18 December 2003

They tried to get the replica Wright Flyer to fly at Kitty Hawk yesterday, but it didn't work. It was raining, which made the replica heavier, and the launch rail had more resistance, and although the front end pitched up briefly, they couldn't get it airborne on two tries. There were over 35,000 people there to watch.

The Wrights had some issues, too, but they took things in measured steps. One of their first flights back in Ohio went only 25 feet, which is much more like a hop than a flight. So the supporters of Mr. Santos-Dumont may have a point, saying he flew first in zero wind conditions.

But it was indisputable that the President of the United States took Air Force One down to watch the attempt, and so was Buzz Aldren, the Second Man on the Moon, thought in fairness it should be noted that he got there the same time Neil Armstrong did.

I couldn't get to Kitty Hawk yesterday. I had a morning meeting with the Customer, since they were having a training session that I thought I should it in on it. The lecturer mentioned that had had been in the Army before going to the Emergency Management Agency. He had been there over a decade before being detailed to the new Department. Or transferred. He wasn't quite sure. There is a lot of confusion about who is doing what, a lot of steps in the process. There is a significant difference in status, of course, since a person on "detail" has to return to their home agency at some point and a "transferee" is sent away permanently.

Some of the other people at the table laughed a little nervously, saying that they hoped they had been transferred, since they were not gong to be welcome if they ever got shipped home. The lecturer seemed like a nice guy. I need to make note of that, since the new Department seems filled with good people trying to do the right thing as best they see it.

This particular meeting was to orient the office staff on how to deal with the system the government uses to control classified information. It is a concept that was intrinsic in my career, but complex. For much of the rest of the government it is a trip to a foreign land. It will be a multi-step process of education and training. It will take some time to indoctrinate the workforce into the subtleties. Like learning when to double-wrap a document, when to pouch it, when a courier letter is required, what can be said to whom, and where it may be said.

Most of it just went by like an old movie I didn't have to pay much attention to. I was still thinking about the chit-chat before the formal presentation began. It was one of those surreal conversations that can only happen in Washington.

Our lecturer had been on the Ceremonial Joint Service Color Guard during the Reagan Administration. Under a muscular Republican regime that supported the military, the Color Guard had requirements all over the world. Mike- that was the name- got a chance to do things like the Super Bowl and the 45th Anniversary of D-Day in Normandy. There was a brisk discussion around the table of Air Force One, which serves as a sort of flying commissary, providing the whole Air Force with White House logo mini-pretzel packages, nuts, matches, and newsmaganizes actually read by the President.

The Color Guard also serves as a sort of national first-response capability for grief. If something awful happens and a ceremony is needed, they are the people who call. The ties run deep. We lived next door to a family whose older son was the Army Captain who led the ceremonial horse detachment for John Kennedy's funeral, and that is as stressful an ad hoc assignment as it is possible to have.

The young Captain was assigned to the Old Guard, the 3rd U.S. Infantry whose mission is to manage the Arlington National Cemetery. They are the most squared away soldiers in the Army. You could cut yourself on the creases in their uniforms. Sometimes when I am Fort Myers I see the troops practicing their unique tasks, a group of young people with high-and-tight haircuts in two short neat lines folding a flag over a simulated casket to be presented in the tight triangle to the bereaved. The rituals are important things, and they must be carried out flawlessly, step by step

Imagine how important they are to a young widow or a mother. Then, imagine how overwhelming the funeral of a President must be to those who must conduct it before the camera, an unscheduled bolt of national grief. The Commander in Chief coming home to Arlington, the black stallion with no rider, empty highly polished boots placed backwards in the stirrups.

Think of the image of the African-American bugler, weeping for FDR as he played. This is powerful stuff.

President Kennedy's funeral came off without a hitch, a tribute to the Army, and a tribute to our neighbor's son. But it came with a cost. It may not have been directly related, but the young Captain died of a coronary shortly after the President's funeral. Then he was in his own Arlington ceremony.

I could see that our security lecturer still had the erect bearing of The Old Guard. He must have looked good in an Army uniform. He mentioned that he had been the flag-bearer, from which I surmised that he was the trim and crisp young man with the grave face who carried the Flag in its triangular fold, only the blue field and stars showing, for presentation to the survivors.

He stayed in touch with the Unit. He mentioned that President Reagan is expected at Arlington and the Color Guard is carrying beepers.

There are practical matters to be considered. If the coffin is to be carried to the Capitol to lie in state, it is 113 steps to the top. That is a long way and our lecturer said the President is still a big man, despite it all.

It is a factor in the steps the Joint Service Color Guard has to consider.

One of the ladies at the table said her husband was still in the unit, getting out in April. She said it sounded kind of bad, but she hoped that he would have the honor of doing Mr. Reagan before leaving active duty.

I blinked, not having thought about it that way. My beeper only goes off for the living.

Copyright 2003 Vic Socotra