God's Light Shines in The Darkest Storms of Life

Hell – And The Synapses That Done It

He applies his human reason

To facts not at all related –

And to say his false conclusions

Are erroneous is understated.

Fighting a losing war within,

He struggles for an appearance of normalcy.

But, there are so many cracks and flaws

All crumbles in sad absurdity.

His soul is trapped inside his body,

With expressions frustratingly checked –

Synapses deteriorating, scrambled understanding,

And relationships effectively wrecked.

He lives within this fleshly shell,

And struggles for recognition.

Loosing connection with reality,

He desperately seeks affirmation.

Oh – The horror of this slippery slope,

This living analogy of Hell.

Able to feel on the inside,

But unable others to tell.

To know the truth, but not to know it;

To want to interact with the world –

Yet not to be sure that he can or he does,

Leaves his mind in a horrible swirl.

What's happening in him is baffling;

To hope, to question, to doubt, to pursue –

Thoughts that leave him greatly perplexed

About how this Gordian knot to undo.

To have the truth before his eyes

Yet not be able to grasp it well –

To feel it there, yet beyond his reach,

Is a living picture of hell.

"But", says he, "it's not my choice and not my will,

This body where my soul does sit –

Have patience and take care of me.

It's the synapses in my brain that done it."

J. Alton Davis  © 2012

(re Alzheimer's disease)

Don't Destroy Life (The Logical Extreme ?)

Support Life 

Chew on a Rock

History - Its Importance and Use

 A perspective on the importance and usefulness of history:

History informs us first concerning our starting point, then the path taken from that starting point to where we find ourselves today.  Having an adequate knowledge of our history, we are armed to make today's decisions – Armed to make the decision that will most properly guide our path into the future.

Decisions affecting the future must be based on the proper historic foundation – like the upper floors of a tall building, which are aligned with the foundation, and not simply on the floor below, and then built in accordance with an appropriate plan.

In making today's decisions, we should first ask if we can identify any past decisions, which in retrospect may have been erroneous and, therefore, ought to be corrected lest we propagate that error into the future by basing today's decision on the results of that previous error.

Once satisfied (either by acceptance or correction of past decisions) with the path our history has taken to bring us to where we are today, we are in a healthier position to make good decisions that will direct our path into the future.

To Ignore the past when planning for the future is like building a tall building by ignoring the foundation and adding each additional floor by working only from the floor you are currently on.  Eventually, the building will be so far out of alignment from the foundation that the entire structure will fall over and collapse in a useless heap of rubble and dust. 

Airport Security (??) - Pre 9-11

In the late 1980s, I had flown from San Francisco to Eureka to spend a week auditing PG&E's Humboldt Bay Nuclear Power Plant, which was in the process of being decommissioned.  The audit was over, and it was time to fly back home.

At the airport, I was standing in a short line waiting for my turn to go through the metal detector and into the waiting room.  The airport for the Eureka area was quite small (I think there were probably only two, maybe three, boarding gates), and back then we waited at the gate on ground level and boarded our plane by simply walking out across the apron to the waiting plane and up some portable steps - The plane itself was like a flying shoebox.

Anyway - – I was in line behind this long-haired hippy-kind-of-guy who was wearing a camouflaged military field jacket.

Apparently the goal for the security people that day was to only let people through the metal detector and into the waiting area IF they could pass through the system WITHOUT setting of the alarm.  (I don't recall that there was any x-ray machine at that time - just a couple of security people and a metal detector next to a conveyor belt that you were supposed to put your luggage on.)

So, this guy in front of me starts through the detector – – and the alarm goes off(?).  "Whoa there!  It must have been your belt buckle."  So he pulls his belt out of his trousers and puts it on the conveyor belt. 

He steps into the metal detector again and the alarm goes off a second time (??).  "Hmm - must be your wrist watch.  Put it on the conveyor with your belt please."

Attempt #3 - Yet another alarm (???).  "Well - - ?? – - Maybe it's something in your jacket.  Please put your jacket on the conveyor belt."

4th attempt – while we all (actually its only a 24 passenger plane at the most that we're trying to get on) wait patiently for the security people to do their job – I naively thought they were protecting us by keeping anyone from taking a gun (I guess) on the airplane.

Hey - Three cheers - No alarm!  The guy in front of me has now successfully passed through the metal detector – and without setting off an alarm, which, as I said, was apparently the goal.  Because, the next thing the security guard does is hand this guy his belt, his watch and . . . his jacket.  Then he says, "Hmmm . . . must have been something in your jacket."  –  "Next please!" - – – My turn.

Safe and secure  –  Have a nice flight!  Well, I did make it back to San Francisco.

1968 - L. A. International Airport

In the spring of 1968, I had just been promoted to First Class Petty Officer.  I was an Electronic Technician in the U.S. Navy, and I was being transferred from sea duty on my first ship, the USS Markab (AR 23), to a tour of shore duty.  The Markab was in Long Beach at that time, and I was at the L.A. International Airport waiting to catch a plane to Oakland.

We lived in Castro Valley, and my ship's home port was in Alameda – at the Alameda Naval Air Station.  I was taking 30 days leave before flying with Judy and our son Mark to Hawaii where we would live for the next almost 3 years.

