Posterity

I was following the WordPress breadcrumb trail tonight and smiling at my own words as the Wee Banshee wound down to an odd selection of Russian preschool videos and a collection of computer animations breaking down the space shuttle and the International Space Station. Smiling in remembrance of the events and people which constitute my own personal history, my ability to effectively chronicle those memories for others, and what the unknown reader was concluding from the trio of stories they found interesting.

(Yes, I do this regularly… it is fascinating to rediscover my own observations vicariously and serves to remind me to continue writing.)

There is one rabbit hole I often find myself exploring – how much quantifiable data the human brain can hold. With this, there is the challenge of differentiating between sensory recollections, physical muscle memory, and the nebulous construct of the direct experiences of the individual.

There seems to be no definite answer to the latter – we have theory, yet no hard fact:

…neurons combine so that each one helps with many memories at a time, exponentially increasing the brain’s memory storage capacity to something closer to around 2.5 petabytes (or a million gigabytes)

Paul Reber, “What Is the Memory Capacity of the Human Brain?”

There might be others, but I found myself not exploring the capacity of the human brain, but quickly losing the focus of this blog in the tangents – mind uploading, digital immortality, and 1,001 reasons why I should never be left alone with an fMRI machine…

Though we have never met in the tangible world – only through podcast and blog – Dave and I share a common goal: we record our thoughts and perspectives not for the sake of the listener or the reader, but for when our kids reach the age of reason, enlightenment, and curiosity about what made their parents tick. Perhaps it is a function of getting older and realizing that our time is a lot more finite than we once realized; there are too many stories to tell before there isn’t the ability to say anything anymore.

This realization hits home even more as the days pass and these early days of 2021 find me mourning the loss of two friends Randy on 15Jan, and Bill on 18Jan.

Both provided the instruction and brusque guidance for me during formative times in my life. With Randy, it was the countless dives we went on while I was stationed on Oahu. Though I had gotten open-water certified much later in life that I probably should have, the adventures which brought me into contact with Randy starting in 2004 was exactly what was needed to get up to speed.

“You can be certified, but not everyone can be qualified… according to me,” Randy grumbled as we passed around the obligatory bottle of Crown Royal after establishing our weekend campsite and getting the fire going. “You can lean all sorts of stuff from books, but that does not replace the experience. You can find stories of divers doing stupid shit – oh, they were ‘certified’ alright… probably by some dumbass who wasn’t worth a shit to begin with… But diving with us… Yeah, that’ll do for ‘qualified’ in my book.”

Meeting his definition meant pushing way past your own boundary between reluctance and insanity… into that strange area where you end up with stories which often bring the questions “What in the hell were we thinking?” and “Hell yeah… I did that!” to mind at the same time. Backflips with full dive gear from a 15-foot ledge… negotiating a steep and sketchy path to the upcurrent entry at Portlock, as well as on-the-fly lessons on how to time swells to climb up a staked and knotted rope on a wave-eroded wall of questionable peril… and that one time in 2009 where, upon reading the emails about what had transpired, I actually felt safer flying in Iraq.

The dangers were there; Randy was not foolish when it came to diving. Rather, the hazards – like the ocean – were factors to be respected as you enjoyed the adventure… to be right on the edge, looking over and have him nudge you before catching you with a “Haha… gotcha.” All that really mattered back then was when were “gonna quit yer yakkin’ and gear up – time to get wet!”

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“You didn’t do that 10 hour,” Bill abruptly stopped mid-stride on the flightline and uttered that simple and terse observation. If irritation could be defined in a movement, it was the way in which he spun around and headed back to the hangar. “You didn’t do the inspection right. There’s NO way. Get your damn Platoon Sergeant and see me in the TI shop.”

I turned to look at the helicopter we were headed to, confused. I had dutifully done the inspection required every ten flight hours the way one of the more “senior” crew chiefs had shown me… so what was the…

I looked at the main landing gear tires and, from two parking spots away, could see that the tire pressure was way low.

Ah… wait… that son of a… My thoughts at that moment defined much of the rest of my career – that “pencil-whipping” – or merely signing off an inspection without doing it properly was something which was never going to happen again. I had been misguided by the lazy and reassured that it was normal… and I ended up looking like a fool to this now-pissed-off Technical Inspector.

Embarrassment is such an effective tool at times… especially so early in my career and in the glowering presence of the same person I both respected and apparently irritated. Over time, I redeemed myself to both affronted parties, and it wasn’t too long ago when Bill and I met up with some other folks from the same time and place to tell stories and laugh about the great times we never noticed until after the fact.

Like Randy, Bill wasn’t one to mince words. When I was pondering relocating to Huntsville on Facebook back in early 2018, he left only two words and his phone number: “Call me.” We hadn’t spoken in almost two decades, but we picked up quickly and he proved to be one of the convincing voices: “Dude. Don’t waste your time down in Columbus. Get up here – you got a network and I will help in any way I can.”

Both Randy and Bill continue to remind me of what it took for me to get to where I am now: sitting here and writing about what I have learned with the intent of adding their own legacies to my own. We are the sum of our experiences plus the potential of our goals… but most importantly, we are the bits of each other which rub off when our lives touch.