Texas – Part Four
Flying Planes, Selling Shoes, and Saving Lives
The day I took my first flying lesson, August 13, 1968, marked almost exactly four months before I would arrive at the end of my career in the Air Force. Although I had a general idea about what I wanted to do for a living after getting my discharge, I had no real plan on how to achieve it (aside from earning a pilot’s license); nor did I spend any time wondering how long it would take me to get a job in aviation. In short, I was just winging it. (No pun intended).
I was just ignorant enough to not realize that some successful people either spent years in college, or labored in low-paying apprenticeships preparing themselves for a career in their chosen field, while others hired into companies or corporations right out of high school and slowly gained the knowledge and experience that would eventually make them desirable candidates for higher level positions.
Me? I never spent a moment worrying about where I was going to end up once I got out of the service. As I said before, I had a vague idea that maybe once I earned my private pilot license I could continue my training for a commercial and instrument rating—then maybe get hired by someone, somewhere, to fly airplanes. Yeah.
Of course I could always sell shoes, right? By now I was pretty much keeping up with Eddie on commissions at the shoe store, in spite of putting in less total hours than he did. And, every day I felt more and more comfortable in my role as a debonair ladies’ shoe salesman.
Sadly, it never dawned on me that once I left the Air Force a good chunk of my monthly bring-home would disappear; even with the increase in my hours at the shoe store, my sales income would barely match what I was bringing in before my discharge.
But, ignorance is certainly bliss, because up until then I was a happy, if not tired, camper.
Had it not been for a timely and fortuitous conversation with my flight instructor one day during my flight debrief, I would’ve probably just continued to march blindly toward that proverbial cliff with no bottom, and no telling where I would’ve ended up.
We had just landed after about ninety minutes of practicing stalls, dead-reckoning navigation, and four well-executed short field approaches and landings. “Well,” Marshall said while making an entry into my flight book, “you’re really coming right along. Almost a natural, I’d say.”
“Thanks,” I answered, checking my watch to see how long I had before my return to my daily Air Force duties. “I’m really having a lot of fun—although sometimes I get a bit nervous, especially when I’m doing accelerated stalls and handling engine out procedures.”
“Really? Well, you sure don’t show it. You’re very cool under pressure and you don’t seem to lose your composure like some of my other students. You always been that calm?”
“Are you kidding me? I think I tend to fly off the handle rather easily. I don’t think I’m calm and cool at all.”
“Well, you are, and if what you say is true you hide it very well.”
“Trust me, I may look cool on the outside, but inside I’m a mass of doubts and always on the verge of sheer panic.”
“So, what are your plans?’
“Plans?”
“Yeah, you know—when you get out of the service in December. Gonna stay with the shoe store?”
“Uh…well, I guess—for a while.”
“Then what?”
“Well, I’ll probably want to continue my flight training. You know—work on my commercial, multi-engine, and instrument ratings. Stuff like that. Don’t I have to have those ratings to get a job with an airline?”
“Son, you’re gonna need a whole lot more than that. You need to have a bunch of hours as PIC (pilot-in-command) logged in before anyone’ll even consider you.”
“Oh…about…how many hours do you think?”
“I’ve got over fifteen-hundred as PIC, and twelve-hundred of those is jet time, and I don’t know if that’s gonna be enough. It’s pretty competitive, you know.”
I did a quick mental calculation and figured that I’d probably need another fourteen-hundred and ninety-seven hours to get where Marshall was. At an average of seven dollars per flying hour I’d need another $10,479, and God knows how many more years of flying. Of course, that didn’t take into consideration that I would still have to have a job that would allow me to spend that kind of money outside of normal living expenses.
“Holy cow!” was the most intelligent response I could think of right then. After returning back to my squadron, I spent the rest of the afternoon mulling over what we’d talked about and wondering whether or not I was making the right decision by getting out of the Air Force.
That evening I decided to talk over the situation with Kaz and I told her about the conversation I’d had with Marshall.
“So what are you going to do? We made all these plans and I’m working so you could learn to fly.”
