It was dusk turning to dark on July 4th, 1976 and Washington DC’s Bicentennial fireworks would start at any moment. Cathy and I were stuck in traffic on the 14th Street Bridge over the Potomac. It looked like we were not going to make it in time.

I’d travelled to DC from West Point a couple of days earlier to visit Cathy for the big Bicentennial weekend. Events were going on all across the country, and our nation’s Capitol was having one of the biggest firework celebrations. We didn’t plan to miss it.

July Fourth dawned, and it was a beautiful day. We hung around Cathy’s, as we did not want to arrive downtown too early. There was a protest that morning, and a parade later in the day, and we planned to avoid both. Instead, we had a picnic at Cath’s with grilled steaks, and some of her world famous potato salad. Finally, we decided to drive to DC from her place in Alexandria.

Being young (and maybe foolish), I hadn’t realized how heavy the traffic was going to be in a pre-metro DC. The traffic was at a crawl as soon as we left Cathy’s apartment complex. We joined the throng, and slowly made our way towards DC. Time passed. More time passed. Finally we approached the Potomac River and everything came to a standstill. We were stuck in traffic on the 14th Street Bridge, and dusk was turning to dark. Suddenly, the first fireworks went off. What should we do? We obviously weren’t going to make it.

A car ahead of us made the first move, but soon there were several of us doing the same thing. We pulled out of the traffic and onto the median of the bridge and parked. We’d watch the fireworks from the bridge itself. It turned out to be a great vantage point to watch the unbelievable show taking place in DC. The Jefferson Memorial was in the foreground, with the Washington Monument behind it. I’ve since read that DC set off over 30 tons of fireworks that night and there were a million people in attendance. The display lasted a long time and was worth the drive to get there.

As great as they were, the fireworks weren’t the highlight of the night for me, or for Cathy. That was still to come.

The fireworks ended. We jumped in the car, did a quick u-turn and drove back towards Cathy’s apartment ahead of the traffic exiting DC. On the way, we decided to stop in Old-Town Alexandria and party some more. We tried to get into one of our favorite places, The Fish Market, but it was wall-to-wall people. As we were standing on King Street, we heard music coming from an upstairs bar across the cobblestone street and made our way to the entrance. We climbed the stair, and literally as we were opening the door to the bar, we heard –

“Good morning, America How are you?

Say don’t you know me? I’m your native son.

I’m the train they call the city of New Orleans

And I’ll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done”

Arlo Guthrie had recorded the song “City of New Orleans” in ‘72 and everyone knew the words. Or at least everyone in the bar did, and we all joined right in. There were probably 70 or 80 people, all singing along. We may not have been in perfect harmony, but we made up for it with volume and enthusiasm. When the song ended, there was a huge amount of cheering, clapping and hugging, and people calling out Happy Birthday to America. Cathy and I both remember the utter joy in the bar that night more than anything else about the Fourth of July that year. Everybody truly was celebrating the 200th birthday of our country. It was amazing.

I’ve been thinking about that evening in 1976 as our Independence Day celebration approaches this year. The country went through a rough patch in the early 1970s leading up to our 200th birthday. Vietnam, anti war protests, Kent State, Nixon and Watergate, race issues, the assassination attempts on Ford, and multiple drug overdoses, including Hendrix, Joplin and Morrison, to name just a few of the issues of the day. And yet, to me on that Fourth of July, it felt like we were all in one boat pulling together. We weren’t Republicans or Democrats, liberals or conservatives, young or old, black or white. We were just Americans, and it seemed our differences were set aside, at least for that night.

Which brings me back to this year’s Fourth of July. It appears we are less united now and I sometimes wonder if we can bridge our differences any more. We have a seventeen year war, a drug crisis, race issues, and politicians, some more than others, who divides us. Hatred grows. I know we have gone through similar periods in our nation’s history, but online media accelerates and exasperates the situation. I try and think what the future might hold for this great country of ours, and the answer isn’t always clear.

Good morning, America how are you?

