Editor’s Note: Marlow’s piece this morning hit some issues from yesterday dead on. At Refuge Farm, we were downsizing. We apportioned piles of furniture, old art and memories to their destination stacks: “Auction,” “Kids,” “All that Military Stuff.” It was both fun and wrenching seeing things our great-grandparents made and held important. Positively wrenching, in fact.

– Vic
11 October 2022

Leonard

I was at another of my -ologists the other day for a stress test when I had the great and good luck to run into Leonard, a trim 83-year-old Harley Ultra Classic motorcycle riding (1000 pounds fully loaded), US Army serving, long enduring, regular multiple -ologistvisiting, classic manly framed, born and bred Effingham county boy. He was accompanied by his Harley riding son Ken and daughter in law Cary.

During our down times from the scanning machines and test torture chair, we chatted about all things from our youth, places of origin, or service in the military, fellow testees, recent world events, the media, and various other topics we could use as starting points for making the other laugh or snort with glee.

Both of us were procedure been-there-done-that vets so we only talked briefly about that stuff (our reactions), after the stress portion of the program.

Leonard had just visited with his accompanists the annual summer Sturgis motorcycling gathering. That trip was used to visit the Badlands, the Heads (Mount Rushmore), the Indian (Crazy Horse), Needles Park, the Devils Tower and other assorted side trips. These places had long been on his bucket list. We shared tales of other rides. We agreed that the Tail of the Dragon paled when compared to the technical riding skills required to run the roads out West. We shared new places to visit in the time remaining to each other — Yellowstone, CA Route 1, Beartooth Pass, all the passes through the Sierras, the north rim of the Grand Canyon, Going-to-the-Sun Road, all of Utah’s national parks, the Verde Valley, the 4 corners, end to end on US 1 and US 50, western parts of US 66, and on, and on, and on.

Time went by so quickly we didn’t dwell on what awaited us the next time we were called back into the heavily chilled equipment room office.

His stories of his early Cold War days in the US Army were mesmerizing. Some of the details of his parts of our sea story swapping were likely ‘first heards’ for his son and daughter in law. Here’re two in brief:

· He was shipped, not flown, during the late fall Northern Atlantic storm season overseas to Germany in an old WW II US Navy rust bucket troop transport in the 60s. Many of the guys in green became seasick, some for not inconsiderable periods of time so as to require being helo’d off for their health. He did not. Luck and rigid Army troop rotation schedules had his return on the same ship during a bad nor-easter. The ship was rocking, rolling, and yawing so badly that its screw(s) broached repeatedly, making the engines whine past their design tolerances. I didn’t have the heart to tell him what bad the ju ju those noises meant. He remarked that the ship in just a short year had badly deteriorated and was leaking lot more than just a bit. We both grinned when we mentioned for his kids’ benefit that’s what happens when you want something quick, cheap, and almost barely good enough.

· Still serving in uniform, he was stateside up north late one fall. His unit on base like all the others got emergency orders to muster with their go-bags at their alert stations. When all dutifully got there pronto, they were issued papers and their rifles. “Holy shits” loudly rolled through the assembled troops as ammo was passed out to all men present. That meant only one thing — senior authorities thought things were about to go kinetic domestically. Surprisingly, this private found himself assigned to his Company’s Captain as his jeep driver. Before he could even turn the ignition key, his boss told him to put the windshield down in the late November freezing you ass off up north weather — eliciting an unhearably muttered “Damn Yankee” from our warmer climes southern boy. Oh, I forgot to tell you the date – Friday, November 22, 1963. (Old folks know how to bait a hook and chum the waters for the young ‘uns.)

Once we were through the stress test part, we briefly shared our reactions while we drank the recommended stuff to counteract the side effects’ lingering ughs. We then to his family’s surprise shared how we put up with our hidden maladies/conditions/inconveniences before this office visit, while we pressed on with living life to the fullest in our unknown remaining times allotted. He intimated that he had ridden all those wild west roads in July while his heart was fluttering and his breath was short, shallow, and labored.

Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em seemed to be our silent shared catch phrase from our bygone service times, since we vets both feel like we still have a lot of ammo left so we’re just gonna just let ‘em fly. No personal extinction-level asteroid tumbling towards us is gonna make us stop.

“Ready on the right. Ready on the left. Ready on the firing line, Mates!”

Inhibition knows it numbs our hearts. It cases our hearts and makes us blind. It’s not how we should use up all our precious time.

Going-to-the-Sun Road in Glacier National Park

Hope to see this brave, lion-hearted Leonard of Effingham again. Perhaps some Friday?

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