“I know, but I don’t think we can afford to spend all that money for the next however many years it would take for me to get all those flying hours. And then, there’s no guarantee that I’ll be hired. But I do know one thing: I’m not going to reenlist for another four years in the Air Force. That’s for sure!”
“But you said we may not be able to live just on your shoe store salary.”
“I’ll get another goddamn job before I stay another day past my separation in the Air Force. They’ve done nothing but screw me over for the last eight years. First, they send me to Alaska for a year, and I have to leave Sharon with a six-month-old baby with another one on the way. Then, a year and a half later they send me unaccompanied for another eighteen months to Okinawa.”
“But Okinawa ended up being a good move, don’t you think?” She gave me a cute little mischievous smile and I reached over and gave her a little kiss on the forehead.
“Yes, that’s true. But I went through hell before we met. And it sure wasn’t a picnic for Sharon and the boys either. No, I’m not going to give the Air Force a chance to fuck over me again!”
“So…what we going to do then?”
“If I have to, Kaz, I’ll work two or three jobs to make ends meet.”
“Isn’t there something you can do with your Air Force training?”
“There isn’t much of a call in civilian life for a guy who stared at a radar scope for eight years.”
“Well, I think you will think of something.”
“I hope so.”
For the next few days I did little other than worry about our future. Then, while flying in after a training session for an approach to the Bergstrom Airport an idea popped into my head.
***
“Bergstrom Approach, Cherokee 8461R two miles east of the field, request enter downwind at one-thousand five hundred feet for a touch and go to runway 36 right.” I leveled the aircraft and scanned the skies for traffic.
“Cherokee 8461R, in sight and enter traffic pattern at one-thousand five hundred feet approved. Bergstrom altimeter is 2993, wind 350 degrees at ten knots, report turning crosswind.” The controller’s confidently crisp voice crackled from the speakers in the ceiling over my head.
“Cherokee 8461R, roger.”
“Don’t forget to check your altimeter and set it to the current reading.” Marshall said quietly. “Remember, when you turn final that farmer’s cornfield to the south of the runway’s just been plowed so you’ll get a bit of a thermal out of it. Keep the nose down and concentrate on your airspeed and glide ratio.”
“Got it,” I said confidently.
I entered the traffic pattern and confirmed my altimeter read 1,500 feet. I was about 150 feet high so I nudged the nose down gently and eased down to my assigned altitude.
“Cherokee 8461R, report crosswind leg,” the tower controller ordered.
“Cherokee 8461R, roger wilco.” I looked off to my right and saw the ten-thousand-plus-foot runway glistening in the hot Texas afternoon.
Marshall pointed towards the horizon and said, “OK, now remember where your imaginary point is, (referred to as a key), so you’ll start your right turn into your crosswind leg. If you turn too soon you’ll be too high to execute your turn to final. If you wait too long you’re taking up pattern airspace and the controller will probably ask you what the fuck your intentions are. That’s an ATC phrase you don’t want to hear. These guys in the tower are Air Force controllers but most of them are as sharp as the FAA controllers at the civilian towers.” I suddenly wanted to know more about these civilian controllers, but decided to wait until I was not so busy flying an airplane before asking Marshall anything else.
Once we were on the ground and had completed our post-flight briefing I decided to ask for a little more information about these civilian controllers. “So, these guys here at Bergstrom Air Force Base tower are Air Force, right?”
“Righto!”
“And the guys, say in the tower at Mueller, the downtown Austin Airport, are civilians?”
“Right again. You haven’t had a chance to work with those guys yet since we’re still just doing local Bergstrom to Bergstrom flights, but pretty soon we’ll be doing some unknown airport training—where you fly to and land at an airport you’re not familiar with, like Waco or maybe Temple, and for sure, Austin—and then you’ll be dealing with civilians at those towers. For the most part they’re pretty savvy, but they can be assholes too—especially if they sense you’re a low-time student pilot and don’t know what the fuck you’re doing.”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, they’ll throw some phraseology on you that you may not be familiar with, and when you give them a ‘say again’, or act like you don’t know what they’re asking, they’ll ream you a new one. You gotta be pretty sharp on your airport procedures and ATC (air traffic control) phraseology.”