We had the good fortune of being invited to our neighbors for a dinner of steamed crabs last night. Not just any crabs, but Maryland Blue Crabs that were in our cove yesterday morning.

I love crab and Maryland is a great place to get it. There’s wonderful crab all across the country, whether the North Carolina coast, Gulf crab in Louisiana, or Dungeness crab out in California. But there’s something special about crab that comes out of the Chesapeake. It’s a little sweeter, I think.

We’ve been on the Eastern Shore for the past week celebrating our anniversary. During this time, I’ve made crab cakes at home twice, and had a soft shell sandwich at lunch one day. I suppose I may be a little obsessive about it, but when the crab is so fresh and local, it’s hard not to be.

Our neighbor had a trot line out in the cove yesterday morning and he and another friend gathered a bushel of crabs in about three hours. Later that day, they invited Cathy and I over for steamed crabs last night.

Steamed crabs, are wonderful in a restaurant, but having them in your neighbors backyard with friends is something else. I think the best part is the communal nature of picking and eating fresh crabs. It’s a time commitment. You don’t work your way through a bushel very quickly. I think most people get a little tired of the work involved, before they actually get full of crab.

Last night, we gathered at our friend’s home and had a couple of beers while the crabs were steaming. The butcher paper was already on the picnic table. As he finished cooking the crabs, Jim dumped the first load from the pot straight onto the table. While he reloaded the steamer with the back half of the bushel, the rest of us started eating. They were oh so good. The conversation fell off a bit, but it didn’t stop as we were picking. A while later, the second load was also dumped on the table and we soldiered on, although perhaps slowing a bit. Finally, as it neared dusk, we finished up. The tables were cleaned and we adjourned to the porch for another drink or two and more conversation.

Cath and I finally left and walked home in the dark. It was a great evening of food and friendship. Jim gave me a small going away present as we left – six or seven leftover crabs. I’ll pick them later today, and with a bit of luck we will have enough crab meat for a couple more cakes. Life on the Chesapeake is pretty good.

________________

** The title of this blog was borrowed from Mary Chapin Carpenter’s song “Down in Mary’s Land” .  Give it a listen if you haven’t heard it before – I think you will like it.

Forty years… it sounds more like a prison sentence than it does a wedding anniversary. “That’s right Max and Cathy, your sentence is 40 years to life”. Forty Years… That’s how long Cathy and I will be married on Saturday, June 16th.

It’s not so hard to look at Cathy’s face now and see the sixteen year old girl I started dating in 1972. We were so young. It didn’t feel like we were young at the time, but looking back, my God. All of that future together, and we didn’t yet realize it. Maybe we started to sense it when I left for West Point. I still have the letter she handed me that day, making me promise not to open it until I was in the car and on my way east –

“……Next year is going to be hard on us, but I have a strong feeling that we’ll make it….when it starts getting hard or you feel down, or something goes wrong just remember that I love you….”

She was talking abut my first year at West Point, but the words turned out to be a covenant for our next four plus decades together.

We’ve had mostly good times over the past forty years, but we’ve also had our share of challenges and hard times. There has been “better and worse, richer and poorer, and sickness and health”. In times of trouble, Cathy has been my rock and my strength. We’ve dealt with illnesses, separations due to military deployments, family deaths, tough times at work, people telling us what a marriage should look like, and any number of other challenges both big and small. We needed to learn how to make our marriage work through all of that and we did.

Over the past few years, as we’ve achieved “senior marriage status”, folks have asked me “What’s the secret? How do you make marriage a success?” I’m usually a bit dumbstruck by the question, because I don’t know the answer. Having said that, there are two things I do know. First, marriage takes constant work. Second, you have to figure out what will make your marriage a success. Not what makes generic marriage a success, or what will make someone else’s marriage a success, or your friend’s marriage a success, but what will make your marriage a success. It may be something quite different from what works for other couples. You have to decide what is best for you two, and I don’t think anyone else can tell you that.

