Category Archives: Loose thoughts and musings

July 7, 2009 · 16:24

Implants? On my 13th Anniversary of Being a Priest…What’s up with that?

cantaloupes

I found out today that I’m going to get an implant….and I can’t believe it. And I find out about this on the 13^th anniversary of being ordained as a Priest and I was not a happy camper. The dentist looked at me and told me that the root canal which I had come in to complete would not be possible. This kind of pissed me off, not at him but for the fact that I knew that this was going to happen. Going in to today I knew from the first dentist who examined me two weeks ago that there was only a fifty-fifty chance of saving the tooth, but only a ten percent chance of that. So when the dentist showed me the live camera images of the abyss that used to be the inside of my tooth and the fractures on both sides of the abyss I was not surprised. Not happy, but not surprised. Of course I was hoping and praying that the root canal would be done with and that I would not see dental again until my next exam.

As his team dug around in my mouth the dentist told me that they were going to have to set me up with Oral Surgery to extract the tooth and put an implant in its place. Since my mouth was still full of crap I had difficult time trying to reply. The crap included a rubber dam and its suspension system. I was informed that this was to keep crap out of the abyss and keep it from getting infected. The dentist didn’t say crap, but that is what I inferred. I also had a butt-load of anesthetic aboard. When he asked me the question: “Are you familiar with what an implant is?” I mumbled an unintelligible answer that went something like “yam eh ike marl hmmmn wah” And I kind of motioned over my chest with my hands to try to give as visual but my attempt at communication failed. He said, I’ll wait until we’re done for you to answer and I said “thang u er.” Since my woeful attempt at communication was not understood so I relaxed as best I could for the remainder of the procedure.

steve at dentist

When they were finished the resident had sealed the abyss, removed the dam and washed out my mouth. My mouth, which still hurt some from the work two weeks ago, and the tooth which still had some throbbing as a bit of nerve had survived the first go round caused me some persistent pain even through this morning. This particular tooth had been repaired twice as a child, the first by Doctor Mengele and once as an adult before it erupted two weeks ago. Now after being excavated for the second time in two weeks my mouth felt like a battle zone even with the full effect of the anesthetic.

The dentist then asked about if I understood what an implant was and in my smart assed way said, “Yes, it’s like those things that they put in Mariel Hemingway back in the 1980s right?” The dentist looked at me funny and then, maybe being just a bit older than me then shook his head and started laughing and said “No not that kind of implant.” The resident and the technician being a bit younger than us took a bit longer to get it, and the dentist said, “I saw you motioning with your hands but just didn’t understand the connection.

So I will be getting an artificial root for the old tooth which will be surgically removed possibly under a general anesthetic. I wonder which is worse, enduring a great deal of pain or going under as I am a fan of neither. They say it will take 6-9 months to have the artificial root to be fused into the jaw bone, after which a new crown will be constructed over it. I’m told that the entire process will take about a year to complete. I get my consultation with the Oral Surgeons the middle of August so this story will probably go on in future blog posts in the coming months.

Today is also the 13^th anniversary of me being ordained as a Priest at what used to be the Cathedral of the Resurrection, Life in Jesus Community when it was part of my Church. I am ever grateful to the bishop who ordained me back then, in those days he was a teacher and father. We parted ways when he led his community out of the Church after having his Archdeacon tell me that he was not leaving as the Church experienced a major crisis. While his leaving bothered me it was the deception that I found most difficult and combined with actions of two other former bishops in the church which impacted me in a very personal and hurtful manner which ended our relationship. Since he left I understand that he was removed from the leadership of his community and that the community was not doing well. That saddened me as back in the mid and late 1990s it was a wonderful place where the ancient and modern converged, where hospitality and kindness was shown and people were blessed. I do not know what happened over the years, but it is sad as I cannot go back to the place where I was ordained and have it be the same. When the bishop’s council on ordination recommended that I be ordained I was told by one of the priests said “Steve, you’re home.” Unfortunately only one of that council remains in the church, and that community is no longer home.

891 Christmas Eve in Iraq

Since then I have been blessed. I was ordained on the evening of July 7^th the eve of the Feast of Saint Killian and his companions, an Irish missionary to what is now the German area of Franconia where at Würzburg he was martyred in 689 AD. It was just a few weeks later as a mobilized Army Reserve Chaplain I reported to Würzburg to support the Bosnia operation in my first assignment as a Priest. I lived in town as there was “no room at the inn” on base and since I spoke German I would head downtown in the evenings for Mass at the Killian Dom (Killian Cathedral) as well as visits to many of the other churches. I found it interesting that the occasion of my ordination was the eve of feast of the man responsible for planting the Christian faith in the first place I would serve as a Priest. I feel quite a connection to St Killian as a result of this and whenever I go to Germany I attempt to attend a Mass at the Killian Dom as well as a few steins of Würzburger Hofbrau Pilsner.

Killian Dom Wurzburg Germany

Since then I have celebrated the Eucharist and served God’s people around the world in places that I would have never dreamed. My first Eucharist at sea was on the USS Frederick LST-1184 on Easter 2001, the same ship that in high school Navy Junior ROTC I first felt the call to be a chaplain in March of 1978. I’ve celebrated near the fence line at Guantanamo Bay, all over Al Anbar Province, been a base chaplain and served in units and at sea all over the world. I celebrated my 7^th anniversary celebrating at the ruins of the Martyr Church of Saint Phillip the Apostle in Pamukale Turkey, the site of Ancient Hierapolis.

Today for the first time I spent it in a dentist’s chair. So my mouth feels like a bombed out combat zone, I have the shattered shell of a tooth being held together by a temporary patch and praying that it won’t come apart before it is extricated and I have to wait over a month to just begin talking about the details of how process will unfold with the Oral Surgeon who will perform it. Tonight I will try to eat something soft so as not to tempt fate, drink a good beer or two or three and get ready for work tomorrow.

Pray for me a sinner.

Peace, Steve+

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Filed under beer, healthcare, Loose thoughts and musings, Military, Navy Ships, philosophy, Religion

Tagged as al anbar province, bosnia operation, dentists, franconia, guantanamo bay, hierapolis, implants, killian dom, life in jesus community, mariel hemingway, martyr church of st phillip the apostle ruins, oral surgery, ordination, pamukale turkey, priesthood, root canal, saint killian, uss frederick, wurzburg, wurzburger hofbrau pilsner

July 5, 2009 · 22:51

Manny, A-Rod and Barry: How the Media and Government Selectively Target Ballplayers or Don’t

I love baseball as a game. The Deity herself speaks to me through baseball. While baseball to use the words of George Will is “Heaven’s gift to mortals” it is played, managed and judged by fallen humanity…thanks so much Adam and Eve, you should have gone to the concession stand in the Garden of Eden and got a hot dog and beer and left that that tree that you were told not to touch alone. As the New Baseball Edition of the Bible says: “And God spoke to Adam and Eve saying “Thou mayest eat and drink freely from any concession stand, vendor or restaurant in the park, but thou shalt not eat from the Tree of the Knowlege of Good and Evil, lest you die or otherwise blow the game.” It is my opinion that baseball’s problems can be traced to the failure of the first couple to get this one little thing right.

As a result of the fall we can be assured that while baseball is the chosen sport of the Deity who “in the Big Inning created the heavens and the earth” it will not be perfect in this world. This is readily apparent in the past 7 or 8 years or so of the baseball steroid scandal. There is much blame to go around in this whole sordid affair from the commissioner’s office, to owners, the MLB Players union President Donald Fehr and the players themselves who blocked efforts to initiate tough and fair drug testing managed by them and the league.

Because of the league and players inability to police themselves they opened themselves to machinations of congressional committees led often by congressmen who have to assert their dominance in every aspect of American life. I actually found the inquisitional hearings led by Representative Henry Waxman to be a disgusting overreach of government power directed by people who couldn’t get picked to play on a little league team. The unbridled jealousy of career politicians who haven’t worked a real job in years toward the highly successful athletes was displayed as they dragged player after player before their committee. Congressmen asked them leading questions about the use of substances that were not always illegal setting them up for eventual prosecution of lying to Congress because like in the case of Bonds they gave ambiguous answers to the questions. Now I am not saying that the players were without blame, many set themselves up for this by blatantly looking guilty if they were not guilty of anything. The league and player’s union policies and response did nothing to help the matter and now we sit with what seems to be a never ending circus which harms the game.