“So, most of the civilians at those towers used to be military controllers?”
“Hmm, not all of them. I hear the transition from military to civilian controller is pretty tough, and the testing is extremely complicated, but yeah, some of them are ex-military. Why? You think you might want to try for a job there when you get out?”
“Oh no! I doubt that I’d be able to get to first base with my experience.”
“Well, you know they not only work up in the tower. There’s civilian controllers that work in RAPCONs (Radar Approach Controls), Enroute Centers, and facilities they call Flight Service Stations. If you want I can try to get you some pamphlets from the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) that detail the various jobs controllers do.”
“Sure, that would be great—if it’s not too much trouble.”
“OK, I’ll see what I can do. When I go on training missions in my F-4, I deal with all those guys since I’m IFR rated (Instrument Flight Rules). We’ll learn about them later on in your flight training. Even though you’re only going to be VFR rated (Visual Flight Rules), you’ll want to take advantage of a service that ATC Enroute Centers provide. It’s called VFR Flight Following. We’ll cover that later, but in short when you’re flying VFR from one airport to another you can dial up an Enroute Center up on the radio and ask the controller to watch you on radar and warn you of any other traffic that may be in your line of flight.”
“Wow, that’s cool!”
“Yeah well, but for now let’s just concentrate on your landings and stall procedures. We need to get you sharp enough to where I can trust you to solo the airplane. What do you think?”
“Sure. When do you think that’s gonna happen?”
“Oh, I don’t know. But when I think you’re ready you’ll be the first to know.”
For the next few days I continued with my flight training during my lunch hour at the air base and working at the shoe store in the evenings. In spite of my busy schedule, I kept thinking about what Marshall had said about the civilian controllers. By the end of the week I had made up my mind to get more information and also to discuss this with Kaz. As I sat down for a quick dinner as I was getting ready for a busy Friday evening at the shoe store I told her about my conversation with Marshall.
“But I thought you wanted to be a pilot,” she said, quizzically.
“Yes, I do. But from what Marshall tells me it’s going to be a long and expensive road. I’m thinking that maybe I should have some backup plan to carry us along after my discharge from the Air Force.”
“And you think you are qualified for a job being an air controller?”
“I don’t know. All this time I thought that to be a controller you had to have worked as one in the Air Force. But Marshall told me that while a lot of them are ex-military controllers, he knew of a few that are not.”
“How they become controllers then?”
“Well, that’s what I’m not too sure about. I think they work for the government—the Federal Aviation Administration—so maybe there’s some kind of test that you take, or something.”
“How you gonna find out?”
“I’m thinking maybe I can call the control tower at Austin Mueller Airport. They might have some information.”
“Good idea. Maybe they have number in phone book. I go get it!”
A few minutes later I found several phone numbers listed under the Austin Airport listing in the white pages. But of all of them, the one that caught my attention was the one that was listed as, “Federal Aviation Administration – Austin Mueller Tower and Approach Control”.
“Here’s a number to the tower at Austin. Let me call it and see what happens.” I told Kaz as I reached for the phone.
***
Marshall asked me to come to a full stop as I was rolling out of my fourth touch-and-go landing to the Georgetown, Texas airport. The field was uncontrolled, with no tower or air traffic control services.
I had been in the air for over an hour executing stalls, turns to headings, and unusual attitudes in N8438R, a green and white Cherokee 140. As I applied brakes and stopped on the runway centerline, he suddenly opened the door and stepped out onto the starboard wing.
“OK son,” he yelled over the prop wash, “I want you to take this baby up and shoot me three more touch-and-go approaches. When you’re done with the third one, don’t forget to stop right here to pick me back up ‘cause I don’t feel like walking back to Bergstrom.”
“You want me to do those by myself?” I asked, my heart suddenly jumping into my throat.
“Yup! You’ll notice that take-off speed will come much sooner once my fat ass is out of the plane, so don’t let it shock you. Just do what you know how to do. Now hurry up, it’s fucking chilly out here.”