When anniversaries happen, it’s easy to look to the past and remember the good times you’ve had. On this anniversary, what I’m really excited about is our future together, and what new promises, joys and challenges await us. I know there will be family, old and new friends, adventures, challenges, and yes, heartache and sadness. Our future together starts tomorrow, and I can’t wait to continue this wonderful partnership.

I love you honey…..

Our fortieth wedding anniversary is coming up, and that started my thinking about the taxi that interrupted our very first anniversary. It was June of 1979. Cathy and I were stationed in Germany and living in the small town of Helmstadt. The night of our anniversary, we were sitting outside on the patio drinking Sekt (German champagne) and celebrating the one year mark. I planned to put some steaks on the grill, and we had a fun night planned.

While talking, we saw a cream colored taxi coming up the hill. Hmmm we thought, one of our neighbors must have some rich visitors arriving – the nearest city with taxi service was Würzburg, and that was fifteen miles away. The taxi kept coming and turned onto our street. Wow – a local neighbor. And then it stopped in front of our house. What!?! The back door of the taxi opened and out stepped my sister Roberta and her friend Debbie.

Roberta and Debbie had stayed with us earlier in the month, but now, they were suppose to be on a Eurail pass (a train pass for all of Europe), somewhere in Austria, or France, or Italy. Yet, here they were. Hugs all around and what the hell is going on?

Well, their travels had started out great. Eventually, they made it to Rome, where besides getting pinched, they met the mysterious Giorgio who was quite nice and showed them some of the sites. After spending a few days in Rome, they left town on the train, and were promptly robbed. In fact everyone in their train car was robbed. Roberta and Debbie lost all of their cash AND their passports. What to do?! They left the train at the next station, and then boarded a train back to Rome, where they planned to go to the embassy for new passports.

Arriving in Rome, they realized they had no money. Interestingly, they still had Giorgio’s business card and a few lire in change. They called Giorgio and miraculously, he picked up the phone. No problemo….he would be happy to help. He arrived at the train station, picked them up, and checked them into a hotel not far from his home. For the next couple of days, he squired them around to the embassy for passports, American Express to pick up money being wired in by parents, and several other local sites. One day they were sitting at a small cafe and he bought them cappuccinos. In the America of 1979, pre-Starbucks, nobody knew what a cappuccino was. As they sipped their coffees, Roberta asked him “Who are those guys that are always with you? Can’t you get rid of them?” His answer – “Those are my bodyguards. They go with me everywhere.”

Eventually, they received their new passports and the additional money. Rather than travel around anymore, they decided to return to our house. They said farewell to Giorgio, and took the train north. In Wurzburg, they obtained a taxi at the train station, and make their way to our home.

Now this was an incredibly interesting story, but IT WAS our one year anniversary. We had Sekt for two, steaks for two, dessert for two, and….well you get the idea. So, after chatting a bit more, we mentioned to them that a bier fest had started in town that day, and perhaps they would like to walk to it. They happily agreed and departed a few minutes later, while we went back to celebrating our anniversary.

The next morning over coffee and breakfast, we asked them how the bier fest was. It turned out the fest hadn’t started yet. As a matter of fact, the huge tent was empty, except for about 20 guys. The local soccer team had helped get things ready for the fest and they were now relaxing with a few biers. They saw Roberta and Debbie enter the tent and called them over. Roberta and Debbie spoke no German, and the majority of the team spoke no English. This small impediment caused no issues and they spent the next several hours together becoming the best of friends, drinking biers and eating bratwursts.

At some point in time, Debbie disappeared to take a motorbike ride with one of the soccer players. He was going to “show her the route of the next day’s Volksmarch”. While in the woods, the bike got stuck in the mud, and in order to get it unstuck, Debbie had to follow the cycle on foot until they were out of the muck. As Deb told me later “It was a little eerie to be stuck in a forest in Germany at midnight with a complete stranger. For a moment I questioned my sanity and if it would end well. Fortunately it did.” Eventually she returned, and Berta and Deb made the walk back to our home, arriving some time well after we were in bed.

