There is a modest level of activity at the farm on a luscious golden morning in Virginia’s Piedmont. A closet door had opened and a flood of ancient clothing slumped from “in” to “out.” Outside it was still cold, part of that amazing and memorable cold spell that swept across the Southwest and froze Texas in place. A pal’s family was in the midst of it in Houston as all of us were forced to learn the incomprehensible intricacies of the Texas energy apportionment scheme.

I am very proud of America. We citizens have had to become experts in all sorts of things this last year- finance, fragility, constitutional issues, climate & epidemiology are just the start. We have done well on that, all of us. The only peril in the expert analysis is that the experts have seemed to be wrong about all of it.

Given the times we are in, it was refreshing to have old times reach out in this direction. The stalwart current memorial crew of the USS Midway reached out to hear some words about other places and other times and what it was like to live in her steel embrace.

The esteemed Library Staff recorded a Zoom call that followed all applicable norms. All means of communication has had some memorable casualties over this plague year, but none here, all history, maybe what was PG-13 I anyone recalls what that meant. It was interesting, and my son, a Seventh Fleet veteran himself, made the change of four decades between our times of having Yokosuka, Japan, as a home port.

When this link came in, it prompted me to start looking at the debris that has accumulated since I thought a place away from the city would be a useful thing to have. Accordingly, all the stuff too large to fit in the closet at Big Pink acquired their own piles in closets and the barn. Looking for stuff that dated back to Midway times was an experience. And those boxes of patches to be sewn onto clothing that wore too many of them already.

This morning I found an Airwing FIVE t-shirt from the Philippines, celebrating an aggregation of F-4 fighters, A-6 and A-7 attack jets, tankers, AEW and helicopters all dancing together in noise and steam. In the same pile was a nice “Junior Officers Protective Association (JOPA) ” shirt from Yongsan Garrison up in the ROK. Most of the bars idenified on the other shirts no longer exist. It was an interesting ride.

Anyway, here is the link to the Zoom call. Due to my ineptitude for farm-based IT, you might have to copy and paste it into your browser:

https://ussmidway41-my.sharepoint.com/:v:/g/personal/library1_midway_org/ERdlCTm394VGmAIarDRgXo0B6O-HcicgxEYWJRY-1jAs9w?e=GwRD7X

The one thing that struck me about the current Midway volunteers is the dedication to save a part of a world that is gone. In a couple thick sheafs of old pictures I saw some people who are gone now. And while an act of shameless self-aggrandizement this morning, it is also an experience in a unique cavalcade of wild activity and preparations for war.

Management firmly supports going through the rest of the t-shirts in preparation for providing them to newly arrived Piedmonters. They bear emblems of an older time and some strange taprooms. It is a way to say ‘welcome,’ right? It is part of the great movement from “in” to “out.”

Copyright 2021 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com