However, with active duty Air Force obligations in my past (though I suppose there could have been problems, small chance, as I continued to be available for two more required years in the inactive USAF Reserve) I started accepting guest interviews on radio and TV shows, wrote for various publications and accepted occasional invitations to speak before academia, churches, political gatherings and the like.
One invitation I was happy to accept came from a teacher at a middle school. Now, considering the status of public schools and school boards these days, the very thought of currently allowing in a speaker regarding UFOs may well cause torches and pitchforks to be raised by parents in fear that the speaker would encourage demon worship or foster anti-religious thought. Controversial subjects don't always play well in a regimented, union-driven, Milquetoast educational system dedicated to teaching little of long-term value. But I digress. . .
So, these were the early seventies when I visited a middle school, showed a few slides and pictures of purported UFOs, and answered questions from an auditorium filled with curious youngsters whose heads were still filled with the excitement of knowing United States astronauts had walked about on the moon just a few years previously. To this crowd space, astronauts and UFOs could easily be branches of the same tree.
After my lecture that afternoon, a small group of kids remained behind to ask a few more questions when, to my surprise, a boy of 12 or 13 broke through the small gathering and handed me a piece of paper and a pen. Puzzled, I asked what he wanted.
"Would you please autograph this for me?" he asked.
I think I recoiled a bit, unprepared for this moment in time for which I had never been prepared.
"My. . .you want me to sign this for you?" He nodded. I was not merely taken aback -- I was horrified. Speaking before an audience presented no problems for me, but this was something personal, not simply applause or clapping administered by strangers in a group.
I scribbled something on the paper and signed it, returning it to the boy, who seemed genuinely delighted as he clutched the paper scrap and retreated like somebody who just found a precious gem and wanted to make a hasty exit before it was snatched from his grasp. A few minutes later, the other students departed, leaving me to shake the hands of a few teachers in attendance as I packed up and left the building.
My autograph? This had never happened before and I found it frightening. Hey kid, I'm nothing special, maybe even just a crazy person to your parents, but who am I to sign autographs? Signing letters, postcards and legal documents had been routine over the years, but to be singled out for an autograph was new territory. I'm just another human, hardly worthy of deity-like autographing status. I mean, these signing occasions come about when beloved stars, musicians or circus clowns make appearances, but to summon my personal signature? I suddenly had a fan club, maybe a one-person club, but a new entity nevertheless, and the truth is that I never wanted or would want a fan club -- or a fan. I want the UFO subject to be the main attraction, not me. I am not famous and to be emulated by another just seems so wrong. However, if you're a kid I guess you choose your objects of interest from moment to moment. I guess I did, as a child.
Fame is also transitory for the most part, and even on that afternoon decades ago I momentarily sensed the absurdity of it all. But being regarded as an autograph promoter is the role I had to play just long enough for one little kid to walk away feeling somehow enriched by my presence or presentation. Then again, maybe he was just a young hobbyist accustomed to collecting autographs from strange people? No, of course not. Yet. . .
Maybe I would have felt a little more stability, had I requested his own autograph in return. Did the boy not become famous himself merely for believing me so?
9/11 25 years later: Sure, I remember. It's all about the scum of Islam. I was sitting in my car at a garage, waiting to have some mechanical work done and listening to the radio when the first words about the unfolding tragedy were spoken. The most striking thing to me later that day was the officially demanded absence of any aircraft in the sky over the United States, and the skies were noticeably and strangely quiet. While there are messages galore to be expressed and remembered about that disastrous day over NY, PA and Washington D.C., let one profound warning echo throughout the nation every day of the week: This was radical Islam at work, and to continue allowing its deceptive embrace, insistence and Sharia Law to conquer the United States, one little parcel at a time, must be the catastrophe inhabiting the nightmares of a free people.
Cheap Chinese cars flood the world's market: And Mr. Trump doesn't want them here. Fair enough! Now, American auto manufacturers, it's high time YOU made cheaper cars that don't put Americans in debt for years. Put in the basics, forgo the unnecessary, make unions reasonable again and start rolling affordable vehicles out of your factories like in olden days (which aren't really all that olden).