A Man Named Dave

the squadron, I’d discovered that peers that I didn’t really know were silently rooting for me, a mere cook, to cross over and become an air crew member.
    As Grandmother came toward me, I could see she was not happy. I remembered that she had lectured me to keep the phone call short. I had been speaking to the sergeant for at least ten minutes, which I assumed was nine minutes too long. Besides being overly polite and careful where to tread, I felt my visit with Grandmother was not the tender homecoming I had imagined. I genuinely did not know this relative, and she did not know me.
    “The phone,” she snipped.
    I looked down at my hand grasping the phone. It felt ice cold. “Oh, yeah, sorry.” My eyes darted toward the floor as I replaced the phone in its cradle. Grandmother remained by my side, as if waiting for a report.
    “So?” she asked.
    I shook my head like a scolded puppy. “Oh … sorry,” I said. “It was nothing. Just air force stuff, no big deal. It’s nothing, nothing at all.” I wanted to tell her. To grab her frail body and open my heart to her. Not to necessarily moan about my latest futile crusade, but rather as a way to finally come to know Grandmother as a real person – her hopes, her dreams, her anxieties. To know of her life experiences as a child, as a woman, and a single parent who raised two children during hard times. There was much I admired about her. Grandmother was one of the original “pull yourself up by the bootstraps” people. In a way I still believed she and I were alike. The whole purpose of spending a few days with her was to get to know her better. All my life I had been led to believe that any sensitive matter was to be instantly buried. As an adult, I still knew nothing about my parents and how they came to be. Yet as I stood beside Grandmother, I knew that all we could manage was idle chitchat, at best, praying one of us didn’t step into forbidden territory.
    “Well, then,” Grandmother heaved, breaking the tension, “did I tell you about the time I played golf with an officer from Hill Air Force Base? I think he’s a general… anyway …” And so did Grandmother and I kill time on my last evening, until we finally went to bed.
    Early the next morning, I strapped my oversized green sleeping bag, my military backpack, and, upon Grandmother’s unwavering insistence, a coffee can containing her homemade snickerdoodle cookies onto my motorcycle. After an impassive departing embrace, I rode off. Hours later, in the blazing heat, as my body became numb and dehydrated from the miles of endless interstate, my sole thought was getting back to my Florida base, where I could begin my outprocessing. I was quitting the air force.

8 – Changes
    I barely made it back from Utah to Hurlburt Field in Florida. The chain from my motorcycle stretched so much from the cross-country trek, that nearly all the teeth from the rear sprocket sheared off, almost leaving me stranded in Texas at the height of a heat wave. By the time I limped through Mississippi, my rear tire became bald, and all I could do was disregard it. I had to spend the remainder of my funds filling up my gas tank, praying every mile I’d make it.
    Hours after coasting into the base, I reported to the office that handled out-processing. As luck would have it, I no sooner came before a young airman – newly assigned, frantic, and confused – before he informed me to report to the section chief, pronto! Great, I thought, now what? I was exhausted, ready to give the next person I met a piece of my mind. As I stormed through the passageways, I felt betrayed. After four years, none of my efforts had paid off. Joining the air force to become a fireman was nothing more than a joke. I slaved away like I had years ago, but this time from the swamps of Florida to the Egyptian desert. And for what? I didn’t mind paying my dues, but for once, just once, I wished I could get lucky.
    The more I felt myself getting hot under the collar, the more I tried to brush aside my ego. Okay, I was a cook, but one with jump wings who had actually seen the great pyramids. I’d had a chance to be reassigned to work in an office where I was appreciated, enabling me, a high school dropout, to go to college. I had a couple of bucks socked away, and for four years the air force had given me a home. In all, what did I really have to complain about? So I didn’t snatch the golden ring of becoming an air crew member; big deal. What truly mattered to me was that I