Memorial Day

  
                                               50th Anniversary Vietnam Era Medal

    My experiences in the Army have been etched in my design so profoundly that I seldom verbalize the experience. I'm not sure why... or maybe I do.

    The decision to enlist could be compared to throwing a dart at a map.
June 25th 1973...  Just graduated from Pennridge High School (that in itself deserved a medal) and as I remember it, I'm riding a Greyhound bus to NE Philly headed to the Military Entrance Processing Station. I'm a soft, punky, overweight cigarette/weed smoking kid, and now I'm registering that profile... and I can't get off the bus. I look around to find similar lost souls, but I'm hearing most have been drafted and I might be the only one on the bus who volunteered. I'm keeping my mouth shut.
   Processing station wasn't bad.... I knew my name, my next of kin, and I can suck up inoculations with the best of them. I'm feeling good about how independent I am. I could muster 'yes,' 'no' and I don't know.' "Army life isn't going to be that tough," I said, still in my civilian clothes.  And then,  Ft. Dix, N.J. happened.
    I'm not going to blog a play-by-play about boot camp and how the Army reached down into my soft exterior and pulled out something hard and disciplined (not to be confused w/ other possible parts of that same description). Briefly, the Army was teaching a Perkasie Pa. kid how to survive. This was a camp about life and death realities and the D.I.s were tough loving us to death.
    Vietnam was ugly.  I was never there. Families lost their children without choice.  I remember wondering what souls lay on this same cot before me. I'm processing those same kids who walked the same hallways, had the same training and were later shipped to Southeast Asia with the tools they were given at Ft. Dix. Not to take a morbid slant but, I felt I could be laying in somebody else's coffin, that's how weird it felt... cause I knew chances are...it was true.
     Memorial Day for me is more than a holiday and a hamburger. I may not wear a hat with Vietnam Era pins or parade my American Legion membership to enhance my contribution. I will, though, always remember those forgotten souls like the ones I felt at Ft. Dix... who were kids like myself. Laughing, making friendships, doing Army stuff, and then dying in a far away place or wounded emotionally. It's a real thing.  They are not 60 something... they will never blog... they will never harvest a generous life. They are dead. Vietnam wasn't a threat to our Constitution, but they laid down their LIVES under the name of Freedom. I salute my brothers who make my comfortable day possible.  I remember who you were.

                                                         

It's my Fault

   

I found a place where the Pacific Ocean replenishes a beaten soul and where the sunsets are affordable. It's on a Peninsula.

It may be another chapter in my journey that I could call my last....and have no regrets. It offers earthly gifts, gifts of majesty and wonder that Alaska has laid at my feet daily....for 37 plus yrs.  I'll miss Alaska... With wild enthusiasm I absorbed it's opportunities and adventures. Alaska had challenged me to survive my good decisions as well as my bad.....and it is me.
    It is time to live in new surroundings that renew me without a sub-zero weather signature--  mornings scraping ice off the windshield, weather-proofing my survival tools and black out curtains from the midnight sun....I surrender, its a young man's game.
    This Peninsula, I visit daily....through the laptop and actual reconnaissance -- not once but twice.  The Hemlock, Holly and giant aged Cedar trees offer this Alaskan a story book setting....almost a secretive hamlet isolated from the chaotic America I don't recognize nor want too. I'm almost ashamed to blog about my Shangri-La...... but no fear,  only seven people read these blogs anyway.
    Launching to Southwest Washington, for me can be compared to a Rolling Stones' farewell tour. I keep saying good-bye to Alaska...but I'm still here.
Last Aug. my house sold in just five days on the market...full asking price. I was already in Long Beach Wa. when the offers came rolling in  I could taste the adventure before me. Judith and I were giddy with the possibilities of beach living and what appeared to be a fast moving dream.
(note: giddy is a word I may use three times in my life....two of those times came during the reading of The Christmas Carol )

   Only thing left to do was sell Judiths' house. Until then we follow the Long Beach real estate websites and when we tire of that we view the Long Beach cams or read the local Long Beach paper. In today's world you can relocate to another place collecting the necessary survival tools and still find yourself on the comfort of your couch with a drink and snacks at your side.... laptops are awesome.




   It is now May and momentum to move has slowed to a crawl.  We hit some snags. Judith's health has compromised her energy level and NOBODY touches her stuff to pack. Ok, I get it. But here is the biggest obstacle that we now struggle with. The Cascadia subduction zone!
What ? The Cascadia what...subduction zone?  --  a series of small waterfalls kidnapping children from swimming holes ?
    You may have seen news blips lately. The Northwest will likely be swept off the map due too some plates that are ready to slip. Pulizer Prize article I have felt the earth shake under my foundation more than I can remember. Alaska is famous for the 'Big one' that hit in 1964 so, forecast of catastrophic destruction from an earthquake doesn't scare me easily. I mean, three years ago we never heard of this Cascadia zone....now I could do a Sunday evening term paper on it and hand it in Monday morning and get passing grades....we've done our due diligence. Science isn't in our favor.... the Peninsula could liquefy before the tsunami rolls in. (good news ?... we have 20 min before the big wave hits)
    Disappointment hollowed out our hearts. Judith and I weighed the future dreams with present day scenarios. We started redesigning our beach life dreams in Texas and North Carolina... it just didn't feel the same. Still we hoped to find that life preserver which would float us to a safer location but it felt forced...desperate.
    Now the residents of Long Beach are doing there best to salvage their own dreams. No head in the sand mentality here. They're building monolith type survival outpost. ( talk about desperate ) and the Peninsula was recently paid a visit by U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell...she came, she saw and then she said, "good-bye" and quickly left the scene. see here
    Can you believe it...we decided to keep moving forward. How awful it would be to experience natures fury in this manner but even worse for us, is to observe how awful it would be to see nothing happened and we're in our 90's... living in Texas. Foolish,... perhaps. We just have each other,.. we're not risking our children or family to live there. Judith worked in State government via Juneau and survived and I use to run into burning buildings. I figure....everyday we wake up by the Pacific would be a 'Great" day and not a cliché.
Now I know why some people live in trailer parks in Kansas....it's home.

  The following our tips on how to survive....please read if you need a smile.

When - not if - it arrives, it is unlikely the people of coastal Oregon, Washington and California will be able to escape.

But if they want to try, there are a few tips they should keep in mind.

Run, don't drive, to higher ground, says Kevin Cupples, the city planner for the town of Seaside, Oregon, in an interview with the New Yorker.

The force of the quake will cause liquefaction, when solid ground acts like liquid, across vast swathes of the porous region.

In the areas that aren't 'liquefied', the highways will likely be crumpled by landslides, with 30,000 avalanches set to hit Seattle alone.

Citizens will have a 20-minute interval to climb to the highest altitude possible before the full force of the tsunami hits, scientists predict.

Their alert will be when dogs start barking.

The first sign the quake is coming will be a set of compressional waves, only audible by dogs. Then there will be the quake, then 20 minutes later, the tsunami.

Geographers estimate that many could survive just by walking - however, they need to be going at least 3.5mph.

If everyone ups their average speed from 2.5mph to 3.5mph, the death toll drops to 15,970. About 70 per cent of them would be in Washington, nearly 30 per cent in Oregon and only 4 per cent in California.

And there is no point being a hero. 'When that tsunami is coming, you run,' Jay Wilson, the chair of the Oregon Seismic Safety Policy Advisory Commission, tells the New Yorker.

'You protect yourself, you don't turn around, you don't go back to save anybody. You run for your life.'

The only other safety measure is to relocate away from the Pacific north west.

    So,....The Cascadia Subduction Zone..... It's my fault.