My beef with many of those involved is that they do not respect the game. This goes for players, owners, union officials, media, politicians and investigators. This disrespect for the game has reached epic proportions as the hubris of all concerned reached incredible heights. While I could go on and on about this I am going for now focus on the inequitable treatment of the accused players by the media and government which I believe is glaringly apparent in the treatment given to Barry Bonds as opposed to players such as Alex Rodriguez and Manny Ramirez.

Baseball purists are perhaps the most religious of fans. We don’t like it when people mess with the game. The game itself is sacred, thus when players, owners, union people, media or the government do things that we perceive to hurt the game we get just a tad bit upset. Football, Basketball and Hockey players, owners and officials can just about get away with murder and not only remain in the game but become or remain stars who eventually reach their respective Hall of Fame. Baseball on the other hand will take the person who has committed an infraction and like the ancient Israelites cast heavy stones upon their reputation and memory to the seventh generation. Baseball can be a very unforgiving game. The diamond is “holy ground” and the game is to be respected by players, owners, media, government and fans alike. This has not been the case in regard to steroids and other performance enhancing substances including their use by players, toleration by owners and “fishing expedition” investigations by Federal agents and Congress.

This being said in the past six years there has been an inequitable treatment of players accused or proven to have taken banned or illegal performance enhancing drugs or supplements. When Congress, the media and a then relatively unknown IRS investigator named Jeff Novitzky. One of the best commentators on the way that the Bonds investigation and prosecution has been handled, Jonathon Littman notes that the “Clear” that Bonds was accused of using was not illegal at the time that he allegedly used it, but also was not classified as a steroid. Littman notes that

“Experts say prosecutors might have intentionally asked Bonds what they knew to be ambiguous questions – never defining steroids or making a distinction between drugs that were illegal or merely banned by many major sports.”

“This case has been presented as Barry Bonds lying about steroids,” said Christopher Cannon, a San Francisco defense attorney with extensive experience in federal perjury cases. “The government’s theory is that he was taking the Clear. If the government knows the Clear wasn’t a steroid – then when Barry said he wasn’t taking a steroid, he was telling the truth.”

Likewise the manner in which Novitzky has led the government investigation leads on to wonder what the motivation is for the prosecution. There was very little money involved in the BALCO case, those accused or convicted have received very minor penalties, but the investigation which has spanned years has cost the government 55 million dollars. As Littman writes:

“The paucity of illegal profits and drugs raises the question whether prosecutors realized that the only potential for criminalizing the behavior of athletes who took banned substances was to set perjury traps or bait athletes into lying to the grand jury or to a federal agent.

“It sounds like a misuse of the grand jury,” said John Bartko, a former assistant U.S. Attorney in San Francisco who has tried perjury cases. “They go and try to trip the guy into lying.””

Now Bonds may not be the most sympathetic character, but he does deserve to be treated as innocent until proven guilty. Instead the prosecutors and some in the media have gone out of their way to destroy any chance of Bonds either playing again ever reaching the Hall of Fame. He is called a cheater in an era when it is likely that that a large number of players were doing the same thing, without penalty. It seems to me that Bonds has been singled out while others are left alone.

This is nowhere nearly apparent than with the recent admission by Alex Rodriguez that he took steroids, after having previously denied it and the positive test and 50 game suspension of Manny Ramirez for the use of a banned substance, a suspension that Ramirez just completed. A-Rod seems to have weathered his admission and I see no one coming after him while Ramirez’s return punctuated every other game during the day. Neither man received the abuse heaped upon Bonds and they have admitted or actually tested positive for the use of steroids or banned substances.

Having had to administer drug tests as a Army Company Commander I know that the burden of proof is on the prosecutor. The manner of testing and the chain of custody must be impeccable, otherwise allegations are just that and you cannot, unless you want to look like a fool and attempt to prosecute under Article 15 proceedings or Courts-Martial without unimpeachable evidence that a person took a substance known to be illegal at the time it was used, not something that was made illegal after the fact. The Bonds prosecution looks to me like a gross misuse of the Grand-Jury system and government power to make an example of Barry Bonds. If Bonds had been a mediocre player or not hold the records for the all time home runs and single season home runs he would not be a target.

Having said all of this the entire steroid era, especially the actions of the baseball owners, commissioner and players union sullied the game and opened the door to political opportunists like Waxman and investigators who use questionable and likely unethical and maybe even illegal means in order to trip up as suspect, as Novitzky appears to me to have done. Baseball must police itself and both players and owners must subscribe to a fair and clearly defined drug policy that leaves no room for misinterpretation. Maybe they should look to military rules of evidence for such a program which apply to all players equally with both random tests throughout the season which would ensure that every player was tested as well as periodic sweeps of the entire league.

In the case of Bonds and those whose real or alleged crimes now date back six or more years it is time to stop the madness. It is a waste of taxpayer money to continue this sham puritanical inquisition against Bonds while so many others are given a pass. Bonds name and reputation have been destroyed and he has never been convicted of a crime by prosecutors who continually have their evidence thrown out and indictments overturned by judges.

If you want to read more by Littman and his reporting of this go to: http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slug=li-novitzkythomas031909&prov=yhoo&type=lgns

As far as A-Rod and Manny, they are not going to the All-Star game this year as baseball fans are tired of this kind of behavior. If owners and players will not police themselves those of us who love and respect the game will ensure that they are accorded no honors.

Peace, Steve+

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Filed under Baseball, Loose thoughts and musings, philosophy, Religion

Tagged as alex rodriguez, all star game, article 15, balco, barry bonds, baseball hall of fame, beg sellig, congressional baseball steriods hearings, courts-martial, donald fehr, drug tests, evidence chain of custody, henry waxman, jeff novitzky, jonathan littman, major league baseball owners, major league baseball players association, manny ramirez, steroids, the clear

June 30, 2009 · 21:17

The Gifts of PTSD: Insomnia is a Terrible Thing to Waste and the Hidden Value of Hyper-vigilance

On Board a 53 out near Syria

I’ve been asked by a number of people at work just how I manage to find the time to write the way that I do. The answer, which I have said to all of them is simple…insomnia, which it turns out is not necessarily a curse, but for me in some ways is a gift. I find that insomnia really is a terrible thing to waste. Until I went to Iraq I went to bed at a decent hour every night and seldom did I have problems sleeping. At the same time my life while busy pursuing work, military and professional education as well as academic degrees was full but not completely fulfilling. I had always wanted to write on a variety of subjects to include military history, theology, ethics and baseball. In fact someday I hope to get published. However back then I was always too distracted to write what I wanted to write. I could t stay on task for anything other than things that would seemingly directly affect my military career, even my marriage.

Convoy On Route Michigan

Iraq changed that more than I thought it could. I got back, fell apart about 90 days after returning home and despite pushing myself harder at work, ministry and academically I was not making it. Nightmares, dreams, chronic pain and anxiety, stress reactions even in church about crippled me. About the only place I felt some peace was at the ball park. Somehow the sight of that great field and the infield diamond settles me. Sleep deprivation became a very real and persistent part of my life. I guess it was the fact in Iraq that we did most of our travel at night by helicopter, usually CH-46, CH-47 or CH-53’s and had very irregular schedules. Likewise when we came back to base there was another little issue. The pad for the Army Medivac Choppers, or “Dustoff” was about 200 yards from my quarters so all night long I was subjected to the constant noise from these aircraft. If I hear a UH-60 Blackhawk or SH-60 Seahawk at night I still get a startle reaction. Outgoing artillery fire and occasional fire, explosions and sirens in the adjacent town of Habbinyah were staples of life. When bored I would stand outside and watch illumination rounds going off the highway just outside our entry control point or wander over near the Shock Surgery Trauma Platoon facility where “Dustoff” was waiting on the pad. I’m sure that working a number of mass casualty events and seeing our wounded Marines and Soldiers being treated as well as Iraqi civilians including kids had to affect me. These Americans and Iraqis were out driving the same roads that we would drive on a regular basis and the sight of their shattered bodies went through my mind every time we went on a mission.

As I got deeper into my tour I found that no matter how tired that I was I had great difficulty getting to sleep. I’m sure this was due to our operational tempo, odd hours, demanding travel, sleeping conditions which varied at every location and occasionally getting shot at. The most cool of those were when our Army CH-47D talking off from Ramadi , took fire from the ground and proceeded to pop flares, take evasive action while the tail gunner opened fire with his M240 series machine gun. Since I was sitting two seats from the tail gunner and saw, heard and smelled the gun as it fired I’m pretty sure that it happened. However, when I called the Army squadron to see what happened they denied that the event happened. I hear that was not an uncommon occurrence. So anyway by the mid-point of my tour I was no longer sleeping so I would sit up and play games on my computer, such as chess and Ma-jong. It is amazing how good you can get at stuff like that through sheer repetition. It was playing these games that I would wear myself our enough to sleep since I usually did an hour or two of PT during the day or late evening when not on the road. It is comforting when you are running near the perimeter on a cool Saturday morning and hear explosions and exchanges of automatic weapons fire going off about 2 km to your right.