With that, he slammed the door shut, motioning me to activate the lock, and jumped off the wing and on to the runway. He trotted over to the sloping grass hugging the narrow asphalt strip and vigorously waved his arms urging me to turn the airplane around and taxi to the end of the runway in preparation for take-off.
I took a deep breath and pushed the throttle in while introducing full left rudder. The little plane responded gingerly and in a few seconds, I was headed in the opposite direction to the end of the five-thousand-foot strip. Reaching the marked over-run area, I reduced throttle and again carefully turned the aircraft around one hundred and eighty degrees. I looked down the runway and was barely able to pick Marshall out as he stood in the grass.
Giving myself a few seconds to calm down, I lowered the flaps to fifteen degrees and slowly brought the engine up to take-off RPM. Releasing the brakes with my toes the plane seemed to leap forward with a burst of energy that I had not experienced before. Easing in a few inches of right rudder to counteract the craft’s natural tendency to pull left of runway centerline, I began my takeoff roll. As promised, I glanced at the airspeed indicator and noticed that I had reached takeoff speed sooner than anticipated. I eased the yoke gently back an inch or so, and the little Cherokee all but leaped off the runway.
The altimeter needle was passing through a hundred feet as I saw Marshall out of the corner of my eye waving wildly. I sincerely hoped that he was waving at me ecstatically because I had actually gotten off the ground successfully, and not because I was on fire.
I leveled off at pattern altitude, retracted the flaps, and turned crosswind setting the airplane up for a left-hand pattern approach. After executing three successful touch-and-go landings, I came to a full stop and taxied confidently back to retrieve Marshall.
“Holy shit, Frank! You did it! Those landings were flawless—Christ almighty!!” He literally jumped in, strapping on his shoulder harness and slamming and locking the door. “Let’s do three or four more just to see if you weren’t just being lucky!”
When we finally landed back at Bergstrom that afternoon, I had completed a total of ten takeoffs and landings. It was Tuesday, September 10th, 1968—and it was the seventh flight I had ever taken. I had managed to solo less than a month after my first flight, and after logging a grand total of 5.9 hours of flight time.
When we walked into the flight office, Marshall chopped a piece off the back of my fatigue uniform shirt and presented me with it and my solo certificate. There were five or six other students and instructors there and had it not be necessary for me to return to duty for the rest of the day, I would’ve had a glass of the champagne that was being poured all around.
***
My days and evenings at the shoe store were beginning to take their toll. My days—Monday through Friday—consisted of my waking up at 6AM and reporting to my squadron at 7:30AM. Unless we were on mobile deployment, I would spend the morning running my ten-man crew through countless mind-numbing set-up drills, or walking around our buildings checking for discarded cigarette butts or trash in general. We still took our generous breaks, but the trips to the cafeteria were also beginning to get monotonous, and I often found myself dozing off at the table while nursing a cup of caffeine-rich black coffee. When I was scheduled to fly during my two-hour lunch I tried to use my break-times to mentally review my flight procedures, as I’d been told by my supervisor that I couldn’t read my flight manuals during duty time. By the time I got to the shoe store at 5PM, I was almost completely exhausted—having already put in a full day at the base plus at least one stressful flying hour during my lunch.
Because I was expected to stay completely occupied while at the shoe store when I wasn’t on the floor selling shoes, I was in the back taking inventory or in the display window re-arranging the shoes. The only time we were allowed to be off our feet was during the oft-interrupted twenty minutes we were given to gulp down our lunch.
Although the store closed at 9PM, but I usually didn’t make it out to my car any earlier than 10PM. Once the doors were locked we had to clean the floor of all the shoe boxes that had been left open—some with only one shoe, others completely empty—and restock them back in the stock room. Then, while the cashiers were tallying up the day’s sales we were expected to tidy up and rearrange the in-store shoe displays, restock the purse poles, straighten up the customer seating area, and finally vacuum the floors. All this was done while still wearing a suit, tie, and dress shoes.
