Only Human

   I'm only human, of flesh and blood I'm made.
Human, born to make mistakes.

-Human League

             Back when I was in the service my ship pulled into Valdez, Alaska for a few days of liberty for the crew.  On the first day there was a posting that said if anyone was interested in touring the southern terminal of the Alaskan Pipeline, there would be a van waiting on the dock the next morning.  Thinking there would be a mad scramble for seats on that van, I went down and found one early.  By the time the van left, my touring companions were the Captain of our ship, the XO (second in command), a gaggle of other officers, a representative of either the Pipeline or the City of Valdez, I don’t remember which, and me.  The mad scramble had never materialized.

            As we made our way to the terminal there was talk of the behavior of the crew the night before.  Some scuffles had happened between Coasties and townspeople, a neon beer sign had turned up missing, and maybe some bar furniture had been damaged.  The Captain started and apology when the rep from the area waved it off and said something like, “Sounds like the Coast Guard recruits from the same human race the rest of us are from.”

            I’ve always remember that line, even if I don’t remember who said it or what he represented.  I think of it now and then when reading about some of the sins we deliver upon each other.  I recently read where reports of sexual abuse in the military were up in 2012.  A whopping 26,000 reported cases.  Before you get as upset as I did when you realize that is 500 cases a week, understand that for every reported assault or abuse, nine likely go unreported. 

           But wait there’s more as they say.  Back in May Lt. Col. Jeffrey Krusinski was arrested for sexual battery.  One more military member added to between 26,000 and 260,000 matters little right?  Well what if Krusinski’s job was say, oh I don't know, to lead a sexual assault prevention program for the Air Force?  Too much to believe?  Believe.

          We throw the word hero at those serving in all branches of our armed forces, and indeed in a career where many literally put their lives on the line, hero seems appropriate.  But just because they wear the uniform, doesn’t mean they are heroic.  Remember, same human race.  Mr. Krusinski certainly had the opportunity to be and was anything but.  Praise those that do heroic deeds, but not all heroism is performed by those on the battlefield.  Sometimes it’s by those who come forward to say “this is not right” and by those who protect and defend them, along with the Constitution they swore to.

My Left Foot

             I was little. Maybe I was six or seven years old.  I was running in and out of my front door, for no particular reason, when on one of my trips back in, my bare foot and the front door arrived simultaneously at the threshold.  I don’t remember pain but I do remember running back to the front lawn, dropping to the ground and watching the blood running out of the middle toe on my left foot like water out of a hose.  The door was likely slammed by the swamp cooler and not my little brother Steve as I may have suggested years ago.

I also don’t remember the doctor visit but I do remember my mom buying me a 100-pack of little plastic cars at Cedar Drugs on Cedar and Clinton.  In a family where toys were rarely given outside of birthdays or Christmas, getting something like that was a special treat.  Maybe if it had been the big toe it would have been a G.I. JOE.

The cars are long gone; lost in, well in 100 difference places, likely before the end of summer that year.  The end of my toe was never recovered and I doubt even looked for.  Maybe the dog took it.  Cedar Drugs moved to the building next door, and eventually closed for good.  I’ll never see any of those cars or that phantom toe part again, but in the course of my job I had the opportunity to visit the Cedar Drugs building.

What I mostly remember about that store are the high, mirrored windows at the back.  When I was a kid, as I moved along the aisles I imagined that behind those windows sat a stern-faced store detective, planted ramrod straight in a stiff wooden chair, crew cut flecked with grey, a too tight blazer buttoned over his belly, his eyes roaming from corner to corner, watching and waiting for someone to slip something in a coat or pants pocket so he could drop the cold hand of justice on his shoulder and say, “Come with me son.”  I never shoplifted, maybe because of those windows, so I never found out if my fears were justified.  More likely there was some manager back there sleepily going over the books and paying little attention to what was going on below.

When I paid my visit to what is now the Cedar Clinton branch of the Library I was tracing phone cabling and that took me up to that office behind those windows.  Inside I found a couple of tired desks, file cabinets, and more than a little dust.  There were no remnants of security cameras and no wooden chair with arms rubbed smooth from the ever vigilant blazer owner.  And the entire place seemed much smaller than when I was smaller.

In my few short months working for the County I’ve visited the buildings that comprised the skyline of my youth more than my entire 50 years before.  In the old Del Webb Building I’ve been from the basement, where strange machines wheeze and hiss like dragons sleeping in deep dark caverns, to the 21^st floor where wires and other cabling hang as silent as vines in a green house.  I’ve visited the old Crocker Bank Building where there are so many coats of paint on the doors that the hinges seem to melt into them, and the vault (pictured above) sits quiet and forever open, far too big and heavy to ever move. I work behind the empty, former Juvenile Hall, I’ve been to Sunnyside Bowl where the alleys have been covered by a vast cube farm, and I’ve walked the halls of the Hall of Records with stainless steel and brass art-deco finishes look at new as the day they were installed.

It’s a little sad to see some of these buildings only continue to live on as government office space.  No one will ever roll a ball down the alleys in Sunnyside again.  No wealthy travelers will ever check into the penthouse of the Del Webb Building with views of both the Sierra Nevada and Coast Range Mountains, and the vault in the Crocker Building holds boxes of paper and broken down printers and obsolete fax machines instead of bundled and stacked legal tender.

As to the library occupying the former Cedar Drugs?  As far as I’m concerned you could put a library in ever other building from one end of town to the other and I’d be okay with it.  If I ever lose a toe part from another foot, left or right, there are other drugstores where I can get prescriptions.  As to the every seeing that 100-pack of cars?  Not so much.