Debbie and Roberta left for the States a few days later. Time passed and they both became wives, mothers, and eventually grandmothers. I laugh to myself when I think about the story and the passage of time. I know my sister and Deb are around my age, but I can still see them as the young women who met Giorgio in Italy and the soccer team in Helmstadt. We should all know how to have such fun.

The NFL certainly has the right as a business to do what it wants in administering it’s business. Personally, I have mixed feelings on players kneeling during the Star Spangled Banner. It’s something I would never do, and I’m not sure it helps the cause(s) they are advocating. But, I do believe they have the right to do so. And of course, people have the right to watch, or not watch NFL games.

I think it’s interesting to see what the Supreme Court said in 1943, while our country was in the middle of WWII. The Court held, in a 6-to-3 decision, that it was unconstitutional for public schools to compel students to salute the flag. The Court wrote that any “compulsory unification of opinion” was doomed to failure and was antithetical to the values set forth in the First Amendment. The Court stated:

“To believe that patriotism will not flourish if patriotic ceremonies are voluntary and spontaneous instead of a compulsory routine is to make an unflattering estimate of the appeal of our institutions to free minds. We can have intellectual individualism and the rich cultural diversities that we owe to exceptional minds only at the price of occasional eccentricity and abnormal attitudes. When they are so harmless to others or to the State as those we deal with here, the price is not too great. But freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order.

If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein. If there are any circumstances which permit an exception, they do not now occur to us.

The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One’s right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections.”

The Supreme Court announced its decision on June 14, Flag Day.

I was cleaning out the truck, when I came across this gem – a cassette tape labeled “Party – Slow Mix”. I had an instant flashback to New Year’s Eve, 1987.

At the time, I was a Captain in the Army and we were on our second tour in Germany. We lived on the economy in the small town of Rheindurkheim, just outside of Worms. In December of ‘87 we decided to have a New Year’s Eve party that year and started getting ready.

One of my jobs in “party prep” was to make some music tapes. We had started converting our music library to CDs, but also still had albums and cassette tapes. The problem was, if you wanted to mix your music up for a party, you had to make tapes. Making a mixed CD wasn’t yet possible, and no one had even heard of downloading music, or having your own private station on iHeart Radio or Spotify. That was still a decade or two in the future.

I made four ninety-minute cassette tapes of “Party Music”. I tried to keep it at five or six loud/fast songs to one slow song for a mix, with the tapes planned for later in the evening changing the mix to a bit more slow music. Four tapes would get me from 8:00PM to about 2:00AM. Then I decided to make one more tape – the “Party- Slow Mix” tape. By 2:00AM, most folk would be gone, and we could just have some mellow stuff to listen to.

The night of the party came and we had a great time. German friends, local American military friends, out of town friends who were crashing at our house for the night, and Cathy’s sister Bonnie, who was visiting from the States were all there. There was lots of food that everyone contributed and plenty to drink – Bier, Wein, Sekt (German champagne)and homemade Schnapps from a neighbor. There was also plenty of dancing. At one point, someone started a conga line that snaked around the house, out the front door, down the Strasse (street), and finally circled back through our back door. Things went on at a dull roar until sometime well after midnight.

Sure enough, around 1:30 or 2:00AM the party thinned out and the only ones remaining were those spending the night. The night slowed down, and I put on the “Party – Slow Mix” tape and it seemed to fit – nice, mellow, and good in the background. People were mostly just hanging out, sitting around and sipping on this or that. Slowly, folk slipped off to bed, and I think Cath and I retired around 4:00AM.

The next day was a bit rough. Eventually people were waking up and moving around. We cooked a big American breakfast of eggs, bacon, sausage, fried potatoes and toast. The kind of breakfast that has a bit of grease in it to help soak up the previous night’s activities. After that, everyone pitched in and we started cleaning up the house. Someone found a half case of Sekt outside that hadn’t been opened, and someone else suggested mimosas might be in order. The mimosas made the cleaning go a bit quicker, and soon enough we finished the cleaning, but not the mimosas. Those continued for quite some time. In fact those mimosas started a tradition that we ended up having off and on for the next thirty years – our New Year’s Day Hair of the Dog Party.