Our apartment was only a couple of minutes away, and by the time I got home Kaz was usually already in bed—also exhausted from putting in a twelve-hour day at the department store’s buffet line. After a hot shower I all but collapsed into our bed and usually fell into a deep and mostly dreamless sleep. The worst sound in the world was the alarm clock shocking me out of bed at 6AM.
Although I worked at the shoe store all day both Saturdays and Sundays (10AM until 8PM), I was able to sleep until 9AM. It doesn’t sound like much of a bonus but I eagerly looked forward to my weekends just to be able to sleep in.
One Saturday morning in late November I had gotten up a little earlier than usual because Kaz had been asked to work as cashier and I had to drive her up to the store. That week, what is described as a “blue norther” in Texas, had descended on Austin, and temperatures had dipped into the low twenties. That particular morning seemed extra cold—the sky bleak and gray, and the north wind swirling madly around the large swimming pool in the center of the complex.
Since our apartments were for adults only, when I got back from dropping Kaz off at work, I was surprised to see a small child, maybe three or four years old, riding a trike around the concrete walkways surrounding the pool. Because I had just thrown my dress overcoat over my pajamas when I drove Kaz up to the mall, I hurried back into my cozy apartment not paying a whole lot of attention to the little kid.
While in the shower I wondered which of my neighbors had dared break the “No Kids” rule so strictly enforced by our Nazi-like apartment manager. For sure she was probably already going through the residents’ listing to figure out who would be most likely to have allowed a small grandchild or nephew to spend the night at our complex.
After donning a newly dry-cleaned suit, I slipped into my brand new Johnston-Murphy cordovan wingtip shoes. Eddie had convinced me that no shoe salesman worth his salt (especially a wildly successful one) would ever be taken seriously if he didn’t own at least one pair of Johnston-Murphy shoes. Paired with a nice pin-stripe, Brooks Brothers single breast wool-blend suit, you could almost guarantee yourself a ten-percent boost in sales just for looking snappy.
I popped a couple of slices of bread into the toaster and filled a mug with the last of the coffee Kaz had brewed prior to leaving. As I waited for the toaster I walked into the living room with my cup and drew the curtains slightly to see if any snow was coming down. No snow, but I did notice the little kid on his trike precariously close to the pool. Sitting there, little red sneakers resting on the pedals and dressed in an overstuffed blue parka and khaki pants, he seemed to be mesmerized by the ripples the stiff wind was creating on the surface of the water in the pool.
Glancing over to the apartment manager’s door, I wondered why she wasn’t out there asking the kid who he belonged to. By now she should have already come bursting out of her door, her kinky gray-streaked permed hair mashed down under the olive-green safari hat she favored in cold weather, yelling for the kid to back away from the pool.
The toaster popped and I walked back into the kitchen to butter it up and wash it down with the last dregs of my coffee. After rinsing my mug and placing it in the dishwasher I threw my navy-blue top coat over my shoulders and gave the apartment one last look.
Pulling and locking the door behind me I lowered my head into the wind and began the short brisk walk out into the parking lot. I had gone about ten feet when the gentle and almost unperceivable sound of splashing water reached my ears. I stopped dead in my tracks.
Without looking back I waited to see if there were any further sounds of splashing water.
Nothing.
I took another step or two, after which curiosity got the better of me.
I turned around slowly and saw the red trike still sitting by the side of the pool. The kid was not on it and the handlebars were skewed to one side. I looked over to the pool and saw what I was hoping not to see: The kid was in the water.
The down-filled parka he was wearing was acting somewhat like a life preserver, allowing the kid’s head and shoulders to remain above the water. He was bobbing up and down like a cork—slowly drifting to the center of the pool’s deep end.
Looking around, panic beginning to swell in my chest, I was hoping to see someone but saw absolutely nothing. The kid and I were the only ones within the confines of our apartment complex and its pool. Focusing back, I saw that the kid was thrashing his feet ferociously in an instinctive effort to stay afloat. It wasn’t working; and he was sinking slowly—the water now touching his chin. His eyes were locked on me—opened wide and pleading. I looked around in all directions silently praying that someone besides me was seeing what was happening. No one.