So now despite my cool concoction of meds I still have difficulty getting to sleep. In order to sleep I have to wear myself out and when I am done I take my meds and crash. If I take them before I am exhausted I see little effect and I am not about to start mixing them with the good beer that I enjoy so much. I do not drink crappy beer thank you. Maybe it will be time to go back to the doctor when my provider’s relief arrives in August or September. I probably need to talk to my buddy Elmer the shrink again soon. Elmer is great but my schedule has not lined up well to see him the past couple of weeks between leave, call schedule and the emergency root canal. I probably have to go back in on that sooner than my appointment as I still am having some pain and wonder if there is an infection there.

Since I don’t believe in wasting time I have decided to be productive when I can’t sleep. I started writing as I finished my class requirements for my latest Masters Degree. I still need to do the comprehensive exams but will wait until September so as not to mess with any home games the Tides have left. I began writing as a means of both helping me and disciplining myself to write regularly. I have several book ideas but have never been able to get any off the ground because I could not stay focused. This website helps me do that and has got me thinking creatively again. So my answer to how I can find the time to write is simple, if I have 20 or so extra hours in the week late at night that are going to be there no matter what I do, then I shouldn’t waste them. So my point is that insomnia is a terrible thing to waste. It could be worse. I know of other vets who can’t sleep either due to war experiences and some have fallen off the deep end with self destructive behaviors at least I am not doing online gambling, porn or other distractions that have helped continue to ravage some of my brothers and sisters who have served in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam. I have found in a strange way that the chronic insomnia has been a gift which has enabled me to gain insights on life and experience that I had never been able to put down before. It has forced me to take advantage of time that I would otherwise waste web or channel surfing until I fell asleep. It is interesting to see what comes out of your computer when you are trying to write while falling asleep.

Here is an example that I found and saved a few weeks ago: “Manages not only check their the firduk about what they fell than…”

I have no earthly idea what it means or what a “firduk” is or what “manages would “not only check their the firduk” means and I don’t want to find out. God only knows what it means but it reminds me where a half-asleep Jerry Seinfeld wrote down something that he saw on TV that he thought was funny. He spent the show trying to see what he wrote and then finally saw what he actually heard. He discovered that it was not nearly as funny as he thought.

Another gift I have been given with my PTSD is that of hyper-vigilance. I am much more alert and observant than I ever was. This is on the road, in crowds or even as I do my job in the hospital. I have begun to notice the little odd things that are clues to other possibly more significant issues. This probably has saved my life on the road on several occasions since I returned as I have a much great “feel” for what is going on around me than I have ever had while driving. There have been at least three times where I “felt” the danger of another vehicle and took evasive action to avoid a collision before I heard or saw it. Of course the colorful euphemisms which poured out of me on these occasions were quite memorable, I think the best being “You Oedipal Mother F—-r!” when some asshole almost plowed over me in a grocery store parking lot not far from home.

So, despite the inherent problems that PTSD, insomnia and the other maladies I have incurred have caused me, the Deity Herself has also given them to me as a gift. For which I am strangely grateful. Even a few months back I saw them as a curse, but now they have become a source of blessing. Like Commander Spock might say to Captain Kirk after observing a human idiosyncrasy “fascinating Captain, fascinating.”

It’s a Gift…Enjoy

I’m back on duty tomorrow for another overnight. This will be a long week, 3 duty nights out of 5 work days. Thankfully I will not have duty again for two weeks after Friday.

Peace, Steve+

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Filed under Baseball, Loose thoughts and musings, philosophy, PTSD, star trek

Tagged as afghanistan, ch-46, ch-47, commander spock, dustoff, habbinyah, hummv, hyper-vigilance, insomina, iraq, mass casualty events, medivac, mh-53, PTSD, ramadi, route michigan, seinfeld, sh-60 seahawk, shock surgery trauma platoon, star trek, uh-60 blackhawk, vietnam, writing

June 29, 2009 · 22:32

Interns and Residents Graduate while New Ones Arrive; Save #500 for Mariano Rivera and I Know Why the North Koreans are So Belligerent…They Don’t Have Baseball!

Well. I got back to work today and I’m glad to be back. The trip to DC was really nice. Having duty the first day back well, what can I say? Tonight has been very busy but not too sporty yet, although I am wondering as the night has a weird feel, which a resident that I have worked with a lot feels too. Hopefully we are just paranoid. I wrote this at my dinner break and thankfully I picked relatively uncomplicated things to write about tonight, I had it done by the time the cardiac response pager went off following some meetings and early rounds and patient visits. It’s about 2300 and I am just now sitting down to finish this prologue.

Today we graduated our Intern Class. I have gotten to know a good number of these young physicians during the past year during their ICU rotation as well as when I have been on call throughout the house. It was a privilege to be at the graduation at the invitation of the class leadership as I had been with them on their Dining Out back in April. To have one more time with them before they go on to residency, the Fleet Marine Force or Sea Billets as General Medical Officers or Surgeons, as well as those selected to become Flight Surgeons or Diving Medical Officers assigned to Special Operations, Diving or EOD units was really nice. Having spent a lot of time with many on the ICU I see the toll that the internship places on them and their families. These young physicians have done well and will serve our Sailors and Marines, as well as Soldiers and Airmen and their families well. Some will remain to complete residencies of various types and lengths, while those who do not initially get a residency will likely be on the front line of caring for our servicemen and women in harm’s way or on medical and humanitarian missions. Some will end up with the Marines in Iraq or Afghanistan and others serve as the “Doctor” for a ship or Marine battalion often far from any immediate back up or specialty care. I wish all of them the best. We have also had residents leave us for new horizons. Some will be going on to advanced fellowships while others will serve as staff physicians or surgeons throughout the world. It has been great working with many of them in their final residency year.

While these young physicians are leaving us, we have some who will remain on as residents here or fellowships. It will be good to continue to work with and get to know them over the coming years. Now the fun part, we have a butt load of brand new Interns who are reporting to us as well as some Residents from other institutions or coming back from their tours in the Fleet. I remember my time at civilian teaching hospitals where I served as a chaplain or did my residency. Pastoral Care Residencies typically start in September or October which takes them out of the cycle that most residents or interns have in the medical community. I hope that we will eventually have our program lined up so our new residents report the same time the physician internships and residencies begin and for our residents to have more interaction with them. I think the latter will happen sooner than the first mentioned with things that we are in the process of instituting. I really believe that the cross pollination of physician and pastoral care residencies will benefit both specialties as they meet at the intersections of healing, life and death, faith and spirituality. Tonight when I have been greeting every new physician I see and introducing myself to them. They come from quite a few interesting places and I hope to get to know them all pretty well.

Last night was a great event. Yankees ace reliever and “closer deluxe” Mariano Rivera notched his 500^th save. He became the second pitcher to achieve this number as he shut down the New York Mets at Citi Park. To some this may not seem too much of an accomplishment. After all, the relief pitcher as a specialty and development of pitchers to serve in different relief roles is a relatively new part of baseball, really only going back to the 1970s. Of course there were relieves before, but they had a limited role as starters often would pitch complete games. Satchel Paige was an exception when he came to the Majors from the Negro Leagues spending most of his time in a relief role, and there are a few others but the reliever was in many cases a former starter who didn’t have the juice to pitch complete games later in their careers. Rivera is a special breed even as a reliever. He is a closer. This means that when he comes in he is either trying to save the victory or stave off defeat. He has to come in at a moment’s notice in any park, weather or situation often to deal with the heart of an opponent’s batting order. He has the 500 saves and a career 2.29 ERA. In the World Series he has 9 saves and a 1.16 ERA. It gets better. In the League Championship Series that he has pitched in he has 10 saves and a 0.97 ERA and in Division Series he has 15 saves and a 0.38 ERA. Since the playoffs tend to have the better and more competitive teams in them so these are amazing statistics. In the playoff he has 8 wins and only one loss. At age 39 he shows no sign of letting up.

