Memory Workout

I think I am losing my memory, one memory blog at a time. I have been told to give yourself a good memory workout. Write down your memory of a trip, episode of your life, so on. To try to recollect everything is brain brain pushups. Here goes: After I was released of two years active duty in the Navy I was assigned a Naval Reserve unit at NAS ATLANTA. We met once and month and two weeks a year our squadron went on active duty. The first year we went to Norfolk, Virginia. The second year, about 1967, we went to Yuma, Arizona. This post is mostly about that trip. We went to a Marine Air Base. When I stepped off the plane I was hit by a blast of dry heat that I never experienced before. In the Eastern United States the air is humid, that we are used to it. But in the desert, it is a total change of environment. The barracks were more like dormitories., two a room. And you share bathroom facilities with one two other men living on the flipside. At New Jersey, we had 4 men to partitioned cube and shared the bathroom, or head, I should say, with about 100 men. I thought Marines was known for roughing it? My job was to walk through a little desert, about equal to a quarter of mile to pick up the mail and bring it back, sort if, and deliver it. I enjoyed my desert walk every day and never once saw a snake. There was an EM Club which I went to several times. I don’t remember anything memorable about the club except worms in the tequila bottles. One evening some of us paid a Marine to take us across the border about 20 miles away to Saint Louise, Mexico. I was warned the merchants of that town had a custom that “if you touch something, you buy it.” So, I walked around with my hands more or less locked. My immediate Supervisor was Chief Sprung. Chief Sprung lived in North Carolina when he wasn’t at Reserve Training. I liked to avoid him because he talked too much and expect interactive responses. I avoided him when I could. While walking on the base I ran into someone that was stationed in New Jersey. With me. His last name was Lambert and he was from North Carolina. I did not know it at the time but my great grandfather and his uncle Van Trammell was accused of killing a Lambert when having a heated political argument. The two Lamberts may have been kin. Possibly, a small world. We had one full opened weekend there. We heard that a Naval Helicopter was to go to Las Angeles on Friday and could possibly get a ride but we would have to find our own way back to the base Monday morning. About 5 or 6 of us took advantage of the free ride. The Naval helicopter took us to a Naval Air Station in Anaheim, California. There we were on our own. I chose to hitchhike to Los Angeles, which was not far away, so I got out on the highway and stuck my thumb out. I would never do that today. While I had my thumb out I realized the Naval Air Station was across the street from DISNEYLAND. I could hear rides causing people oooing and aahhing and loud music. I could see one ride clearly, it looked like a mountain with opened box cars with people going into caves, and around bends, and all. I think it was called THE MATTERHORN. I finally got a ride to downtown L.A. I hit a few bars and the USO, strolled around looking for attractions I have heard about. I also got a room in a big hotel for two days. I think the first thing I did after I checked in was pick up a bunch of brochures on local attractions and in the lobby and sat down in front of a big window and watched the pedestrians walk by. I was enjoying it until I saw on the sidewalk Chief Sprung walked by. He glanced in the window and kept on walking. I did not move afraid the chief would see me. Then apparently, about 20 feet later he realized he saw me and turned around and then there he stood looking at me. He smiled when he knew his eyes were not playing tricks on him. He smiled and waved and started for the door. Chief Sprung sprung into the lobby and he talked me into letting him share the room with him I just rented. He said he would reimburse me his half. Which I think he probably did. The chief needed to use the phone in the room to hunt down a friend he was in the Navy with many years ago. He found his old friend. The old friend wanted to see him again, so he told us to stand on the corner of the streets our hotel was on and he could pick us up, which he did. He drove us to his house, in Hollywood Hills, I think. His friend was an engineer for Disney land. Apparently, It paid well. They had a lot to talk about, like “Who was that guy that…blab la?” or “What ever happened to…blab la.” The wife, who was a nice and kind looking lady, and I were excluded from the conversation because it just was not about us. She offered to show me the house, which she did. A couple of times on her guided tour we sat down and talked. She was knowledgeable on a lot of subjects. We walked out the back door onto a patio. And again, sat and talked. Then we walked over the back yard. We got very close to the wired fence. On the other side of the fence two huge dogs came galloping up. They wanted to know more about me. The wife told me they were Steve McQueen’s dogs. I asked something like, “Steve McQueen’s is your neighbor?” She said “Yes.” In a non braggart’s way. I said, as I always say, “My claim to fame!” She laughed. Chief Sprung and his friend’s wife got us to the bus station on time and we spent a few hours appreciating the rocky mountain landscape between .L.A. and Yuma, Arizona. In the middle of the next week when one of the squadron’s pilots went out on training one did not come back. Apparently, something went wrong. The next day a local dome buggy squadron, as a search party, went looking for hm and the plane. I overheard s couple of elderly chiefs who were talking about heaving a ball riding done buggies around the scary rocky mountain terrain. As far as I know the plain or body was not found. Surely they have by now. When we were loading stuff on the plain to return back to NAS ATLANTA one of the drivers of the drivers a the trams was a first class mechanic. I recognized him, from my old Squadron in New Jersey. His last name is Moody. We recognized each other. He told me he had just got orders for Vietnam. What I did not know at the time is that I am descended from the Moody Family. The guy might have been a distant cousin. Again, small world.