Finally deciding that there was nothing else to do but try to pull him out of the pool, I began to run. As I reached the edge of the deep end I realized that his wildly kicking legs had taken him to the farthest point of the deep water. He was too far for me to reach out with my arms, and without a ten-foot pole there was no way I could reach him. I hurriedly shrugged off my heavy wool topcoat and reached down to pull my shoes off. My right shoe pulled off easily as I grasped it by the heel while balancing on my left foot, but when I switched over to my left shoe it didn’t come off quite as effortlessly. Realizing that the kid would be taking mouthfuls of water any second now I jerked violently at the stubborn shoe. It came off, but because of the force I had to use, instead of dropping to the ground, it instead flew up into the air landing about ten feet away from me and into the pool’s frigid water. I watched dumbfounded as it sunk a couple of feet before it rose to float merrily on the surface of the freezing water.
The water was now over the kid’s chin and he was forced to throw his head back to keep his mouth from filling with water.
I fumbled to unbutton my jacket, but because of the cold my fingers just couldn’t grasp the small button. I pulled hard on the lower half of the jacket and saw the button fly off and join my left shoe in the water. It sank slowly to the bottom as my jacket dropped to the concrete.
Reaching the knot on my tie I saw the kid’s head go under. No time for the tie.
Without further thought I leaped feet first into the pool.
As I sunk down into the water I felt as if the soul had left my body. Instantly, every muscle in my body seemed to want to lock up and my heart felt as if it had completely stopped. I blinked to clear the air bubbles clinging to my eyes and tried to focus so I could find the kid. My feet touched the bottom of the ten-foot pool.
Seeing the kid, I willed my legs to kick so I could close the distance between us. He was still kicking wildly and I saw one of his red sneakers drifting to the bottom. Because of the weight of my pants and shirt I was barely able to break to surface. I saw that I was still about four or five feet away from him so I began to kick my feet to try to close the gap between us. It was excruciatingly painful as my knees and hips insisted on trying to lock up, but with some effort I finally got within an arm’s reach.
As I reached out for him he suddenly sunk. I stopped pedaling and I sunk with him. Because I was heavier I sunk faster and found myself directly under him. Reaching out with an almost dead arm I grabbed the kid’s bottom to stop his gradual descent. Instinctively, he stopped kicking.
Gathering the strength that the cold water had not yet sapped from my body, I pushed up—hoping that the effort would push the kid’s head up out of the water. I looked up and saw that my efforts had taken both of us up to the surface. My face broke out of the water and I saw that the kid’s mouth as it was in the process of sucking air.
I let loose of his bottom and grabbed a handful of blue parka. I rolled over to my left side and pulled him up and on top of me with my right arm—my right, weakly trying to side paddle to the edge of the pool. It took a supreme effort to keep the kid on top of me and his head above the water.
After what seemed an abnormally long time, my left hand hit the concrete side of the pool. I put a death grip on the small gutter under the lip of the edge and pulled us in. Because I was losing strength quickly, I concentrated on pulling the kid to the concrete edge of the pool, hoping he’d grip it and hold himself up. But I soon realized that he had lost all muscle control and his body was almost total dead weight.
With a final gigantic effort, I hung on to the edge with my left hand and arm and swung the kid up and over my head. He landed with a wet squish on the rough surface of the pool’s concrete edge and rolled slowly over.
On his side, still slightly paralyzed by the extreme cold, he turned his head and looked at me with his little bloodshot eyes. I tried to tell him he was okay, but all my now trembling jaw would allow me to say was, “You…K.”
Knowing he was now out of danger I began to concentrate on trying to pull myself out of the pool. As I tried to bring my legs up to swing them over the side I realized that they had both cramped up and would not cooperate with any command I gave them. I then tried to move my arms up and out, but found that they too were quickly going numb. I was still in ten feet of water, clinging helplessly to the edge and try as I might, I could not pull myself up and out.
All feeling, from my neck down was swiftly disappearing—replaced by a feeling of damp warmth. I needed to get out of this water but knew I was quickly losing the ability to do so. Any longer and the strength in my arms would leave and I would slip soundlessly into the freezing depth.