What makes a guy like Mariano so special is first that he is nearly unhittable and his very presence on the mound gives confidence to the Yankees and sends a message to their opponents. He will if he has any say in the matter save or win that game even if he comes in early with the bases loaded and no outs in the 8^th inning. Rivera is like a really hot ER or ICU team that has to save a life when the situation is at the worst or if not that bad where it could get sporty. I have always admired relievers who do the job well having had to go into a number of jobs where my predecessor both as a Medical Service Corps Officer in the Army or Navy Chaplain was fired. That is no fun when you have to go pick up the pieces. Relievers make their living doing this and Rivera has to be the best reliever who has ever lived. To top it off he is regarded as a nice guy, a leader and one of baseball’s good guys. And last but not least Mariano was not a “bonus baby.” He came up as an undrafted free agent. Some Trevor Hoffman fans may argue this point but the high intensity playoff game record speaks for itself. Nobody does it better. Someday Jonathan Papelbon may do so for the Red Sox, but he has many years to go before he hits 500 saves. He has the advantage of starting his Major League career as a closer and already has as of the end of 2008 114 saves and a 1.84 ERA. He is the real deal and hopefully will remain healthy.

Finally a closing thought for the night. I have wondered for some time just why the North Koreans can be so bellicose and ill tempered. They are threatening to incinerate us and upset that we have moved missile interceptors to Hawaii, like hello, Hawaii is 4000 miles away from North Korea. Needless to say the whole bunch of nations in the neighborhood is not real happy with the Dictator named Kim. The Japanese are upping their readiness, the South Koreans sending folks to the border and talking of pre-emption and even the Chicoms and Russians are not real happy. Some sources are even saying the Nutty North Koreans may launch and ICBM in our general direction around the 4^th of July. That would not be cool.

So like I said, I was wondering about what makes the North Koreans so ill tempered. It finally came to me last week at Harbor Park when watching the Tides play the Pawtucket Red Sox. There were scouts from the Korean Professional Baseball league in the stands as well as Japanese scouts and American scouts. Then it hit me. Baseball is big in South Korea and they are getting pretty darned good in international competition. They are so good in fact that they have won the Olympic Gold Medal and finished second in the World Baseball Classic. In contrast the North Koreans don’t have baseball. If they had baseball they would be able to work off all that unhealthy stress and hatred, the Yin and Yang would come back into balance. What if Kim Jung Il had played little league and high school ball? Who knows he might be a manager in the Korean Leagues taking out all that anger on the umpires when they make a bad call or executing his closers when they fail. The South Koreans have been blessed by the Deity Herself with Baseball and I do believe that this has to be the difference. Even Communist Cuba is nowhere near as nutty as North Korea and this too I attribute to Baseball and Fidel having played ball himself. Maybe we should instead of negotiators send Baseball players, scouts and instructors to North Korea? It just might work. Look what McDonald’s and Coke did to the former Soviet Union….

Peace, Steve+

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June 28, 2009 · 21:33

Back form DC Duty Tomorrow

Back from our trip to DC celebrating our 26th anniversary. I have duty tomorrow. Post a couple of pictures into last night’s post. Looks like I am taking a night off from writing anything tonight.

Peace, Steve+ washington monument

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June 27, 2009 · 23:26

Weekend in Washington-Reconnecting with Friends Family, Each Other and an Evening at the West Wing

1091 At the Brady Press Room in the West Wing

Our anniversary weekend continues, tonight we have our behind the scenes tour of the White House. Last night we had a wonderful reunion with my former Commanding Officer Colonel Mike Paulovich and his wife Janet. Colonel Paulovich and I served together at Marine Security Force Battalion, when it was still called a battalion. The unit was actually regimental size with subordinate units located in the United State, the Middle East, Guantanamo Bay Cuba and Europe with FAST (Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team) Platoons deployed in hot spots world-wide. The Colonel was a great officer and should have been a Flag Officer. He retired as the senior Marine Corps Officer and Professor of Ethics at the Naval Academy. We have remained close over the years and have always had a special connection, to include that of our wives. During our time together at Security Force Battalion we went through some incredibly difficult personal and professional times. The battalion lost I think about 11 Marines while we were there due to all sorts of causes so we shared a lot of community grief as we saw our battalion through difficult times.

I never will forget the night that Colonel Paulovich called me on my cell phone saying he needed me. I was at the ballpark and I knew things were bad for him to be calling me there, he too is a baseball fan and has great respect for the game. When I got to the battalion I found that he had been involved in giving CPR to a Marine who had just checked into the unit that late that afternoon from an overseas command and had hanged himself within 30 minutes of checking in and getting his room. That night I was with him and the other Marines who tried to save that young man’s life until about 0300 the next morning. I was there when the Colonel’s father died and he was there when I found that my father had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. We shared many other difficult times together as well as good times. We frequently travelled overseas together and I have never had a Commanding Officer any time or any where seek my advice on caring for people, support the ministry of his chaplain and ensure that I got to his Marines no matter where in the world they were. Even more importantly he allowed me to be his Priest. Some of the places that we travelled together included Bahrain, Japan and Spain and a particularly memorable trip to England and Scotland where our Marines were doing exercises with the British Royal Marines. We saw each other through good times and bad and it was such a pleasure to fellowship with both him and Janet over dinner and beer at the D.C. Chophouse. I am so honored to have him as a friend and Judy to be a friend of his wife.

1094 Outside the West Wing

This morning was a relaxing morning except for two things. First, my tooth started acting up again and started hurting pretty bad. I doubled up on one of my non-narcotic pain meds and slammed down some 800 mg. Motrin which made the pain bearable through most of the day. It is starting up again right now so I will be hitting some more Motrin and Ultram this evening. Then I read the details of our invitation to the White House and realized that we had not brought appropriate attire for Judy. I looked up women’s clothing nearby and saw a Dress Barn. We started walking, unfortunately not being very familiar with the layout of the city I made a right turn rather than left coming out of the hotel. After dragging Judy around having followed the advice of several residents and a store keeper we were nowhere near where we needed to be. I realized then that some people are clueless as to the layout of the city that they live in. These people really had no clue; I’m surprised that they could find their way to their own toilet much less survive in the city. Heck if I lived here I would know this place by heart within months because I have one of those phonographic memories you know. It was kind of like they were saying “go four blocks and if you pass Freddy the pan handler turn left and the street will be two blocks down” except that Freddy the pan-handler wasn’t on the corner and the street was the opposite direction from where the clueless person said that it was. Finally I knew that I was only torturing Judy by dragging her around. I hailed a cab and said I need to go to Dress Barn on Connecticut Avenue Northwest. The guy was great. He knew where it was; he was friendly and dropped us off at the door. An hour and $248 later we walked out of the store with a nice outfit and butt-load of other clothes. Since I had not really gotten her much for the anniversary it was nice to do that for her, after all she tolerates all of my annoying habits and understands how to make sure that I don’t do anything to screw up my career. The ladies that helped us, Frieda and Mary were great. If all people in retail were as friendly and helpful as these women there would be a lot more coming off the shelves even in the bad economy.

I guess one of the really cool things about this weekend is that we have not tried to fit too much into it. It used to be that we would plan and schedule so much that although we were “together” there was no time for any kind of intimacy. We would end up stressed out, tired and resentful of each other. For once we decided just to be with each other and that has been way cool. If there is any advice I can offer to couples be they young or old is to get to know each other again by not focusing on things which entertain and take up time but don’t bring you together. Judy and I are wired differently, we have different interests, but we give each other the freedom to pursue those interests and encourage each other to fulfill our dreams. At the same time we finally figured out that we have to take time with each other. It took a quarter century to figure this out but we have finally been able to and the results have been amazing.

This evening we had our private staff guided tour of the West Wing of the White House. My friend Mark, the Chief of Staff to the National Security Council had to be out doing a Navy Reserve Drill so his assistant Cindy took us around. It was really cool seeing the Oval Office, the Roosevelt Room and a number of other historic places including the James Brady Press Room. We were not able to see the Rose Garden on this trip as the President and his family was relaxing out there, but we did see the Presidential First Puppy “Bo” playing on the back lawn. Hopefully we will get to meet the President on a future trip. Since we have reason to come up here anyway it would be cool to get to meet him. Everyone was great to us at the White House and we enjoyed our visit tremendously.

Tonight we went out with Judy’s cousin Becki to a Gordon Biersch Brewery Restaurant and will meet her again in the morning for breakfast before heading back home. We stopped by her house which she bought when she moved her for her job with US Department of Fish and Game. The house was a “fixer-upper” and Becki has been doing this with houses for a good amount of time. She has already transformed much of the place which frankly looked like hell when she purchased it. It was good to see her and Tucker her friendly little black cat. It’s weird having a cat come when you call it, hell our first dog Frieda wouldn’t do that unless she thought it was in HER best interests.

