When is it time?

I got this terrible feeling over breakfast this morning, looking out at the grass; when is it time? When will I know when it is time to go?

The awful truth is that I had a momentary lapse, a temporary let-up in my constant watch on the mind and emotions; chronic pain beats down the door, and forces thoughts that would normally remain in darkness:

When will life be no fun anymore? When is the future no longer bright? What will I do when there is no one left to talk to?

I am tired. But I know thinking on laying down is a "slippery slope" which I can neither afford nor desire to explore. I am fortunate to have the support of a wonderful doctor, who I think I owe much to, including at least the last five years of productive life. However, we both agree that perhaps just enjoying life, in as good a quality as we can get for me without the productivity part, may be the best that we can hope for.

These are the things that we never tell our children about, nor do we let our children take part in the decision making process. Getting old is something that is not honored, or even acknowledged, and we tend to cover up the trappings of aging in our society. No one teaches our young about buying medications, and when to ask for generic meds, or a higher strength medication and use a pill cutter to halve the dosage to save money; no one discusses the use of diapers when incontinence becomes an issue; our children never learn about paralysis and what is does to the body, and why grandparents might not want to go to the movie, or out to dinner.

No one takes the time to talk to the children about the side effects of prescription drugs, and why we would want to put up with all the discomfort, and sometimes the dangers, of those side effects.

So when is it time to talk to them? It will be too late when we are too tired, and when we pass away.

Its too bad that they won't be interested until it happens to them. I hope the words of the Crow are still around for them to hear when they feel the frost settle on their hearts, and in their bones.

MMG

Late Night Ice Water

It was this very night, about this very hour (3 am), off the coast of North Carolina on the USS Jack in 1987 that the fire occurred.

I was at the Feed Station with a student (MM2/SS Frink) when we got the order aft to go to Ahead Flank. I watched Frink start the Number Two Main Feed Pump, when we heard a load buzzing noise, and saw black smoke start to roll out from the bilge below us. No big deal, I thought, just a feed pump bearing failure. I had seen many in my eleven years shifting feed pumps. I told Frink to shut down the Feed Pump, and I grabbed the phone to report the fire in the pump.

"Fire in Number Two Main Feed Pump, pump is secured," I announced firmly to Maneuvering.

There was no response. The buzzing and the smoke continued. By now the pump had begun to coast down. "Maneuvering, did you receive my last?"

Then over the 2MC (intercom system aft), we heard "Fire in Number Two Main Feed Pump... FIRE IN MACHINERY SPACE UPPER LEVEL!! FIRE IN MACHINERY SPACE UPPER LEVEL!!

The ship is divided into five compartments, the after three, Reactor Compartment, Auxiliary Machinery Space, and Engine Room, were collectively know as the Engineering Spaces. The Feed Station is in the Auxiliary Machinery Space Lower Level. There were two ladders that led from the lower level to the upper level, and only the Upper Level had access to the Engine Room and the Reactor Compartment Tunnel which led forward.

My Student and I found ourselves trapped under a major fire in a submarine at over 400 feet deep off the coast of North Carolina. And trapped is the word: the immediate actions in a submarine fire is to isolate the fire after evacuating everyone possible. All personnel left the Upper Level, and then the hatched were shut and dogged (locked). We had air-line breathing masks to breath from, and sound powered phones to communicate with, but as far as expectations for surviving the fire, we had none. We were told that rescue crews would re-enter the compartment in about 20 minutes when they had organized a fire fighting team.

So we watched the copper buss bars over us melt, and rain down on the deckplates; we watched the smoke turn from dark to oily to solid; we listened carefully for any crews to enter the compartment. It got hot, then it got hotter. We squatted down on the deck, then we lifted the deckplates and sat with our legs in the bilge.

Throughout the fire, I had two overwhelming considerations washing over me the whole time: the second was that we were not going to survive, but that the longer we could keep the machinery going, the better chance for the rest of the crew to survive. The Feed Station keeps water going to the Steam Generators, which keeps the Steam Turbines on line, and the Steam Turbines are the engines that keep the submarine going. The Thresher accident showed that modern submarines have to be able to drive the boat to the surface as well as blow ballast, so the engines are necessary for the survival of the crew, and that was high on my mind.