I made another gigantic effort, and slid my left arm away from my body while still gripping the small gutter with my stiffening fingers. I concentrated all my strength on my left hand’s fingers, hoping they were tightening up on the lip of the gutter. With another painful effort, I began to pull my body to the left—sliding along the side of the pool, in the direction of the shallow water.
After about three or four pulls I began to feel the smooth tile bottom touch my feet. I was making slow but steady progress. Suddenly, I thought I heard the sound of a door opening.
I twisted my head to the right and strained to look over the edge toward the doors of the apartments facing the pool. Sure enough, one of them was open and an elderly lady, who I recognized as one of our resident tenants, was coming out. She was wearing a white chenille duster and furry aqua slippers. I called out and made some sort of gurgling sound while waving weakly with my left arm.
To my horror, she completely ignored me—instead, running awkwardly in the direction of the kid with one arm extended while trying to keep the front of her duster closed with the other. While I watched, she scooped up the child with her free arm, and without a word spun around and ran clumsily back toward her apartment’s still open door.
Just as she got to the door she stopped, turned, and looked directly at me. I waved again weakly, imploring her with my eyes to return and help me out. After four or five seconds, she turned, entered the apartment and slammed the door.
Too cold and weak to spend precious energy wondering why she did what she did, I instead returned to my efforts to try to reach shallow water.
Painfully and slowly pulling myself along the side of the pool I was finally able to stand on my feet, keeping my head above the surface of the water, and painfully plotted toward the semi-circular steps at the end of the pool. Reaching them, I found that I no longer had the strength to raise or bend my knees enough to bring my feet up, so I semi-collapsed and crawled up each step.
Finally, I was out of the water and I rolled over and lay on my back on the cold concrete. My body felt like it was covered in an invisible and very heavy blanket of warm air. Knowing I needed to get back into my apartment I made yet another supreme effort and got on my knees. From there I crawled in the direction of my door. Several times I tried to get back on my feet but my legs did not want to support my body and once I tried to get upright a wave of dizziness washed over my head.
When I reached my door, I lay by it for a few minutes trying to will the strength to reach into my pocket for my keys. After a while I retrieved my keys and reached up to insert the door key into the lock. It slipped in easily enough, but then I realized that my fingers had cramped so that I was unable to hold the key tight enough to turn the lock.
Leaving the key in the lock, I brought my right hand down to my mouth and tried to blow whatever warm air I still had in my body onto it. While doing this I tried to flex my fingers to get them to move. It was insanely difficult to do so, and once they began to move I experienced intense pain in the joints of my fingers.
After what seemed to be hours, I was able to hold the key tight enough and I heard the lock release.
I pushed the door open and dragged myself in. I pushed the door closed with one of my feet and lay on the carpet completely exhausted. The heat was still on in the apartment and soon feeling began to seep back into my body. It was then I felt my cold clammy shirt stinging my skin and my soaked wool pants clinging icily to my legs. I needed to get out of my clothes.
After pulling my tie off, I found that I was unable to feel the buttons on my shirt with enough strength to slip them through their respective holes. I reached down, pulled my shirt up out of my pants, and gripped the bottom with both hand. With another concentrated effort, I pulled the shirt in opposite directions with each hand and ripped the buttons clean off. I was now able to pull it over my shoulders.
I was beginning to warm up sufficiently enough to where some of my muscle strength was returning so I sat up and ripped the sleeve cuffs off my arms. The effort made me a little dizzy and nauseous but soon I found that by supporting myself on the table lamp by the door I was able to get up on my feet. With an unsteady gait and by shuffling my feet, I was able to navigate myself in the direction of the bathroom.
Kneeling by the tub I knew that I needed to get some warmth back into my body so I reached over and gripped the chrome faucet. I knew that the water that started pouring out was probably cold, but to my near frozen hands it felt insanely warm.
I pushed the stopper lever and watched the tub begin to fill. I adjusted the temperature of the water to what I thought should be warm but it felt painfully hot. I knew I had to somehow force myself into what felt like blisteringly hot water.