Note: As I was getting ready to post I decided to load my SD card from my camera into my computer to retrieve my photos from the West Wing. It looks like I have somehow got the damned thing jammed in and I can’t figure out either how to get the pictures off of it or how to get it back out. Since I want to save the card and not damage my computer I will try to figure this out when I am not tired and have some idea of what I might do to solve the problem. So now the cool pictures inside the Press Room and at the entry reserved for official visitors will have to wait. Be assured that they are cool and I will post them when I can. Gotta love technology sometimes….

So tomorrow we see Becki again for breakfast and head home.

Peace, Steve+

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June 26, 2009 · 16:54

Where were You When…? The Death of an Icon and Its Impact in Our Lives

Note: This post is one where I invite readers to share any memories they have of Michael Jackson’s death or other events that involved the deaths of cultural icons as well as significant events that either affected you or made a deep impact on your life or that of people that you know. I will approve all comments except those identified as spam by WordPress.

The death of Michael Jackson yesterday was one of those events in life that when they occur leave a lasting impression on people. Even people who were not fans of Michael will remember because Michael Jackson was a cultural icon. When icons die, or tragedies occur they tend to leave a lasting mark. You can be talking to anyone and if they were alive when one of these events happened and quite a few or most people will be able to tell you exactly where they were and what they were doing at the time of the event.

I am 49 years old, though patently I don’t really look my age, nor do I act it. Being that I am nearly half a century old it means that I have seen a fair amount of life. Since I am passionate about life and a keen observer of life, society and culture being a historian as well as member of the Church of Baseball, Harbor Park parish I remember a lot. I’m told by some that I have one of those phonographic memories. You know the kind where you get a thought in your head and it keeps going and going round and round at 33 1/3 RPMs. I will remember this because we had just arrived at the Capital Hilton and were preparing to go out for dinner with Judy’s cousin Becki at Murphy’s of DC to celebrate our anniversary. I had just checked the news when I heard that Michael had been found down and was in cardiac arrest. Since I have seen a lot of these cases roll into ERs that I have worked in I knew that Jackson had very little chance of coming out of this alive. Most news sites were reported that he was getting CPR and had been taken to UCLA Medical Center. Then I checked the website of Matt Drudge, the Drudge Report following a look at CNN. I opened the page and Drudge’s trademark old fashioned police siren light was flashing and below it in red was “WEBSITE: JACKSON DEAD!” and had a link to the celebrity gossip site TMZ. TMZ actually reported the death over an hour prior to most of the networks. It also turned out that TMZ’s report was pretty accurate. Later other sites began to announce the news pretty much confirming TMZ’s initial report. I saw the report on CNN as we walked to get a cab to the restaurant with Becki. It was kind of surreal as Michael Jackson, despite his eccentric actions and nearly continuous controversy surrounding his life, was a larger than life figure.

So events like this get etched on people’s memories like images of the Virgin Mary on grilled cheese sandwiches or pizzas. These have been reported by the faithful and offered for sale on E-bay so they must be authentic right? They are something that you reallymust remember. Talking with Judy and Becki at dinner we began to recount where we were at different moments events over the past 30 years or so. For me the events are often linked to other seemingly inconsequential events going on in my own life. As I have said before we have lived a life much like the characters in the show Seinfeld so some of these things may not be as funny to you as they are for me.

Some of the things that I remember which stand out include the following events. If you remember where you were at these events please feel free to comment or add your own in the comments section. This is one of those rare times when almost everyone has a memory that surfaces because a current event triggers the memory of that particular event.

For me I’m going to first each back to is the assassination of the Reverend Martin Luther King on April 4^th 1968. That was strange because we lived in the little town of Oak Harbor Washington where my dad was stationed. The town was small and isolated by being on an island. We saw the news reports that night this time I believe we were watching NBC’s Huntley and Brinkley give the news. This was way before Cable news and so it took a while to get the story out. As a little kid I was astounded that anyone could kill a minister and I knew that Dr. King was a leader in trying get blacks the same rights that whites enjoyed. The next day our teacher at Oak Harbor Elementary School, Mrs. Jackson talked about it with us. This was follow just two months later by the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy following his California Primary election victory. I remember the news reports the next day and how upset that my parents were about his death.

The next event was Apollo 11 Moon landing, the “One small step for man, one giant step for mankind” moment on July 20^th 1969 where Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed the Lunar Module on the “Sea of Tranquility.” I was a kid and on summer vacation still living in Oak Harbor. We were at home watching Walter Cronkite report the event live when it happened. That was an amazing event.

The next really big thing for me was the Marshall University Football team plane crash in Huntington West Virginia where at 7:35 Pm EST a Southern Airways DC-9 crashed into a hillside just short of the runway killing the team as well as numerous boosters, alumni and Huntington notables. This was kind of person for us. I had seen that team practice at the old Fairfield Stadium across the street from my grandparent’s house the previous spring before we returned to California to rejoin my dad after he had found us decent housing. We were watching the evening news in Long Beach California when the local announcer interrupted the story he was working on and announced the crash. My mom knew a number of people on the aircraft and was devastated.

I’m going to jump forward a bit, to the fall of Saigon on April 30^th 1975. This was a bitter day for me. My dad had fought in Vietnam and I knew kids who had lost their fathers in the war. I had experienced a Sunday School teach telling me that my dad was a “baby killer” for being in Vietnam in 1972 and I felt that we had let the South Vietnamese down and that it was the fault of those in the media, on the street and in Congress that had ensured that our men died in vain. I think that was the point that I decided that I was going to enter the military. I still cannot look at Jane Fonda and some of her fellow travelers without feeling a sense of anger.

Jumping again a few years I remember the fall of the Shah of Iran and the takeover of the US Embassy in Tehran by so called “students” on November 4^th 1979. The takeover which lasted 444 days began in my sophomore year of college. The humiliation of the country and the poor response of President Jimmy Carter confirmed that I would enter the military after college. I won’t forget the nightly updates on ABC hosted by Ted Koppel which became the long running show Nightline. I would stay up every night to get the updates. When the hostages were released this was cause for celebration, but the damage was done. Of course we saw the pro and anti-Ayatollah protesters on our university, Northride a big business school responded to a pro-Ayatollah by driving the protestors off campus. So much for riled up MBA students and Science geeks huh?

When Elvis died on August 16^th 1977 I was a getting ready to enter my senior year of high school. In fact only a week before I had won a copy of a blue vinyl copy of his last album Moody Blue in a local pop radio station give away. I was on a church high school trip when the news came over the radio. The man driving the car a real estate agent who was a deacon in the church started to cry, I mean like really cry almost like Middle Eastern mourning kind of crying. As someone who is less expressive of such emotions being a Romulan at heart I was mildly taken aback, after all it wasn’t like they had dated or anything. I had seldom seen men cry before and this was some pretty emotional stuff. My mom had the same kind of reaction I discovered on my way home. I guess it was the generation thing. He was the icon of his generation and changed both the style and the performance of music. It was Elvis that I immediately thought of when I first saw the news of Michael Jackson’s death. I guess the fact that both were known as the “king”, that both died young and unexpectedly and that Michael was briefly married to Lisa Marie Presley makes their connection a bit stronger than otherwise expected. I wonder if there will be stories that Michael is really dead or if it was staged to get him some privacy. I’m sure that conspiracy theorists will be looking into this as both a death and a disappearance. On a side note I visited Graceland in 1983 on my way to Fort Knox Kentucky and sat in the “pink Jeep.” Judy had a Tonka pink Jeep when she was a kid.

The attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan on March 20^th 1981 stands out. I was a junior at cal State Northridge and was taking my lunch on the lawn outside of the office where I worked as a peer counselor. I was getting ready to go to class as I watched to really good looking girls go walking by me talking. I didn’t notice anything unusual until the past me and continuing to watch I noticed that each had their hand down the back side of the pants of the other one. I had never seen this before. Of course having grown up in California I knew homosexual men and I had heard of lesbians but this was the first time that I ever noticed women of that persuasion like doing some affection or foreplay in public. Since then of course I have had many friendships with both male homosexuals and lesbians but this was one of those moments that sticks out in my mind. Anyway, as I walked back into the office to grab my books for class the office TV was on announcing the attempted assassination and what I will never forget is watching retired General Alexander Haig as Secretary of State have a news conference where he stated “I’m in control.” Of course he wasn’t the next in line and though he thought that he was he was not in control, even of himself that that point. I don’t think that then Vice President George H.W. Bush was very impressed nor were the actuals in the line of succession. So the shooting of President Reagan is intermixed with my first view of lesbian touching and seeing a General go out of control to be in control. As Mr. Spock might say to Captain Kirk, “Captain I find this fascinating.”