All of those thoughts flashed through my brain as I looked at the tape. I wondered how well the tape had survived the passage of time – both physically, and aesthetically. Our truck has a tape player, so I decided to find out and popped it in.

Louis Armstrong’s “Summertime” filled the cab, followed by John Lee Hooker’s “Whiskey and Women”, and then The Stones “You can’t always get what you want”. ….this isn’t bad…. Next came “Nights in White Satin”, a couple of Sam Cooke songs, and Madonna’s “Crazy for you”. Hmmm… this stuff is holding up…. Two German songs, a slow version of “99 Luft Balloons” and “Uber Sieben Brucke (Over Seven Bridges) added some local host country flavor, and then came “Take my Breath Away” from Top Gun. I was enjoying the tape quite well, thank you very much.

What happened next is what always eventually happens to cassette tapes. No music and a funny sound. Nooooooo! Yep. The cassette player was eating the tape. I hit the eject button and pulled the tape out. Rutro. I tried to save it, but to no avail.

What’s on the rest of the tape? I don’t know. Part of me wants to try and re-spool the cassette, and part of me says let it go. That was one damn fine party, but you can never go back……

Our 40th Reunion of the West Point Class of 1978 is over and Cath and I are back home after a wonderful, wonderful time. I have struggled with trying to capture in my own mind the events and emotions of the weekend.

West Point is a beautiful place, and it was ideal this past weekend. It was fun to walk around the Post and see the sites – the massive gray buildings, The Plain, the statues of Patton, Eisenhower, and others, Trophy Point with the Hudson flowing below….

Among other activities, we went to the Cadet Chapel where our class held a heartfelt memorial service for our fifty departed classmates. We have done one of these at every reunion, but as we get older, the words from the song “The Corps” become more meaningful – “They are here in ghostly assemblage, The men of the Corps long dead….”

One of the most rewarding part of the weekend was linking up with old classmates and recapturing a bit of the past. Some, Cathy and I had not seen in 40 years, others not for 5 or 10 years, and some that I’ve only met online. The camaraderie, the love and the fellowship were overwhelming. We told stories of our time at West Point, but also stories about Germany, Italy, Korea, Panama, Granada, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan. Places where our careers had intersected or overlapped.

As we get older, the full meaning of being a part of The Long Gray Line becomes more evident. We truly are a part of a 200 year continuum that has stretched from 1802 to now, and into the future. We met some Firstie (Senior) cadets who will be 2nd Lieutenants in a few weeks. They will soon head to postings around the world. After meeting and talking with them, I am encouraged. These young men and women will do America proud as we go into an uncertain future.

At West Point we have vows, watchwords, and themes that have served as guideposts through the course of our lives….. Duty, Honor, Country…. Choosing the harder right, rather than the easier wrong….Never be content with a half truth, when the whole can be won….. and many more. After attending the reunion, I feel renewed and, as another classmate said, recharged. There is something about the gathering of this group that helps to remind us not only of who we were in our youth, but also who we have strived to be throughout our lives.

I observed my classmates over the course of the weekend, and there is no doubt that we are older, thicker, and grayer (or balding). And yet…there is something else there too. I reflect on West Point, see my classmates, and think of Tennysons’s words at the end of Ulysses…

” We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”

I can’t wait for our next gathering.

**

The title of this blog is a line from the song “The Corps”

Strange emotions this week. The 28th of April is the one year anniversary of mom’s death, and next week is the 40th reunion of my West Point class, celebrating our graduation in 1978. As I think about the two events, I have no doubts that it was because of mom that I made it to West Point, and that changed my life.

