Sunday was deceptively calm. Old movies (including one with a hilarious supporting role played by my spiritual godmother Eve Arden), watching the football playoffs and the goofiness thereof. But it was all with two thoughts looming in the background: it all changes tomorrow, and it all changes next week.

The more immediate change happened Monday at noon, and that’s been the gigantic thing that has dominated the entire landscape before and since. Others have written volumes about it, and we’re not even through the first week. For my part, since I try to keep this place reasonably family-friendly and there’s no way I can discuss it without using language that’s not at all family-friendly, it’s best if I preserve silence. I didn’t have long to think about it, anyway, because an hour after it all began, I was in our front yard helping to free a delivery van whose driver got it stuck in our wet grass. (It’s a long story involving some poor assumptions on his part.)

The other change I had to cope with this week was more personal: the end of a lengthy winter break. A few years ago, the college went to an academic calendar that built a very brief January term into the schedule, which then bumped the start of the Spring semester by about two and a half weeks. For those of us who don’t teach in the January term, it effectively means half of December and almost all of January are out of the office and self-directed.

Those who don’t understand what we do in our trade (and it’s a lot of folks, including most people in my family) get the idea that we coddled professors use all this free time to lounge around eating bon-bons while regular folks work for a living. What many don’t know is that my work doesn’t stop. It’s just not in the office. We have to rewrite our syllabus documents, write and revise lesson plans, develop assignments, take care of requests from students (which continue regardless of what the calendar says), develop and submit course schedules for upcoming semesters, monitor e-mail…a ton of things. In my case, I’ve also had to continue producing episodes of the television program – which, even though most of it is assembling features and connecting segments we recorded in advance, still involves about a half-day to stitch everything together, round up the latest game information for the scoreboard segment, QC it, render the final version and deliver it, etc. And in between all that is when I see after the things that are hard to fit in my schedule during the school term: taking the car in for service, taking the cat in for her annual exam, meetings with colleagues at other institutions to share/steal ideas, etc.

And, sometimes, we have to attend things on campus. There were a couple during the break, but few are as sobering as the one I attended Thursday, which had to do with preparation in the event of something that’s happened with increasing frequency over the last many years (and, indeed, happened again this week). It was a presentation of about two and a half hours, and it forced me to think about things I really don’t want to think about – including, again, how vulnerable a campus is, and how easily some nutcase could shatter the peace and goodwill that we take as a given.

Now, none of this is that new. In 1988 it happened at an elementary school near my hometown. I was in high school at the time, only a few miles from that school, and I remember hearing about it when school dismissed that afternoon. Three years later, the semester after I graduated, an isolated incident happened at my high school (more disturbing is that my mother, who worked at the school, was just over in the next hallway when it happened). And over the years, these kinds of incidents have happened in all kinds of places; not just schools but just about anywhere groups of people can gather.

You would have hoped at some point enough would have been enough, but it keeps happening. At one point the presentation showed, on a map, the number and magnitude of these incidents over the last 24 years. The word “disturbing” isn’t enough to describe it. The incidents themselves are disturbing enough, but the lack of meaningful action by those who could do something about it is even more so, and on the notes I took, I wrote some rather pungent commentary about this sorry state of affairs.

Part of the presentation included a network interview with a teacher who was at the school that got attacked not long before Christmas 2012, and she talked (through tears) about what she did to protect her students. We were told about another teacher who got on top of her students to protect them, and then paid for their futures with her life.

I remember that day very vividly – or, more accurately, the following days. We were going to a Christmas party the next afternoon, but it was so difficult to feel any kind of joy after knowing what had happened. Even though it was hundreds of miles away, the horror of it all was overwhelming. On the way home, as we listened to a radio news story about it, I had the first genuine crisis of faith I can recall in my life. It frightened me. What kind of world could this happen in, that this could happen to these little kids and the adults who took care of them? And it was my hope that something would get done about it. But we know what happened: a whole lot of nothing. My faith in God survived, but my faith in a few other things has yet to recover, and my scorn for a few people in particular only deepened.

And that’s what accompanied me as I sat through this seminar on Thursday. Not only do I have to know my subject area, not only do I have to know about classroom management and assessment methods and all this other stuff, but I have to constantly keep one ear open. I have to know where the nearest exits are (or can be made). I have to keep a special app on my phone, just in case. I have to know how to use the things in my classroom to defend or fight. And I also know that, in the worst case, I have to make sure my students are safe before I can see after my own safety. I’m the last one out of the danger zone. And I also know in my heart that if I have to, I’m going to be the one on top of the pile, protecting them.

It’s a hell of a thing, but it’s what we have become, or what we have allowed to happen. I’m in this business to give these young people knowledge and experience. And yet I know there’s a very real possibility I could pay for that with my own life. I know if it came to it, I would, and without a moment’s hesitation. But it shouldn’t be that way. (And any time somebody suggests that the solution is for teachers to carry…well, please don’t go there with me. And I write this as someone with a small arsenal of my own.)

Over the years I’ve become more reclusive. Some of it is because some things I used to enjoy are no longer out there to be had. But, to be honest, some of it is because I’m turned off by the amount of rudeness and lack of consideration so many people display any more. It’s everywhere from the drive over (try going anywhere without somebody zooming up and tailgating you) to people plowing you over in store aisles, people using their phones in movie theaters…there’s so much that’s counter to how I was taught to behave. But on top of that, when you go anywhere, you also have in the back of your mind…what if somebody comes in to cause mayhem?