In January 1985 I was a young company commander in Wiesbaden Germany. The Space Shuttle Challenger with 7 Astronauts aboard blew up shortly after launch. It was already the close of the business day in Germany when this happened. I had the First Sergeant release the soldiers a bit early and set the duty, the Charge of Quarters, the Assistant and the Duty Driver. I was staying late as always to take care of maintenance management and personnel reports when Specialist Lisa Dailey rushed into my office. Lisa was the Charge of Quarters or CQ that day. She knocked on my door and said “Sir the space shuttle just blew up.” She had been watching it live on the new AFN broadcast of live stateside TV news broadcasts. If I recall this was the time slot of the Today Show, and yes it was when there was only one AFN broadcast channel. I looked up from my mountain of reports and said to her, “Specialist Dailey, space shuttles don’t blow up.” And she said, no sir it just did, I was watching it and it is on TV right now.” So I got up from my desk and walked at a brisk pace down the hall with my spun up specialist and looked on in horror as I saw a replay of the launch. I was stunned as like I had told Lisa “space shuttles don’t blow up.” However this one did and it was sobering. I should have believed Lisa, she was a great soldier and the last time that I heard from her is doing well working as an RN in Southern California. I had an eerie reprise of this when the Space Shuttle Columbia blew up on re-entry. At the time I was waiting for the arrival of General Peter Pace who was to be our guest speaker at the Battle of Hue City Memorial Weekend in Jacksonville FL. He was delayed a couple of hours by an emergency meeting of the Joint Chiefs.

Fast forward a few years to the bombing by Libyan agents of Pam Am flight 103, the Clipper Maid of the Seas over Lockerbie Scotland, on December 21^st 1988. I had left active duty for seminary a couple of months previously and was engaged in a nearly futile job search in oil and real estate busted Texas. I had completed the share of my morning futility mailing our more resumes, making more calls and picking up more job applications. As always I would take a football out and punt it as far as I could to relieve the stress. I had already found out that breaking things that you actually need when being accosted by bill collectors is not good a good way to deal with stress. In today’s current economy I suggest anyone is such straits pick up a football and punt the crap out of it rather than taking anything out on home appliances, electronics or loved ones. Eventually things will work out as sucky as they may seem now; the Deity Herself has assured me of this. Anyway, back to the plane crash. This really was weird for us because barely two years prior we had flown the same aircraft back from Germany when we were reassigned to the states. We remembered this because then they showed the photo of the nose and cockpit area we saw the name of the aircraft. I looked at Judy and said, does the name of that airplane look familiar? If I recall correctly she said something like “Oh my God” and I said: “Remember back in Frankfurt when I saw the name of the aircraft prior to boarding?” and how “l liked the way Pan Am gave pretty names to its aircraft.” It was funny because we both vividly recalled waiting for our flight and what we said about the aircraft. That was totally weird and surreal almost like an X-Files thing as I thought back to details inside of the aircraft and the trip home from Germany.

We were in Fort Worth for the first bombing of the World Trade Center and the destruction of the Branch Davidian Compound outside Waco. Both times I was at work and watched the events unfold on the televisions of our ministry’s television production department. The Branch Davidian stand-off and attempted seizure of by Federal Agents used M-751 Combat Engineer Vehicles from my National Guard unit. The vehicles were not manned by Guardsmen but Federal agents. Later that summer I saw a couple of the vehicles which still had white paint scratches on them from the Branch Davidian building. In 1995 I was home getting ready to go to work in Huntington West Virginia when the Murrow Federal Building was destroyed by Timothy McVeigh.

There are quite a few others that I could mention but will finish with the destruction of the World Trade Center twin towers on September 11^th 2001. I had finished a couple of counseling cases and put out some other brush fires as the Chaplain for Headquarters Battalion 2^nd Marine Division. Leaving my office for a belated PT session at the French Creek gym I was closing out my internet explorer. On the Yahoo home page there was a small news line that said “Aircraft crashes into World Trade Center.” I shrugged and figured that some idiot private pilot had flown his aircraft into is by mistake and when out to my car. I got in my 2001 Honda CR-V and some guy on the radio was blathering about it being an airliner and then I heard a chilling line that I will never forget. “Oh my God another aircraft has hit the second building.” I went over to the gym and stood staring in disbelief at one of the TVs with a bunch of Marines and Sailors. I shook my head, ran back to the office and changed over to my cammies and when to the Battalion Headquarters where we were informed of what the command knew and then set to work taking anti-terror precautions as no one knew what might happen next. Camp LeJeune became a fortress. There were checkpoints at key locations throughout the base. Patrols were set up and we remained in lock-down for almost 4 days. That is a day that I can never forget, over 3000 Americans and others killed by Islamic extremist terrorists out to ignite a world war.

So those are some of mine. What about yours? Feel free to add your posts here and get a discussion of these and other notable events including the death of Michael Jackson going. It will be interesting to see and I will approve all posts to this article, excepting of course spam posts.

Peace, Steve+

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June 25, 2009 · 23:50

Always on the Road…Memories of a Marriage Spent Apart Together

anniverary 2009 26 Years Together: At Murphy’s of DC

The 1980s super-group Journey had a song called Faithfully. It is to this day one of my favorite songs for though it is about the life a travelling musician the lyrics are quite fitting for a military family.

Highway run
Into the midnight sun
Wheels go round and round
You’re on my mind
Restless hearts
Sleep alone tonight
Sendin’ all my love
Along the wire

They say that the road
Ain’t no place to start a family
Right down the line
Its been you and me
And lovin’ a music man
Ain’t always what it’s supposed to be
Oh girl you stand by me
I’m forever yours…faithfully

Circus life
Under the big top world
We all need the clowns
To make us smile
Through space and time
Always another show
Wondering where I am
Lost without you

And being apart ain’t easy
On this love affair
Two strangers learn to fall in love again
I get the joy
Of rediscovering you
Oh girl, you stand by me
Im forever yours…faithfully

Oh, oh, oh, oh
Faithfully, Im still yours
Im forever yours
Ever yours…faithfully

If your read yesterday’s post you know that we have only spent 10 of 26 anniversaries together. In those years we have often been apart. In fact a mere 3 ½ weeks after we started dating I left on a 3 month tour with a Christian singing group called the Continental Singers and Orchestra. Fort those that have heard me sing there is nothing to fear as I was the spotlight tech. In this position I got to sing along without anyone having to hear me as I trained my Strong Trouperette III spotlight on the various soloists and while in Europe on the whole group. This continued on multiple occasions after we were married during my military career, periods of 6-9 months were common, once a 15 month separation with a three week period together. From May of 1996 until August 2003 we spent 43 out of 63 months apart. This did not include the period of my hospital residency and civilian hospital chaplain jobs working many second shifts and overnights in addition to National Guard and Army Reserve exercises, training, official travel or schools. Of course this put strain on both of us yet somehow we survived.

It is in the times like these that you find out what you as a couple are made of. Both of us are somewhat independent spirits and though both natural introverts have strong personalities. At the same time we both see the world through a somewhat warped prism and both have strong senses of irony which is strange because I take my clothes that need pressing to the cleaners. I think a lot of what besides the grace of God, which the Deity Herself has seemed to has given both of us a lot of, many times in spite of me.

In the course of our marriage we have lived quite a few places and of course I have been to even more. We were married in Stockton California, aka “Mudville” of Casey at the Bat fame or more recently the birthplace of the drive by shooting and 2500 square foot two story suburban marijuana farms and the highest home foreclosure rate in the country. Stockton is a great place to be from and a nice place to visit family. If the economy wasn’t so sucky and the crime rate so high it would be a really awesome place to live only a couple of hours from the San Francisco and the Northern California coast, the Sierra Nevada Mountains and Lake Tahoe, the California Wine country, Redwood Groves, Yosemite and many historic or natural venues.

That rabbit chase we first set up house in a little town called Eckelhausen Germany in the Saarland when my first unit the 557^th Medical Company (Ambulance) was based at a little Kaserne called Neubrücke. Eckelhausen and Neubrücke were ideal small bases in West Germany during the Cold War. We lived off base in a small town overlooking a resort lake called the Böstalsee. The town was so small that it only had a small Postamt (Post office) and one Gästhaus. The people spoke a strong dialect of German that approximated Appalachian English. Not long after settling there the unit was moved to Wiesbaden, the state capital of Hessen. We got our first dog in Wiesbaden, the little Wire Haired Dachshund named Frieda, or sometimes “Dammitt Frieda” or simply “little shit.” In Wiesbaden The Deity presumed to started meddling in my life and renewing a call to ministry that I knew that I had back before I went on tour with Continentals. I successfully parried the Deity’s call until we moved to San Antonio Texas when I was the Adjutant of the Academy Brigade of the Academy of Health Sciences. This was where the Deity really began to rain on my parade and Judy of course was affected as well. She was supportive of the call to ministry and what we hoped would be the Army Chaplaincy, but really had not signed up for this. She had in fact signed up to be the wife of a regular active duty officer who would spend 20 or so years in and retire at a comfortable pay grade. Nope, the Deity had other plans.