It was spring of my sophomore year at Ottawa High School. Mom was the principal’s secretary at OHS, and knew everything that was happening at school. One evening over dinner she said “you know, you’re pretty smart, but dad and I don’t have the money to send you kids to college. If you plan to go to college, you need to work, or receive some kind of scholarship. By the way, Colin Willis is back on spring break from West Point next week, and is giving a talk here at school. Maybe you should go hear what he has to say.”

Everyone knew Colin. He was a senior my freshman year at OHS and was all-state in football and wrestling. I played football and wrestled, and while not at his level, I knew him a bit from both sports. So, I thought about it, and the next week I went to hear Colin. He gave a great talk, made West Point sound interesting, and basically said that if you worked hard, you had a good chance of getting in, and then surviving there.

I worked hard in high school, but I think mom worked harder to propel me along the way. She pushed me to talk with the counsellors I needed to see at school; found a connection for me with a local businessman (Mr Thornton) who wrote a letter of recommendation and and sent it to our Congressman; typed up my applications and cataloged all of my “achievements” for both our congressman and for West Point; kept dinners warm on the stove when I came home late from football or wrestling practice; and of course provided me with encouragement and a push from behind, along the way.

On Thanksgiving day of my senior year at OHS, I received the first and only telegram of my life. It was from our congressman, informing me I had received one of his nominations to West Point. On March 8th, just after lunch, a call came over the intercom at high school to report to the principal’s office. I arrived in the office and mom gave me a huge hug. She had gone home for lunch and there was a letter waiting for me there. I had been accepted to West Point.

I made it through West Point, not without a few challenges along the way. With that, the arc of my life changed in many ways that I could not imagine as a boy of eighteen.

Looking back now, with my West Point 40th Reunion approaching, it’s easier to see many of the turning points and influences in my life, although they may not have been so clear when happening. One of the things that is very clear, is mom’s work getting me to the Military Academy. A West Point classmate of mine, Scott Shorr, wrote a song called “Gone so Long”. It’s about returning to the Academy for a visit after many years away. I’ve listened to it several times and a part of the refrain always touches me – the line goes “My mom’s persistence, probably led me there….” With that line, Scott summed up my experience perfectly.

*** *** ***

Mom, It’s a year now since your death. I just wanted to say I miss you, and thank you for all you did. I know your persistence put me on a different path in life, and that’s a debt I can never repay.

The words that grabbed my attention were “…..and then we’ll have a leisurely lunch on the Vic Falls Hotel veranda, while sipping Pink Gins”. We were talking with our friend Marty about an upcoming trip to Africa he was organizing. That quote put a picture in my brain, and I was hooked.

As many of you know, I like an occasional cocktail. OK, maybe more than occasional. My go-to cocktails are a Gin Martini, a Rye Manhattan, or a Negroni, but there is a whole universe of classic drinks out there worth sipping. The classics tend to have a sense of history or place, are bracing, and usually only have a few ingredients. While they are often pretty to look at, drinking more than one or two can lead to….trouble.

So, where does the Pink Gin fit in all of this? After Marty mentioned Pink Gins, I started doing some research. It turns out that the Pink Gin was first developed by the British Navy. They were looking for a way to entice sailors to take “bitters”, which were used to combat seasickness. Coincidentally, in the mid 1800s, over 1,000 casks of Plymouth gin were supplied to the British Navy on an annual basis. After some experimentation, the Navy learned that sailors were more willing to take bitters when they were combined with gin (surprise!). Now the Navy version of the drink was probably served warm and in a wooden mug, but nonetheless, a drink was born. Add some ice, stir a bit, and there you go.

The Pink Gin is a classic drink with a sense of history about it. Stanley and Livingston “discovered” the Falls in 1855 and promptly named it for Queen Victoria. The Victoria Falls Hotel in Zimbabwe was built less than fifty years later in 1904. In addition to afternoon tea, it has served Pink Gins on that veranda for a looooooong time.

