Memorial

 

So, today, we celebrate Memorial Day, a Day to honor our men and women who have died in the service of protecting our Nation. Being a bit older than most of you, I still remember that Day as Decoration Day, its original name because it was a Day when people would honor our War dead by decorating their graves with flowers.

The origins of that Day are greatly mixed with America’s Race arguments. One of the earliest celebrations involved freed Black men and women honoring the War dead who had been responsible for freeing them.  The Nation moved from that more limited memorial to one that honors all of our War dead, those men and women who died serving the Nation, especially in our many times of War.  And think of that. Just since I have been alive, we have experienced World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and those seemingly never-ending Middle East conflicts, even if they are not properly called Wars.

Apparently, Humans of all kinds prefer resolving their conflicts by shooting at the “Other Side”.  And again, apparently, that has transferred in America into a Love of Guns and just shooting people generally, even if we don’t know those people.

Our World today seems to sit on the edge of a precipice, as we sit pointing guns and hating people generally.  So many people, so little time.  At one point, in my now long life, I still remember living on the edge of oblivion. America and the Soviet Union, both armed with nuclear weapons pointed at the other, were practically drooling at the prospect of letting loose those thousands of Death missiles. The world’s problem, and our problem more specifically, was that, should we loosen those weapons and send them on their way, the Russians would do the same, and then we would all disappear into a nuclear emptiness, where no humans continued to exist.  I was working at Lockheed at the time. The Lockheed Missiles and Space Company was hard at work, as was I, on designing and building the Polaris, submarine-launched ballistic missile. It was a fearsome thing. Each submarine could hold 16 missiles, each of which could deliver, in turn, three independently targetable nuclear delivery vehicles.  The missiles could be fired while the submarine was submerged.

But it was a while in development. In 1957, when the Russians launched SPUTNIK successfully, we were still in the early development stages of designing and building Polaris.  And our anxiety leaped up after the Soviets were successful. Now, to be fair, SPUTNIK was a satellite, not an ICBM. But it made very clear that Soviet technology had suddenly leaped ahead of ours.  And I still remember in that dark, cold period, beginning to feel actually threatened. Our President, Dwight Eisenhower, told the American people that we had entered a new era. The level of threat I perceived was sufficiently real that I experienced serious fears.  But our work went on, even if not without glitches.  Among the glitches, were our experiences blowing up our missile over Cape Canaveral. We nicknamed our Polaris developmental missile as “The Snake Killer”, because of its unfortunate habit of blowing up soon after launch, thereby spewing flaming solid propellant all over the Cape’s grassy launch area, thereby killing all snakes and other mammals in that area.

And so, we went on developing our horror machines, while the Soviets were doing the same.  And that “Cold War” continued with Hate spewing at each of the contestants, mainly America and Russia.

Eventually, of course, both of us acquired the technical capability of totally destroying the other side.  And each crisis seemed to generate its own anxiety level. I vividly remember that nasty Cuban Missile Crisis.

From a reference text:

October 16-28 marks the anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, an anxious period during the Cold War in which the two superpowers—The United States and the Soviet Union—stood on the brink of a nuclear war. Just 17 years after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a stark warning of the devastating consequences of launching a nuclear warhead, fear of nuclear conflict was at America’s doorstep. Over the course of 13 days, the world avoided nuclear catastrophe through shrewd diplomacy and sheer luck.

October 16, 1962: US National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy briefed President John F. Kennedy on evidence that the Soviets were constructing nuclear missile sites in Cuba, just 90 miles from US territory. Earlier that year, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev had reached a secret agreement with Cuban leader Fidel Castro after the island experienced a failed US attempt to overthrow his government.

President Kennedy met with a group of trusted advisers to discuss options. This group would meet daily during the crisis and later be named the Executive Committee of the National Security Council, or ExComm.  Two main options emerged: destroying the Soviet missile sites with air strikes, or establishing a naval blockade to cut off Soviet shipments of additional materials to Cuba.

October 20, 1962: Following days of meetings, including one with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrey Gromyko, Kennedy decided on a naval blockade.