The first thing on my mind was that I could NOT let my student know that I thought our situation hopeless. I had to not only let him think we would be saved, but I had to make it look as routine as possible. I had him simply follow procedures, and tried to shield him from any indication that this was a terminal event on our part.

And, as luck had it, we were saved. It should not have been, but it was. Fifteen minutes later, the fire out, a crew came in to relieve us. I went to the mess decks and had a coffee, then went back on watch. I don't think my student joined me. I would have liked to gone to bed myself, but I had to keep it routine.

And now, years later, I am still experiencing life colored through the lens of those few minutes that night off the North Carolina coast. It is hard to take the minutia of life seriously when you have actually faced your mortality so early in life, and in such a hostile, violent environment. I don't suffer foolishness in my professional relations very easily, which marks me. I rarely maintain a job for more than three years before my inability to navigate the politics or the culture of the workplace causes me to fall on my own sword, or to become too expensive a liability for a top cat.

But then, I always land on my feet. I feel certain that I will find that next job, and I always do. I never let anything stand in the way of getting on with life, even my considerable disability, as I feel I have seen worse. You can find comfort in having seen the Devil already, then he holds no power over you.

There are nights, though, I would rather be sleeping, than sitting up, sipping on a late night ice water and writing in my blog, remembering nights long ago off the coast of North Carolina.

Is it kind?

There is an old Chinese proverb out there (does anyone know of any new Chinese proverbs?) that gives wisdom on how to approach interpersonal relationships, specifically, how do you know what things to do to one another, and what things not to do? I suppose the Chinese equivalent of Dr. Phil got tired of answering the age old question of "Is it okay to tell a little white lie if it doesn't hurt anyone, and no one every finds out." Back then, no one would find out for centuries, even if it was important.

So the sage tells his audience that if you go to do something, you should first stop and ask yourself three questions: Is it right? Is it necessary? Is it kind? If the answer to any of those three is "no," then you should not do it, whatever it is.

If it is not right, then you should not do it on moral grounds: I have always tried to impress on my own children that their integrity is the only thing that is truly their own in this world. Even their name is given to them by someone else, but their integrity is theirs alone. Only they can protect it, and only they can throw it away. Once lost, your integrity will take years to regain, if ever. The best thing is, never, ever let it go. You can get another job, you will never get another reputation. I have walked away from two jobs in my life over moral issues, and in both cases it set me back financially, but I recovered in a short time. My integrity did not suffer, and is intact to this day.

If it is not necessary, then why expend the effort? There are so many other things in life that require our attention, there is little time to waste on things of little concern. I may have a different outlook than some on this, but I have seen life in a light where there is precious little time on teh earth, far too little time to be spending it on minutia. If you are going to be burning calories, burn them in the pursuit of matters that make a difference. Trivial concerns spill the life energy of others who may not have that much to spill.

Is it kind. This may be the most important of all. In our trade with each other, as we meet and speak, exchange ideas and words, just how much of our greeting and time spent communicating is spend being pleasant? How much do we demand from each other, without being thankful for making each others' jobs a little easier when we help each other out?

At my work, for some reason the language has turned to demanding this last year. Over the intercom, teachers and students are now ordered to "Report to Room 205 for a conference!" Report! I am sure it never occurs to the person on the other end of the microphone that in America the only persons that can order me to report anywhere are a magistrate or law enforcement with a properly executed warrant, or the Navy if my skills were so badly in need that I should have to be reactivated. No one at my school has that power. Yet they still order me to "Report!" Why?

Somewhere our society has learned that it is okay to push around the weak and marginalized. We feel it is for the greater good, so it is acceptable. When did we make this shift? We didn't used to feel this way. It used to be that the weak were protected, the marginalized were included. It was the obligation of the strong to protect the weak and lame.

Is it kind? Think before you do. If it isn't kind, then don't do it. Life is hard enough without adding to each others' burdens. We should do all we can to lighten each others' load every chance we get, whenever we can, for our time here is short, and hard.