It's been awhile since I just posted some non news event stuff.
The other night I awoke and had what I call a moment of clarity. Some answers were apparent to me when I had not even asked the question. Three morsels came through almost at once . At least three that I remembered. I think it was 3:35 in the morning.
The first to arise was a long standing question about why I could not enjoy life or experience what I view as true happiness. I admit to little bits and pieces of it but I have always felt like I was living with the emergency brake engaged. I was once on the spot diagnosed by a psychiatrist of having PTSD to the '94 Northridge earthquake. Not having health insurance at the time he gave me a card and asked me to use his name at the Sepulveda Veterans Hospital. I never did. I know a little about mental heath from my earlier days with the Church of Scientology and now believe the earthquake was one in a series of events (engrams) that could be the culprit.
Back to the topic. It became apparent to me in this dream-state that the airplane crash I witnessed as a teen was the primary source and needed to be dealt with. I promised myself I would have it looked into. The details of the event were for the most part shielded from my family. Once in a while I would tell the story but I could not believe my 22 year old never heard it. It goes like this....
I was fourteen or fifteen at the time, however old one is in ninth grade and was walking home after straggling around the campus. I recall having watched some of a soccer game at Pioneer High School where I attended. My neighbor, Larry Mejia, was with me and we walked our usual path home. I was at the corner of my street, exactly in front of my sister's house when we heard a rip in the sky that I later likened to an aluminum can being powerfully ripped in two. We looked up to the sky and could see debris falling that would later prove to be the airplanes occupants and their property as well as parts of the two planes that collided. Larry and I both said, "Eyewitness News!" at the same time I think. I alerted my brother in law, Bill Mezzell, and we darted toward the direction where the debris had fallen.
We were several blocks to the north when we saw the first confounding piece of evidence. I saw a piece of luggage with personal affects in it strewn open near the entrance to the junior high school both Larry and I attended. I didn't put the information in order yet and thought how odd to see this property at that place. Maybe someone dropped it on the way to see the wreckage I mistakenly thought. I looked up and saw the awesome sight of a twin engine airplane's fuselage at rest in the middle of the field that was part of Katherine Edwards school. At this point, it didn't even occur to me that there were people in the airplane. It was a gigantically surreal scene that my little brain could not get a wrap on.
There had been an intramural basketball game at the school so we were by far not the first ones there. school towels lay over bodies and there parts as some quick thinker was already on duty. From this point, Larry, me and our fellow gawkers would find something noteworthy and point it out. Others would run over to the find and "Ooooh or awwwe" it.
Eventually firefighters and police arrived and began cordoning off the site while booting off us looky loos. I recall how even amidst the chaos, later that evening when we saw a female newscaster that everyone knew forced to climb two ladders propped on a chain link fence and we had the boyish duty to try to look up her dress and she scurried over.
The gawking game continued on the perimeter where a discovery was made in a yard or an adjacent alley and folks would run over for a look. Perhaps the most lingering site was one on a lawn to the north of the field, I recall knowing the home owners, but there was a body planted in the lawn that appeared to land feet first. The face on the body had been ripped from the skull and like a mask was pulled up so the nose was at the top of the head. aside from the woman's panty hose clad leg on the basketball court, this was the memory that had stuff with me the longest.
It was dark when I headed toward home and the secondary group of curious bystanders were packed around the perimeter in their cars curious for a look at what was being fed to the news media. Funny thing, back then it was really not a big deal to show up at home four or five hours after school had ended. When I got home it became apparent that the news knew more about what had happened than I did. I didn't know that it was a mid air collision until I saw it reported on the news. In fact, when I was walking home a passerby asked from their car, "Hey- what happened?"
As I walked along I thought about it and reported, "A plane fell out of the sky." My parents said I was an unequalled shade of white when I got home.
The other night I awoke and had what I call a moment of clarity. Some answers were apparent to me when I had not even asked the question. Three morsels came through almost at once . At least three that I remembered. I think it was 3:35 in the morning.
The first to arise was a long standing question about why I could not enjoy life or experience what I view as true happiness. I admit to little bits and pieces of it but I have always felt like I was living with the emergency brake engaged. I was once on the spot diagnosed by a psychiatrist of having PTSD to the '94 Northridge earthquake. Not having health insurance at the time he gave me a card and asked me to use his name at the Sepulveda Veterans Hospital. I never did. I know a little about mental heath from my earlier days with the Church of Scientology and now believe the earthquake was one in a series of events (engrams) that could be the culprit.
Back to the topic. It became apparent to me in this dream-state that the airplane crash I witnessed as a teen was the primary source and needed to be dealt with. I promised myself I would have it looked into. The details of the event were for the most part shielded from my family. Once in a while I would tell the story but I could not believe my 22 year old never heard it. It goes like this....
