probably re-fuel while in the heavens.

The Lt. replied, “This could turn into a Turkey shoot before that,” the landing process, although a dangerous part of the evening, was more of the business side of this mission; Lt. Harrington’s fangs were out, clearly focused on engaging bandits before the serious landing maneuvers started.

“Can’t you see the guys in the con-tower placing their side-bets on Bubba Bolter,” the slang name for the pilot who makes multiple attempts at the tail-hook. My bombardier-navigator focuses also sharp, still picturing the SNAFU routine of the pitching deck at landing time.

Carrier landings are actually controlled crashes. The fighter jet rams into a lurching runway, hoping the large titanium hook jutting out of his tail slaps across the thick steel cord tightly wired across the deck, known as the crossdeck pendant.

Once the plane hits the ship’s surface, hopefully lined up straight down the runway; the pilot throws the throttles forward full. This full speed tactic instantly allows a hookless Hornet the opportunity to get back off the carrier and try again; otherwise jets skid off the runway and into the ocean in front of the ship, adding insult to injury.

Blue-water ops in the dark, an opportunity to excel as Lt. Harrington liked to remind us. “You look like a lost nugget tonight, J.O.?” “What’s wrong?” “I’ll take you out partying tonight, little brother, promise.”

“It’s gonna be a long night, Lieutenant,” trying not to complain. “At least we don’t have to plow through the Goo,” meaning bad weather that makes it impossible to see.

“We’re in the Navy to have fun, remember?” I was looking at the back of his helmet by now; we were conversing on the intercom. “Don’t forget the Code:Yellow gouge we got in the readyroom?”

“Copy, Rocket One.” I was done with small talk and wanted to light the two fires on the Hornet’s tail and get up in the sky, where even though I was not flying the aircraft, I had the best seat in the house.

©Mark H. Pillsbury

(aviator fiction series #2)

Dave's blu Gibson in case you watched the YouTube video "My Hero" on Letterman