October 22, 1962: Kennedy addressed the American public, revealing the news of Soviet moves in Cuba and announcing the US establishment of naval quarantine until the Soviets dismantled the missile sites. He also sent a letter to Khruschev, warning him of deliberately plunging the world into war, which it is crystal clear no country could win and which could only result in catastrophic consequences to the whole world, including the aggressor.

October 23, 1962: US ships moved into place around Cuba. Soviet freighters bringing supplies to the island moved into the area, but ultimately altered course, or stopped in their place.

October 25, 1962: Soviet freighters turned back toward Europe, but a commercial oil tanker—The Bucharest-- continued towards Cuba. The US allowed the Bucharest to pass through the blockade, without search, after the Navy was satisfied it was carrying petroleum.

October 26, 1962: As work on the missile sites continued, Castro requested Khrushchev to launch a nuclear first strike against the US. This never happened. Instead, then Soviet leader sent a letter to President Kennedy suggesting a way to resolve the conflict: the Soviets would remove the missiles in exchange for a US pledge not to invade Cuba.

Kennedy’s brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, played a crucial role in diplomatic efforts, meeting with Russian Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin who likened the Soviet buildup in Cuba to the US nuclear missiles stationed in Turkey. AG Kennedy informed Dobrynin that the United States was ready to discuss the issue as part of a potential agreement to end the crisis.

And talk about nervous mind-blowing. Yes, we were all biting our nails, because this one could be “The One”.  Happily, everyone backed off. Perhaps visions of Hiroshima danced in their heads, as they did mine.  I don’t know if I have ever been that frightened. But we all kept on truck’n, designing and building our Polaris.

And now we fast forward to our present 2023. What we have now is a new way to reconsider WAR. Only now, we are simply and collectively trying to think of new ways to live our lives as we move towards the next Presidential election.  And on one side we have the Democratic party trying to figure out how best to support our President, Joe Biden. On the other side, we have a new Republican Party—“new” because republicans broadly have killed of that party of Eisenhower. I personally am no longer sure what this newly incarnated political party wants, aside from, obviously, political power. They wish to be in charge, apparently so they can cut taxes of their wealthy supporters, reduce all benefits to middle and lower class citizens (including, apparently, Social Security) and take action against Women, people of color, the LGBTQ folks, and any and all migrants here or wishing to be here. They most now remind me of those folks in 1936 Germany, working with and supporting Adolph Hitler.

Seemingly each day brings us some new form of anti-democracy movement by the current pseudo-Republicans. And their continued siege against America makes me want to throw up, and returns me to those nervous days of the 1960s. America may not survive this constant barrage of fascist attacks from our right wing. They may succeed in doing what the Soviet Sputnik crowd could not. Indeed, I find myself thinking seriously about where I might be considering migrating, were I much younger. New Zealand anyone?

But I am old now. In under two years, I shall be 90, and married for 70 years. Those are good things I know, to be celebrated. But simultaneously, our Nation seems to be fracturing into a new form of Civil War.

But in the meantime, happily we still continue to find some way to honor our War dead. So, YES, Decoration Day continues and we should all find some way to honor those men and women who died trying to help our Nation survive the threats from within and Without.

So, Thank you Veterans, Men and Women alike. You, at least continue to make our Nation proud.  Again, THANK YOU.

May 8, VE Day, 1945

It was a Tuesday.  And as the day was ending, the Unconditional Surrender was announced.

From Wiki:

“Adolf Hitler, the Nazi leader, had committed suicide on 30 April during the Battle of Berlin, and Germany's surrender was authorised by his successor, Reichspräsident Karl Dönitz. The administration headed by Dönitz was known as the Flensburg Government. The act of military surrender was first signed at 02:41 on 7 May in SHAEF HQ at Reims,^[2] and a slightly modified document, considered the definitive German Instrument of Surrender, was signed on 8 May 1945 in Karlshorst, Berlin at 22:43 local time (that’s 5:45 PM Washington Time).

The German High Command will at once issue orders to all German military, naval and air authorities and to all forces under German control to cease active operations at 23.01 hours Central European time on 8 May 1945.”

I had gone to school that day, PS-82 in Manhattan, knowing nothing of this momentous event. We were at home, beginning to eat our dinner at our Manhattan apartment. The announcement came on the radio shortly thereafter. We all smiled, I remember.