I was fourteen or fifteen at the time, however old one is in ninth grade and was walking home after straggling around the campus. I recall having watched some of a soccer game at Pioneer High School where I attended. My neighbor, Larry Mejia, was with me and we walked our usual path home. I was at the corner of my street, exactly in front of my sister's house when we heard a rip in the sky that I later likened to an aluminum can being powerfully ripped in two. We looked up to the sky and could see debris falling that would later prove to be the airplanes occupants and their property as well as parts of the two planes that collided. Larry and I both said, "Eyewitness News!" at the same time I think. I alerted my brother in law, Bill Mezzell, and we darted toward the direction where the debris had fallen.
We were several blocks to the north when we saw the first confounding piece of evidence. I saw a piece of luggage with personal affects in it strewn open near the entrance to the junior high school both Larry and I attended. I didn't put the information in order yet and thought how odd to see this property at that place. Maybe someone dropped it on the way to see the wreckage I mistakenly thought. I looked up and saw the awesome sight of a twin engine airplane's fuselage at rest in the middle of the field that was part of Katherine Edwards school. At this point, it didn't even occur to me that there were people in the airplane. It was a gigantically surreal scene that my little brain could not get a wrap on.
There had been an intramural basketball game at the school so we were by far not the first ones there. school towels lay over bodies and there parts as some quick thinker was already on duty. From this point, Larry, me and our fellow gawkers would find something noteworthy and point it out. Others would run over to the find and "Ooooh or awwwe" it.
Eventually firefighters and police arrived and began cordoning off the site while booting off us looky loos. I recall how even amidst the chaos, later that evening when we saw a female newscaster that everyone knew forced to climb two ladders propped on a chain link fence and we had the boyish duty to try to look up her dress and she scurried over.
The gawking game continued on the perimeter where a discovery was made in a yard or an adjacent alley and folks would run over for a look. Perhaps the most lingering site was one on a lawn to the north of the field, I recall knowing the home owners, but there was a body planted in the lawn that appeared to land feet first. The face on the body had been ripped from the skull and like a mask was pulled up so the nose was at the top of the head. aside from the woman's panty hose clad leg on the basketball court, this was the memory that had stuff with me the longest.
It was dark when I headed toward home and the secondary group of curious bystanders were packed around the perimeter in their cars curious for a look at what was being fed to the news media. Funny thing, back then it was really not a big deal to show up at home four or five hours after school had ended. When I got home it became apparent that the news knew more about what had happened than I did. I didn't know that it was a mid air collision until I saw it reported on the news. In fact, when I was walking home a passerby asked from their car, "Hey- what happened?"
As I walked along I thought about it and reported, "A plane fell out of the sky." My parents said I was an unequalled shade of white when I got home.
Here's another version of the same incident.
The other two points pale in comparison to the previous. They involved the same former co-worker who I'll call Jake. He is a retired LAPD officer and headed security at the company I now work for until he retired about a year ago. I was told to ask for his address, as well as provide my own, for a a subordinate. I never really knew why but knew the common denominator was his son who had become a naval officer as posted previously. The realism that came to me was that the address was to invite us to the son's wedding. So far no invitation in the mail but that's what surfaced. (Update: that Friday my co-worker handed me an envelope and I said to him, "Wedding invitation?" It was. )
The other morsel as I said earlier also involved Jake. Earlier in the evening in question, I spoke with a niece who I knew was interested in becoming a police officer. When I asked her why, she responded with what I regard as the perfect answer. I do not want to post it publicly but it was connected to a sense of duty that I connected with. I saw it as the same reason I had joined the Air Force thirty years previous. My connection was that Jake would be the perfect mentor for this young lady.
The other two points pale in comparison to the previous. They involved the same former co-worker who I'll call Jake. He is a retired LAPD officer and headed security at the company I now work for until he retired about a year ago. I was told to ask for his address, as well as provide my own, for a a subordinate. I never really knew why but knew the common denominator was his son who had become a naval officer as posted previously. The realism that came to me was that the address was to invite us to the son's wedding. So far no invitation in the mail but that's what surfaced. (Update: that Friday my co-worker handed me an envelope and I said to him, "Wedding invitation?" It was. )
The other morsel as I said earlier also involved Jake. Earlier in the evening in question, I spoke with a niece who I knew was interested in becoming a police officer. When I asked her why, she responded with what I regard as the perfect answer. I do not want to post it publicly but it was connected to a sense of duty that I connected with. I saw it as the same reason I had joined the Air Force thirty years previous. My connection was that Jake would be the perfect mentor for this young lady.
This post touches on some of the similarities between the 1957 Pacoima air crash and the 1975 Whittier crash.
