Notes from Sick Bay - book of the day

I came home a day early, sick with a bug that's going around. Two of my team had it, it was inevitable that I was next. I stopped by Rangebuddy's as he and Tam share the job of watching over Barkley when I'm gone. RB said "you don't look so good" at which point I threw up. He gave me a warm robe and some aspirin and the next I remember, I woke up in a little bed shaped like a race car with a stuffed bear on my head. But I'd slept 10 hours and though I'm taking another day off, I feel slightly better. I've got a busy work schedule ahead, so I need to rest up. So. there's not been much action on my part at home other than surfing the net and sleeping while Barkley readjusts to my being home. My friends are busy, and the house was just too quiet, a good day for a computer or a book.

There was the usual assortment of interest. On several of the blogs lately were quizzes. I only took one of two of them but the titles made me smile. "What tree are you" (I'm not sure, but wood is good). "What does your pizza choice say about you?" (uh, I'm hungry?) or one that I still am laughing at "what are your boobie's names (Sigfried and Roy?)

But I didn't feel like surfing the net; didn't want the political, the trivial or the catty. I wanted a good, old fashioned non fiction book, and today was a good day for reading one. . "Safe Return Doubtful - The Heroic Age of Polar Exploration" by John Maxtone-Graham. Until the early 20th century, both the North and South poles remained alluring unknowns shrouded in a biting cold mystery that demanded resolution. Only a century ago, intrepid men dreamed of conquering the planet's last continent with tools unfit for purpose. For those men, heroism alone sufficed.

Being a leader is never easy. I lead a fairly large group of people, all male, including our administrative support. All are ex military, many ex special forces. I'm the lone female and the one they look to for direction. It's not always easy. It takes patience, and humor and knowing what battles are worth fighting for.

People, I have found, are vastly complex, with many facets that never show until they are placed in a certain light. We all place such a degree on face judgements, on quick assumptions of a persons character, but you really have to spend time with a person, to see what they are made of. You can't rely on what you hear, only what you see for yourself.

I flew with this older fellow years ago in early Squirrel days that at best could be described as "gruff". He could be judgemental, critical, and opinionated. He was also extremely straight laced, didn't smoke or drink or swear. If someone said a curse word in front of him, look out. A lot of people couldn't bear to crew with him.

We were both qualified as Command Pilot on the plane so when we did fly together we would swap seats, to keep currency in both. But he had a hard time being Second in Command when it was my leg as pilot. So added to the gruffness, he would be "instructing" me constantly when it was my turn to be Pilot in Command, even though I outgunned and outranked him. There's a lot of things I can't do well, golf, sing, accessorize, but what I could do was fly this jet and I didn't need any instructing. It was starting to get on my last nerve.

Yet, this fellow had the sweetest wife and little girls at home, all of whom adored him. There had to be something there under the surface we all just didn't see, so I tried to be patient with him and get along.

One day, we'd been in the cockpit about 14 hours, we were exhausted, we were thirsty, flying over a land where people liked to occassionally shoot at us and I was starting to get a little testy. He started in with his opinion on how I should fly the landing approach with "well if you do this. . ." and I just looked at him, over there in the copilots seat, and said "Look Captain, I'm fucking this goat, you just hold the head."

He started laughing so hard he had tears rolling down his face. He couldn't speak for several minutes, as he was laughing so hard. This man had never heard me utter a four letter word in all our time together. I might as well have hit him with a hammer. But he quit questioning me, and still laughing, we finished the mission and remained friends until he retired.

So in reading this book, about leadership and courage pushed to the limits in the worst of conditions, those things that haunt the edges of almost understanding, I thought hard about coping with such adventures. I've been there, but not even close to this level on my worst of days.

The author really does a fine job in exploring the fraternity that experienced not only heartbreaking defeat, but even death, those that have gone to the absolute edge of no return, and had the choice to either continue, to find the land they sought, or hurtle over the world's roaring limit. It was a land of little mercy. Salomon Andree and his Arctic balloon vanished, Ernest Shackleton called it quits only ninety-seven miles from the elusive south pole, and his countryman Captain Robert F. Scott succeeded, only to cruelly perish retuning to base. Yet, with his death pending, Captain Scott wrote these words. "We are weak, writing is difficult but for my own sake I do not regret this journey, which has shown that Englishmen can endure hardships, help one another, and meet death with as great a fortitude as ever in the past. Had we lived, I should have had a tale to tell of the hardihood, endurance and courage of my companions which would have stirred the heart of every every man, these rough notes and our dead bodies must tell the tale. . . "


Articulate grace in the face of death. Courage to even begin the journey. Such are what drives the courageous, the visionaries. Those that earn their names know what risk is, and they elect to it anyway. They pursue, without ambivalence, one bright shining goal, be it exploration of a new land, or promotion of an ideal that should be heard. Walking headlong into the swirling mist of the unknown, they serve a hidden flame and sacrifice what is theirs for what is good. Such is courage.

When Captain Robert Scott's returning Arctic party was down to three surviving men, they were hit by a final blizzard, a ceaseless, battling roar of a storm that made further travel impossible. Almost out of food, water and heat, they hunkered down in hopes of an impossible rescue. When there was no heat left, only some mentholated spirits, Captain Scott devised a makeshift lamp with a small piece of lamp wick, so that in dim light he could continue to write. There was no food left, or water, and he was holding on for the sake of his men. He made one final entry and tucked his diary into a small green canvas pouch, and gently nestled it underneath his head as he lay down to sleep that long dark sleep of yesterday's omission and regrets, the tent answering only to the howling wind.

His last scribed words - "Final Entry. For God's sake, look after our people."


We are but one act of nature, one mistake of man, from being in such a place. Where, by some failure of eye or hand, or the involuntary flick of the atmosphere, or simply geography, we are faced with death. There by fate or human action as remote to indictment as judgment, suddenly too close and too late, you are there. Rushing towards that final crescendo, hoping that fate and momentum won't spew you out the other side before you have one last chance to turn the wheel to get your ship and crew to safety.

I have people who rely on me, for whose well being I am bound to protect. I would only hope, that if ever faced with that sort of situation, I could show such strength. That I could stand stalwart in the hopes that they might live, inextricable from the scattered remains of courage that blow through the infinite passages we seek.