That War had changed many lives, including ending the lives of more than 80 million people worldwide.  And I remember, several months later, smiling when I saw my Uncle Bill walking toward our apartment on Second Avenue, having just returned from his Seabee duties in the South Pacific.  The War had engulfed us all.

Daisy, my mum, had no college training, but she had acquired some skills with numbers. Specifically, she went to work during the War as a Bookkeeper at a company called Gibbs and Cox, a Naval Architecture firm that designed marine vehicles, specifically boats meant for wartime duty.  In addition to Daisy, my sister Ruth dropped out of high school at Julia Richman in Manhattan.  She was 16 and a junior in high school, but the War beckoned and she went to work alongside my mother, but as a typist.

The War had changed so many lives. Daisy worked and earned a decent living, but the War caused the introduction of many changes, not the least being food rationing. We could still buy food, unlike many Europeans, but it was rationed, so that food could be diverted to our troops. Folks were issued Food Stamps that would be needed in order to buy many items of food, as well as other commodities (automobile tires were rationed, and autos themselves became a casualty, with production lines being diverted to producing military vehicles, including tanks, jeeps, etc).

One casualty of the rationing system was our dog. We owned a little white dog we named Cleo. Daisy had bought food for our dinner one day, and, before she got around to preparing our dinner, Cleo had somehow gotten into the meat she had purchased—Rationed Meat!. When it was discovered that Cleo had eaten into the rationed beef, Cleo became history. He was sent to a doggy hostelry and never again darkened our door.

And then there were the Blackouts. When a signal came down, all lights in Manhattan had to be turned off. Think of that. Manhattan went dark. And should we ignore that order, we had an air raid warden banging on our apartment door. They thought maybe New York would be a target for German bombers (although how Germans could have gotten bombers within reach of Manhattan seemed dubious at best. But Blackouts we had aplenty.

I was ten when that war ended, a young lad with many memories of scary days. To be fair, unlike, say, London, we had no bombers dropping those wicked bombs on us in Manhattan. Still, we did not know that then, so we remained apprehensive. Most of us also knew someone actively engaged, and a few friends actually lost someone in conflict. So, when the conflict actually ceased, via that Unconditional Surrender, soon after Adolph committed suicide, there was much shouting and singing and dancing.

Somehow, nothing that followed ever compared to that Great event. 911 comes close to producing great shock, and massive anger. In that crazed act, someone did something that even the Germans could not do during that Great War.  So, if our reaction to 911 is viewed as somehow excessive, we think it was not. Attack America at your peril.

And so it goes.

To Old to Run?

Increasingly, I find myself reading about someone or something that has quit working, or just croaked.  And then, upon checking, it turns out they/it was younger than me.  For example, Gordon Lightfoot, the amazing singer-songwriter, just died at the age of 84 of “natural causes”.  To be fair, some folks have been croaking at well past my age of 88. But, many/most are younger.

We attended a party the other day, and, as we were sitting and chatting, someone asked, “So, how long have you been married?”  And I replied. “Coming up on 68 years this July.” And she looked baffled and said, while laughing, “So, what, you were 3 when you got married?” And then we all laughed. See, nobody else in the group was past maybe their mid-50s.

88?? Who in the hell is 88 and still wandering around, drinking wine and still driving home? It doesn’t even seem right to me.  I mean, I don’t feel like I’m in my 30’s or 40’s, but 88? Nah!.

Now we do know folks who are older. We have a friend, Sidney Tynan, who lives in Rhode Island by herself at the tender age of (almost) 102.  And she still writes a monthly paper called her “Country Newsletter”.  We knew Sidney from our days spent in India during the mid-1960s. And we have remained friends.  And we have another friend from India, now in his 90s, who lives in Florida and still works with his artist wife. And then, we have our friend who lives in Australia and who worked in India with us. He is just 4 months older, but he always makes believe he is younger.