Supporting myself by gripping the hand basin I got up and removed the rest of my clothes. Carefully I climbed into the tub, and before I was able to sit in the water experienced excruciating painful cramps in the calf and thigh muscles of both legs. As the warm water rose over my tortured legs the cramps began to subside.
I spent about thirty minutes in the tub, occasionally replacing the lukewarm water some that felt much hotter. The cramps disappeared and I began to feel normal.
It was time to get out, dry myself off, and call work.
“Good morning, Baker’s Shoes, how may I help you?” It was the head cashier—a heavy dark-skinned girl named Olivia.
“Yes—hey it’s Frank. Is Mr. Sims around?”
“Yeah, he’s here—and he’s been wondering where you are. Wanna talk to him?”
“Yes, please.”
I heard Olivia tell Mr. Sims that it was Frank calling.
“Frank? Where are you? You need to be here now! We need to sell, sell, sell!”
“Mr. Sims, I may have to take the day off. I…I…well, I just got out of the apartment pool. A little kid fell in as I was leaving for work and I had to dive in and get him out.”
“…Uh…well that’s unfortunate now, isn’t it?”
“Yes sir. I’ll be in tomorrow.”
“No Frank! You’ll be in as soon as you dry off and get dressed. Won’t you?”
“Mr. Sims…did you hear what I said? I’ve been in freezing water and I’m chilled to the bone. I just got out of a hot tub but I’m still having chills. I need the day off.”
“Hmmm. Well son, I don’t think you do. If what you say is true and the boy that you pulled out of the pool is OK, then there’s no further reason for you to stay home. Stand by the heater, drink a hot cup of cocoa, and get in here. It’s going to be a busy day and we need to make some money.”
“Well, I…”
“There’s no ‘well’ about it!” I could hear him snapping his fingers. “Unless you’re on your way to the hospital you’ll be here as soon as you can.”
I could see that there was no way for me to talk my way into a day off. I was getting angry but knew that if I kept talking to him I was going to end up telling him to go fuck himself and I’d tell him I was going to quit. And, if I did that then for sure there would be no money for me to continue my flying lessons.
“Uh…OK. But I ruined my suit so I’ll have to go to the laundry and get the one that’s there out to wear.”
“Yes, that’s the spirit. Tell you what: to hurry you along I’ll send Eddie to get your suit and he’ll drive it over to your apartment. That way we’ll cut your time in half. I’ll tell the dry cleaners that you’ll be sure to pay them when you take your lunch. How’s that?”
“Fine, I’ll be in as soon as Eddie gets here with my suit.”
“Wonderful! By the way, how old was the kid?
“I don’t know…maybe three or four”
“Hmm…don’t you live in an adult only residence?”
“Yes.”
“But there was a kid there that for some reason decided go swimming in freezing weather. Hmm, that’s curious, isn’t it?”
“You sound like you don’t believe me.”
“What I believe and what I don’t believe is not important here. What is important though is that you need to be in here selling. See you soon.” And the line went dead.
***
Despite several attempts to contact the people whose grandchild, or nephew, almost caused us both to drown, no one ever answered the door. Since I was rarely home during the day, whenever I’d come knocking in the late evening the shades remained drawn and the lights off.
I eventually resorted to writing a letter in which I threatened to sue, and had it hand-delivered by the apartment manager. After about two months I came home one evening to find an envelope in the door with one-hundred and eighty-five dollars inside. This was the amount that I had referenced in my letter that I was demanding to get my ruined suit and shoes replaced.
I never saw the kid again.
***
When I called the air traffic control tower at the Austin Airport and inquired about a job, I was told that all hiring for jobs in the ATC field was done by the Federal Aviation Administration. The lady to whom I spoke gave me a number to the Civil Service Commission in Austin and said I’d have to ask them about hiring since she had no idea what the procedure was.
I wrote the number down and since it was already late Friday afternoon I decided to make the call on Monday. As it turned out, that call ended up being the most important and pivotal phone call of my life.
To be continued…