I’ve made a few Pink Gins now. You can use any gin, but the original Plymouth still seems to work best, as it is more citrusy than a dryer gin such as Beefeater. The key to the drink is the right amount of dilution. As you stir the gin and bitters in the shaker, the ice melts a bit. Not enough melting, and the drink is too harsh. Too much melting, and the drink is too weak. Just like Goldilocks and her visit to the three bears, it’s important to get it just right.

I think I’ll practice making a few more Pink Gins before our trip to Africa, just to acclimate my taste buds. Having said that, I can’t wait to have one on the veranda of the hotel, with it’s spectacular view of the Victoria Falls Bridge and the spray coming up from the Falls below. I imagine that view might just complete the drink.

***************

Here are two Pink Gin recipes. I think the traditional is slightly better….

Pink Gin traditional recipe:

Large measure of Plymouth Gin (1 1/2 – 2 oz perhaps)

Large measure of Angostura bitters (3-4 shakes, or to taste)

• • Add Angostura Bitters to a mixing glass; Fill mixing glass with ice; Stir for 10 to 15 seconds
  • Roll the combination of bitters and water (melted from the ice) around the glass
  • Strain off water and bitters leaving the ice and a light wash of bitters in the glass
  • Add Plymouth Navy Strength Gin to the mixing glass over the ice. Add more ice if there is space
  • Stir well to chill and dilute (Taste before serving to ensure enough dilution, the alcohol should feel pleasant not aggressive).
  • Strain into a chilled cocktail glass
  • Add lemon twist (or not), ensuring that the lemon oils are expelled across the surface of the drink
  • View of Victoria Falls is optional

Pink Gin updated recipe:

2 oz Plymouth Gin

4 good shakes of Angostura bitters

• • Combine ingredients and shake vigorously in a cocktail shaker with ice
  • Strain into a chilled cocktail glass and serve sans garnish

I believe it was 1990 when Grand Ridge, Illinois was destroyed in a nuclear attack, or at least that’s what the message said. It’s a strange feeling when you suddenly realize that your family and friends are either dead or dying, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

At the time I was an army captain, and a Nuclear Command and Control (C2) Engineer with the Defense Communications Agency. We tested communications systems and procedures that were used in the event of a nuclear war. It was an interesting job, even as the Cold War was winding down after the fall of the Berlin Wall. My boss, a civilian, said to me at the time “I don’t know what your feelings are about nuclear war, but personnally, I want to make sure the systems used during periods of heightened security (that’s what we called it) are working properly, so no mistakes are made.”

The military and National Command Authority (the President) have multiple systems and platforms that are used for C2 communications and they are tested frequently. During one such exercise, I was flying on the Presidents military plane, the National Emergency Airborne Command Post (NEACP – pronounced Knee-cap). We were in the air for ten or twelve hours at this point, and already had one midair refueling. The scenario was playing out and several exercise messages were sent and received.

We had a bit of down time, and I started flipping through old incoming message traffic, just to see what was happening. …STOP… There it was In black and white…. The message stated that the nuclear power plant near Grand Ridge, Illinois was destroyed during a Russian nuclear attack….. My parents lived about 8 miles as the crow flies from that nuclear reactor. Many other friends and family members lived anywhere from three to fifteen miles from the plant. Now, they were all either dead or dying. I froze for a few minutes, as I contemplated the potential reality. I suppose up until that moment I’d always thought of the possibility of me dying in a war, but in this alternate reality, I was the one surviving, or at least surviving for a while longer, while everyone else died.

I resumed the communication’s system testing. I may even have joked with someone else on the plane about the disappearance of my family. Eventually, the exercise ended, we landed, and I made my way home. I thought about that alternate life for awhile after that, and occasionally told the story. It always brought a few interesting comments or nervous chuckles.

The threat of nuclear war lessened in the ’90s and the early 21st century. It seems to be creeping back up now, and that’s probably what made me remember the story. These days, we are talking about Rocket Man, Putin’s new and improved nuclear weapons, and increasing our own capabilities. I guess the more things change, the more they stay the same. Doctor Strangelove seems as relevant as ever.