So what does it feel like to be 88? Well, it really is just one day at a time. Mostly, one day resembles the other. Oh we have some variation. We both go to work out three days a week.  And we go out to shop on Fridays and Saturdays (the latter to a local Farmers Market). And Carol works with our local Literacy Council teaching folks to speak better English.  And then Carol spends a lot of her time making quilts for sick kids at our local children’s hospital.  Me?? I don’t do too much. I write this piece occasionally and I play around with vaguely artsy creations. I used to appear at local Art Walks, but they kind of died out during COVID.  Yeah, COVID killed off some nice affairs.  So I find myself reading a bit more and playing on Facebook and Instagram. No, I don’t do Twitter—too mindless, even for me.

One thing I am finding increasingly, is my impatience with Republicans. I cannot believe that I actually voted for a republican for my first vote—Dwight Eisenhower instead of Adlai Stevenson.  But now, I look at almost all republicans and think, Oh God, they are stuck in their minds in 1936 Germany, looking for their very own Adolph Hitler. And who is they wish to kill? Well, anyone trying to gatecrash their way into America from South America—really any people of color, though. And they seem to despise women, but they have to be a bit more careful there, since they tend to marry women.  Oh, and they really hate anyone in the LGBTQ community. They will do almost anything to make their lives miserable.

Now, being 88, I have difficulty with all this hatred. I realize I’m supposed to be far rightwing, hating along with the worst of them. But I’m just not like that, and I am having increasing difficulty with all these hatreds. I guess Donald Trump triggered all this awful stuff and, well he is old, just not as old as me, or even as Joe.

And so I now have to come to grips with this old people thing.  It would seem that the two main characters planning on running for President in 2024 are Donald Trump, age 76, and Joe Biden, age 80. Yeah, yeah, I know that Ron DeSantis is planning a run, and he is only 44. So, maybe I ought to be reconsidering. But no, DeSantis is young, but he is a young Idiot-Malenfant.  He seems to have joined the weird world of Republican Hate groups. So, No, he is not a candidate I might take seriously.

But How about Joe? Well, he would be 82 on taking office, and 86 on finally retiring from Office, assuming he remains alive.  OK, so I’m 88, and I will be way older than Joe, assuming I continue to remain alive.  And I am hearing a lot of jokes about Joe’s age.  He sometimes seems to stumble a bit in speaking and is not exactly agile physically. Still, he is pretty good for his age. And I am familiar with folks who succumb to things like dementia—my Mother for example. So, how can I continue to consider voting for Joe? Well, first, any prediction you might have for Joe, would be hovering above Donald Trump. Yeah, he’s a few years younger, but he begins as an idiot, whereas Joe still has a functional brain.

But suppose Joe begins to slip partway through his term of Office? Well, for one thing, he has a wife who would be positioned to rein him in. But even more importantly, he would have a Vice President (Kamala maybe?) capable of slipping into the position smoothly. Plus, we have all these highly paid folks who would be working for him who would also likely notice should Joe begin to slip. See, that’s the thing about an American Presidency, as distinct from Russia’s Dictator, Vlad. Over there, I assume someone would have to step in and shoot Vlad. See, we have less drastic ways of “retiring” our leaders.

Now I, at the tender age of 88, still function pretty much the same as I did in my 60s or 70s. I think there has not been much deterioration in my brain functioning. And so, although I am well aware of the aging problems, I don’t yet see that as a major deterrent to Joe running for office.  Would I be happier were Joe only 70, rather than 80, well maybe.  And so, do I think maybe he should not run? Well, no I do not.  It still comes down to Joe Biden vs. whoever the republicans select to run against him. And they seem to have no leaders who are not of the Fascist mindset. I am not sure how or why the republican party as a whole has slipped into the world of 1936 Germany, but there it is. If we want to continue living in a democracy, then folks, we are stuck with the Democrats and likely, with Joe Biden. It is so split that I think we dare not vote for a republican for major national office.  I do not know any longer what happened to those thinking people, of ethical/moral character who were/are republican, but they all seem to have gone into their respective closets.  They are no longer available as aides and counselors helping to keep the American ship afloat.  Maybe someday, they will return and kick out the Trumps, Marjorie Taylor Greenes, Kevin McCarthys and Ron DeSantis’ of this world.

Ahh, that would be a wonderful world indeed.

Fond Hope Springs Eternal. And maybe I will still be alive to see that happening. Who knows??? The Shadow Knows.