After I had checked in for my flight, I had several hours to kill before my plane took off.  I was wandering around the airport, and thought it would be really interesting if I could get a tour of the control tower.  If I asked, the worst that could happen was that they would say "no".  But they might say "yes".

It wasn't hard to find the tower.  After all, it's the tallest building at the airport.  I went into the receptionist's area at the foot of the tower, and asked if it might be possible to go up to the "cab" and see what it is like.  I was in uniform, and told the lady that I worked in electronics and was waiting for my flight.  She said she would call up and ask the supervisor if it was possible for me to go up.  To my surprise, he said yes, and I took an elevator to the very top of the tower.

The air traffic control tower when I was there in 1968 was tall and impressive, but I could not find a picture of it.  This is the newer control tower.

When I stepped out of the elevator, I could see all around the airport.  What a view!  Several people were manning stations where they were talking with pilots who were either taking off, taxying on the ground, or coming in for a landing.  I got to spend about 30 or 40 minutes up there.  It was absolutely fascinating to watch the inner workings of a major airport.

After I had been up in this part of the control tower for a while, the supervisor asked if I would like to go down to Area Control Center on the floor below.  No windows here - This is where air traffic controllers track, coordinate, and communicate with all of the planes flying in the air space all around southern California.  

When a plane approaches Los Angeles to land, a controller in this room coordinates the plane's approach until it reaches a certain distance from the airport.  Then he "hands the pilot off" to a controller in the "cab" upstairs to coordinate the landing.  Or, when a plane takes off, the controller upstairs "hands off" the plane to a controller on this floor, who then coordinates the plane's flight until it is time to "hand off" the plane to the next Area Control Center.  The Los Angeles Center will "hand off" planes to (or receive planes from) either Oakland, Salt Lake City, Denver, or Albuquerque Center.

[It is my understanding that the Los Angeles Area Control Center (En Route Center) is not actually in the tower at the airport anymore, but is actually located in Palmdale, CA.]

I spent a very interesting half hour or so in this large windowless room, which was filled with radar screens manned by a team of air traffic controllers, whose job is to keep everything coordinated and safe in that very large and complex 3-dimensional world of air traffic.

Needless to say, this was an experience I really enjoyed.  As I was writing about this, I was amazed to realize how much things have changed since the 9-11 attack on our country.  Today, the average person like me, walking in off the street, would never be allowed up in a control tower - especially at a place like LA International.

                

Reflections – Late 40's - Early 50's

 I find it intriguing to think about the kinds of things, back when I was a young boy, which seem to have begun shaping my view of the world, and started to create the questions in my mind that I would begin to ask about the world in which I found myself living, and about my place in it.

A few incidents, which occurred generally around the end of the 1940's and beginning of the 1950's, have been drifting though my head.  I was somewhere between seven and eleven years old.

I discovered that my grandma Davis came from a German-speaking family, and I wanted to learn some German words from her.  I remember how she taught me to count: eins, zwei, drei, vier, fünf, sechs, seben, acht, neun, zehn, ... and phrases like Gutten Morgan, dankeschön.

Somehow, which I have never discovered, my grandpa Davis had learned how to count in Chinese.  I seriously doubt that he learned this in his little school house in Baker, Oregon, where he grew up.  At any rate, he taught me to count from "ip" to "sip" (1 - 10).

Grandpa Anderson had lived and worked in Siam (now Thailand) in the very early 1900's.  He had met my English grandmother there.  (She was there with her parents – her father was Captain Robinson, a sea captain sailing ships between the Malay Peninsular and Australia.)  My grandpa told me that there is one word in the English language that comes from the Malay language, "orangutan".  It comes from two Malay words that mean, "hunched over man".

Around this same time in my life, the Korean War broke out.  It was in the news a lot.  We only had a radio then, so all of our news was from the radio or newspapers.  (I don't think we even knew anybody who had a television until about 1953, when a couple of neighbors down the street bought TVs.)  Someone, I think it was my Uncle Larry (he was married to my dad's youngest sister, Catherine), gave me a map of Korea.  I hung it on a wall in my bedroom, and marked all of the places that were being mentioned in the news.  That was my first practical (self-imposed I suppose) geography lesson.  Uncle Larry gave me a surplus Navy short wave radio receiver (An RBO - it covered the broadcast band and up to 15Mhz).  I strung up a long copper wire antenna in the back yard, and listened to as many shortwave broadcasts as I could receive.

(Some 15 or so years later, when I was an electronic technician in the Navy, one of my assignments was to the USS Markab (AR-23).  She had been in service since WWWII, and still had RB series receivers in use in Radio Central, including the RBO.)

One other thing that I clearly remember was my Golden Encyclopedia.  I particularly remember the "map" of the universe in the center of the book.  When you opened the book out flat, this "map" extended all the way across both pages, from the left edge of the left page to the right edge of the right page, and from the top of the page to the bottom - with no margin.  It was black background with various sized white marks indicating the stars and constellations.  What really intrigued me was the question, "what's beyond the edge of the page?  What's beyond and what's behind all of this vast universe?  The way this "map" was printed clear to the edge of the pages implied that their was no known limit.

          A big world was opening up to me.  Bigger than I could have imagined – certainly bigger, grander, and more complex than I could understand, or explain.