Seminary as I hinted in other posts was hell for us. We lost pretty much everything and it was only the grace of God and the people of God who saw some glimmer of hope in me that we made it through. Now true, I worked my ass off in school and always at least one job plus the National Guard, often more than one job. We saw what only can be described as miracles as we fought our way through seminary. Those are enough themselves for another post. We did seminary in Fort Worth Texas and lived there and in the Mid-Cities of Hurst-Euless-Bedford. The entirety of seminary and my hospital residency was spent at the poverty line and we often didn’t know where the next meal, tank of gas or tuition payment would come from. We then moved to Huntington West Virginia where I was a full time contract hospital Emergency Department Chaplain following my residency. We thought that Huntington would be the final stop as it was the city and area that my family came from, I being the first born on the West Coast. That changed in June 1996 when I was mobilized the support the Bosnia Operation. When that happened my contract was terminated and another minister of the Pastoral Care Department’s Chief was hired. After the 9 month deployment I went on very little notice for 6 months at Fort Indiantown Gap PA. This morphed into a civilian position during the transition of the base from the Active Army to the Pennsylvania Army National Guard. This position was a yearlong and I was able to move Judy up with me. Following this it was back to unemployment and poverty in Huntington.

That changed in December 1998 when I was offered the chance to become a Navy Chaplain. Now mind you back in our courtship Judy said that she would not marry me if I joined the Navy, so I did it without consulting her. Now men this is not a smart move, if I had asked her nicely and explained things she probably would have signed off on it. However, like an idiot I nearly blew the marriage apart by doing it my way. I wanted to go back on active duty and the Army told me that I was too senior to go back on active duty. It was like I declared free agency and was picked up by another team, like going from the American League to the National League. It was nearly 8 months later that Judy finally relented and moved to Swansboro North Carolina with me. I really don’t blame her, she had a life and friends in Huntington, in fact far more than me and to move was painful and what I did by not being gentlemanly and asking her was both unfair and stupid. It is my biggest regret in our marriage. At the same time Judy rapidly adapted to the life of a Navy Chaplain on a Marine Corps base and even at a Chaplain wives meeting helped break into the chapel so that it could be set up for the meeting when a Religious Program Specialist did not show to open it up. Never underestimate a Navy wife and her best friend and evil twin, though they might contest which one is actually the “evil” twin.

From Swansboro and Camp LeJeune we went to Mayport/Jacksonville Florida where I was chaplain of a guided missile cruiser. I arrived just prior to deployment and Judy remained in North Carolina until I returned. This was kind of funny because I was calling the US looking for an apartment from a port call in Croatia. Making a call I found out that the place I wanted had already been rented. I can’t remember my exact words when I got this news but be assured that they were a colorful metaphor. I called Judy totally disappointed on to find it was she who had scored the apartment. Our stay in Jacksonville was only about 13 months after the deployment ended when we moved to the Hampton Roads area. It finally looks like we are in the place we will stay after the Navy.

Judy has been with me across country, and a lot of places in Europe to include Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, France, Spain and the UK. She made it to East Berlin as well as Guantanamo Bay Cuba. We have met many people and seen many interesting things. Likewise we have experienced the reality of God’s grace in our lives.

Ours has been strange journey to say the least, but every day I know that it is worth it. Today we had or 26^th wedding anniversary. We drove to DC. One of the cool things was that Judy is trying out a pair of new hearing aids, which she hopes that Tricare will purchase when the time comes due. The hearing aids are remarkable. For the first time in her life she can hear words in songs played on a radio or stereo. She can hear conversations going on behind her without having to look and she has heard for the first tie sounds like the letter “S” a pen scratching on paper, rain dripping down a drain spout and the richness of her guitar. It has been quite an emotional day for her. She is continuing to notice the nuances of sound and every so often she is overcome with all that she has missed over the years. One of the things that she is discovering as she hears the lyrics to songs for the first time without having to read them is that I am a hopeless romantic. A lot of my CDs are compilations of my favorite songs, many of which were picked with Judy in mind. It was quite an emotional ride for both of us as she really experienced what is that hearing people hear on a daily basis.

She is beginning to write about in on her blog, the Abbey Normal Abbess which is on my links menu. We would both appreciate your prayers as Tricare eventually makes the decision as to whether she will get them. Tonight we had dinner with Judy’s cousin Becky who works for the US Department of Fish and Game Law Enforcement at Murphy’s of DC. While on the way there we heard that Michael Jackson had died quite unexpectedly not long after Farrah Fawcett had passed away from Cancer earlier in the day. I guess that we will remember this anniversary.

Anyway, it has been a long day. Judy has passed out a while ago and it is time for me to get some sleep.

Peace and blessings,

Steve+

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Filed under Loose thoughts and musings, marriage and relationships, Military

Tagged as academy of health sciences, army chaplain corps, army reserve, belgium, bosnia operation, bostalsee, camp lejuene nc, changing from Army to the navy, continental singers, dallas, deployment, eckelhausen, farrah fawcett, fort indiantown gap, fort worth, france, germany, hampton roads, hearing aids, huntington wv, jacksonville fl, journey, luxembourg, mayport fl, michael jackson, murphy's of dc, music, national guard, navy chaplain corps, neubrucke, saarland, san antonio, spain, spotlights, stockton ca, strong trouperette iii, swansboro nc, the netherlands, united kingdom, wiesbaden

June 24, 2009 · 23:40

The Eve of 26 Years of Marriage

Judy Wedding Judy on our Wedding Day

“Baseball and marriage have much in common. Both are a team effort. You can’t play baseball by yourself. You need others and have to get along with them. Marriage needs a partner. If marriage reaches a point where getting along is not possible, the marriage is over.” Peter Griffiths in the Daily Herald 1982

Today is our wedding anniversary eve, in fact our 26^th anniversary. It was cool that we got to spend it together; this has not always been the case. Tonight the Deity Herself smiled upon us as on a beautiful night we watched our Norfolk Tides defeat the Pawtucket Red Socks 4-2. Tomorrow we start a 4 day road trip to Washington DC to celebrate our anniversary which will be topped off by a behind the scenes tour of the White House on Saturday Night arranged by a friend who I baptized on the way to Iraq, who is now on the National Security Council. His staff has bent over backward to make this happen and we are blessed. We will also see my old Commanding Officer from Marine Security Force Battalion, or now as it is called the Security force Regiment and his wife who are coming down from Annapolis to meet us Friday night.

So 26 years, as Jerry Garcia would say it has been a long strange trip. We met almost five years before we were married at San Joaquin Delta College. We got to know each other by hanging out between classes with mutual friends. In fact the things we did were almost like Seinfeld before Seinfeld came on. It was a relationship initially based on nothing, except that I had a Dorothy Hamill fetish and Judy had short brown hair. We started dating about 7 months after we met. We were co-conspirators at the Delta College German club where our German candy and bake sales were legendary, racking up huge profits for the club which enabled us to fund our own field trips to San Francisco and Monterrey. Our political prowess was also unmatched, as a small club we had few votes in student government which at the time was dominated by a rather large and active ethnic club. This club was a bit pushy the way it handled itself, so we cobbled together a coalition of the language, science and other kind of “nerdy” clubs, funded our candidate with our sales receipts, even passing our free candy on his campaign materials. He had an ethnic name and we used it to our advantage, we convinced a lot of people that our friend Tory was one of the other ethnic club’s candidates. We used his first name “Salvatore” in our advertising. This caused a split in the voting allowing our stealth candidate from an Asian club to become student body President. I guess had we had the wherewithal to pursue politics as a couple we might have been quite good, as both of us have pretty good instincts and I happen to be rather analytical and calculating at times. As it were this was the high point of our political career but our relationship was solidified as we shared in taking German club from a poor club of nerds to a campus economic and political powerhouse of nerds.

Me and Judy Dorm Us in 1980 at Cal State Northridge

We grew together over the years of our courtship playing off of our mutual twisted sense of humor and our faith. I followed Judy down to Cal State Northridge and a week after I was commissioned we got married at our home Church, East Side Presbyterian Church in Stockton. The eve of the wedding my ROTC friends took me out and tried to get me drunk, but I survived. The wedding itself was on a shoestring as Judy’s dad was out of work and her mom not working and playing well with others. Everything came together and our wedding looked like it cost a lot more than it did. We spent the next two weeks together before I went on active duty and Judy finished her last semester of college. We finally settled in Eckelhausen Germany, a tiny little town in the Saarland in April 1984 and lived in Germany for most of the first three years of our marriage.

Now as to anniversaries that we have spent together and apart; this is what makes 26 pretty special.

Wedding 1 Wedding Day 25 June 1983 East Side Presbyterian Church

In 1984 I was in Landstuhl Army Medical Center dehydrated from a 2 week bout of gastroenteritis where I was so sick I was vomiting my anti-nausea medicine. I had lost almost 20 pounds and my company commander wouldn’t believe that I was sick until I threw up on his desk. It was his fault, I told him I was going to throw up and he told me that I had to stay. Oh well, that got me a ride in a Mercedes-Benz Ambulance to Landstuhl. In 1985 and 1986 I was in the field with my company. We were together in 1987 and 1988 in San Antonio, but from 1989-1997 we did not spend a single anniversary together due to military duties. We spent 1998 together but missed 1999 and 2000 after I came in the Navy. We got 2001 one together, but just barely as I returned from deployment a week before it. We missed 2002 as I was deployed to the Middle East and finally got 2003 together when we renewed our vows in Jacksonville Florida. 2004-2007 we celebrated on the road doing trips to minor league baseball games out of our area in either Pennsylvania or North Carolina. Last year we were together but I was not doing well having hit bottom with my PTSD about 100 or so days after returning from Iraq. So with this history in mind you can understand why this is special. We are 10 for 26 counting tomorrow. If we were a baseball team our record would be somewhere between the Indians and Nationals on a winning percentage at .386. However, if we were a hitter we would have a 386 batting average and that is not too shabby.

We have survived poverty and war, separation and tremendously difficult circumstances and we are still hanging on, and doing pretty good as a couple. We were never able to have children but we have had three really fun dogs, the latest of which, Molly, is looking over my shoulder as I write this now. We are different in the way that we are wired differently and have some different interests. We are both introverts with often strong opinions. But we love each other. I only came close to having her divorce me once, though murder may have played into her mind a time or two.

So here we are…26 years with a 10 and 16, .386 record. Even so Judy is the love of my life and we are together.

Take care and blessings,

Peace, Steve+

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Filed under Baseball, Loose thoughts and musings, philosophy, PTSD

Tagged as Army, california state university northridge, deployment, east side presbyterian church, gastroenteritis, german club, germany, landstuhl army medical center, marine security forces, minor league baseball, national security council, PTSD, san antonio, san joaquin delta college, washington dc, wedding anniversaries, weddings, white house

June 23, 2009 · 22:55

Padre Steve gets An Emergency Root Canal and inducted into the Gordon Biersch “Stein Club”

This is for all of those who just love going to the dentist. I have included links to Steve Martin’s “Dentist Song” from the “Little Shop of Horrors” and Rowan Atkinson as “Mr Bean” going to the dentist for some laughs.

Steve Martin in Little Shop of Horrors….too much like my own Dr Mengele

I believe that most people have at least one horror story from going to the dentist. Even Judy, the Abby Normal Abbess who loves going to the dentist has one story where she had a tooth drilled and filled without anesthetic when the Army dentist refused to give her a topical.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOtMizMQ6o

When I was a kid we lived in Oak Harbor Washington. My dad was stationed at the Naval Air Station and as a young grade school kid I got to pay a visit to the local dentist, in fact if I recall the only civilian dentist in town at the time. Back in those days when a “baby” toot came out the “Tooth Fairy” would leave a quarter or fifty cents under the child’s pillow. It was a pretty cool deal. Lose a tooth get money new tooth grows back in. Unfortunately back then in the days before fluorinated water or great detail education kids got lots of cavities.

Now in our town we had I think only one dentist. Active duty people went to the Navy Dentists on base, but dependants went to civilians. Back in those days dentistry was one step above being a KGB interrogator. It was painful, and if perchance you had a dentist with a mean streak it could be really really ugly. This happened to be the case in our sleepy little town where Dr. Josef Mengele had disguised himself and entered the dentistry field. Our little Dr. Mengele was a tad bit on the cruel side. The guy, to use the Steve Martin Little Shop of Horrors dentist terminology “got off on the pain he’s inflict.” Of course this was in the days before topical anesthetics. Dr. Mengele would make sure that the gleaming steel syringe was visible all the way into your mouth and drive it in hard. After inflicting the maximum amount of pain possible he would go away and wait for the anesthetics to wear off. As they lost their potency he would come back in, pull the start cord on his gas powered drill,…no not really he would start playing with the drills and drill bits in front of my terror stricken eyes waiting for the very moment the anesthetics to wear off to begin to drill, using what I am sure were 1930s vintage drill bits. As I, and other kids down the hall screamed bloody freaking murder he would drill in hard. In fact he wouldn’t waste an opportunity. When we were about to leave town when dad was transferred Dr. Mengele took one last shot and found five “new” cavities. By the time I was done even the sound of any drill would send chills down my spine and cause my heart to race…this remained the case for well over 20 years and it took several really good guys and gals who served as dentists to help me get ver what was by Junior High School a nearly pathological aversion to dentists. The turning point was when I was a student at Cal State Northridge back in 180 and had to have an emergency root canal when a nerve abscessed under some of Dr. Mengele’s work. I went to Dr. Brent Meinhart DDS who happened to have a sign that read “painless dentist” on his door. I was not impressed and could not believe that this could be the case. However, the pain that was rocketing through the top of my skull convinced me that even if the good doctor was lying about this painless crap that something needed to be done. To my surprise and bewilderment the man and his staff worked to make this as painless as possible. He did such good work that nearly 30 years later the root canal, restoration and crown still amaze other dentists with their quality and longevity. I have been very lucky in that I have had no new cavities since before high school and only work to repaired badly done fillings from my childhood, many put there by Dr Mengele.

Mr Bean at the Dentist

Mr. Bean at the Dentist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abJyp4bAi0I

So what this, why me, why now? Right? Here’s the deal. A molar of mine began to hurt a few days back. By yesterday evening it was throbbing like a bass player in an AC/DC concert. I knew that my streak of great dental health had be hit hard. Today I went to our dental clinic at the medical center where I spent the next five hours. A lot of this was because the dentists needed to consult each other as the injury to my tooth was relatively complicated, a fracture ran through it from top to bottom. The nerve was beginning to abscess and I knew that this could not be good. During the time where staff was trying to figure out which tooth was the offending one, I issued several blood curdling screams which were heard throughout the department. After what seemed like unending consults by a number of specialists a root canal was decided upon although one dentist wondered if the tooth was even salvageable. They went to work, killed the tooth and killed and not a moment too soon after soon. The dentist who actually did the work as well as the techs discovered during this time that I was the screamer. Thankfully these works worked very hard to ensure that I was as comfortable as possible during the procedure and were not like old Dr. Mengele at all. Now I still have a couple more appointments to finish this adventure, but from the experience I had today I know that it will not be as bad as the examination yesterday. Thankfully the good dentists that worked on me worked hard to make a painful procedure much more bearable. Dentistry has come a long way since the days of Dr. Mengele. God bless the folks who worked on me.

Anyway, tonight I was inducted into the Gordon Biersch “Stein Club.” That is kind of like the local micro brewery hall of fame. However, that is a story for another day.

Peace, Steve+

Mr. Bean at the Dentist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abJyp4bAi0I

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Filed under Loose thoughts and musings

Tagged as ac/dc, cal state northridge, cavities and fillings, dentists, dr josef mengele, gordon biersch, little shop of horrors, mr bean, mr bean dentist, oak harbor wa, root canal, stein club, steve martin denstist song

Category Archives: Loose thoughts and musings

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Interns and Residents Graduate while New Ones Arrive; Save #500 for Mariano Rivera and I Know Why the North Koreans are So Belligerent…They Don’t Have Baseball!

Back form DC Duty Tomorrow

Weekend in Washington-Reconnecting with Friends Family, Each Other and an Evening at the West Wing

Where were You When…? The Death of an Icon and Its Impact in Our Lives

Always on the Road…Memories of a Marriage Spent Apart Together

The Eve of 26 Years of Marriage

Padre Steve gets An Emergency Root Canal and inducted into the Gordon Biersch “Stein Club”

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