And with all that, being out here in the woods has an appeal that’s almost narcotic. We’re away from so much of that, and to an extent we can control how much of the outside world reaches us. We interact more with animals than with people, and they’re often much better company. It’s easy to get into a groove with all that and wish I could just work from home. But I also know how much I enjoy my work, and how much working with the kids does for me, even on days when they drive me crazy. I spent a year teaching over Zoom during the pandemic and, although it was the prudent thing to do given the circumstances, it was missing something. I didn’t think the students were getting everything they needed from me. And, for my part, it hurt my style. The way I work in a classroom is just this side of improv, and unless I have a live audience I can play off, it just doesn’t work.

It comes down to a calculation. Do I let the possibility that something horrible could happen cheat me out of the joy of doing my job? Do I let it cheat the students out of what I could give them?

Do I let the horror win? Or do I accept the risk, learn what I can about how to protect them if the worst happens, have a plan in the back of my mind, keep one ear open, and move forward?

I know what’ll happen Monday. I’ll go in and do my job, and make the most of it. But part of me will regret that I have to think about those other aspects.

This time of year is my least favorite. It’s the start of a new year; the days are still too short, the shadows are at weird angles, the weather is cold and sometimes fierce. My mood tends to sag, not only because of the environmental factors but also because it’s a new year, full of uncertainties. And within the span of this week, that was driven home anew.

I can’t let that keep me behind a moat, though. I’m cheating myself if I don’t keep my courage, and move toward better days. They are coming, even if I can’t yet know when.

And really, it’s silly. It’s not like there’s some kind of physical, perceptible transition; it’s not like a car crossing over a set of tracks. While we humans make much ado about it, the creatures of nature will carry on with no regard for this human-created milestone. I can’t help thinking this dread is silly, but it’s the same dread I feel about being given a blank piece of paper and being told to create something; instead of thinking about all the possibilities, I feel the empty space and think not only about the vastness of the journey, but of all the ways things could go wrong.

Which is funny, given that 2024 was a wringer of a year for me. I’ve not been fond of the word “bittersweet” but I can’t think of a word to better describe 2024. I’ve had some really peak experiences, done some things I never thought I’d get to do, and had some good times with some really good people. I’ve gone to new places. I had to push myself to take on new challenges and ended up learning new things about myself, and what had scared me turned out to be exhilarating.

But I’ve also suffered losses in 2024. Some of them are the kinds of losses you’re likely to suffer the older you get, but it doesn’t make them hurt less. My mother was in the emergency room the very first day of the year, and the first 13 days of January were a series of ups and downs, until the biggest heart I’ve ever known in my life finally gave out. For years I had known it was going to happen at some point, but no matter how much you intellectually prepare, you can’t foretell the emotional hit. Thankfully, our family came together, did the hard stuff we had to do, made sure Dad didn’t fall into an emotional hole, and we survived.

In my own mind, it’s been an odyssey. The first two weeks of the year were off-and-on feelings of dread, preparing for what could happen. On that last day, as my feelings sank, I began to brace. When the word finally came…well, my grief let go in a very quick burst. And then I focused on what needed doing. It’s how I work through what distresses me. I adapted better than I imagined, although there have been some moments.

That said, that opening led to others. So much of 2024 has been about re-evaluating what I thought I knew. It’s involved the kind of hard work that doesn’t allow for shortcuts. I’ve had to realize a lot of things I thought I knew weren’t really so, and that a lot of assumptions I’d made were faulty. To get into the weeds on this would not only go more deeply personal than I care to in a public forum, but would bore you to tears, so I’ll only say that this year and this journey led me to take lessons from James Stockdale, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius; led me to realize the truth that while I cannot control events, I can control how I react to them; and if I focus on what I can control, that will keep me busy enough.

If I could say 2024 was uniformly sad, it would be useful for sorting purposes, but it would be inaccurate. I’d have to leave out the weirdness of a trip I made in February with a lift-gate truck, during which I took custody of four priceless pieces of broadcast history. I’d have to leave out the surprise invitation to media day at Dollywood in early March, which not only let me drive through gorgeous scenery on the trip up, but provided the priceless opportunity to be a few rows away from the Queen herself as she addressed all we media types in attendance. I’d have to leave out that strange, hurried but exhilarating trip to Philadelphia to visit the flagship. I’d have to leave out a surprise weekend trip to New York, sitting at an edit station inside ABC as that morning’s Good Morning America was underway. I’d have to leave out helping a colleague get a book published. I’d have to leave out a lot of moments that brought me happiness.

Some years, you look back on as halcyon days. Other years, you look back on and think “however bad things are now, at least they’re not as bad as they were then.” I don’t know if I’ll look at 2024 that way, but I am reasonably confident I’ll look back and think of this year as a stern teacher – the kind of teacher who made your life difficult, but over time you realize the value of what you learned.

And yes, 2024 taught me some lessons. Valuable lessons.

But I sure am hoping that 2025 will be more gentle.

On the way out of town, we stopped by the cemetery to visit my mother’s gravesite. We lost her back in January, when a sudden illness took advantage of frailties she either hadn’t known about or had kept well-hidden from the rest of us. (Since she was one of the most selfless people I have ever known, and never wanted to ever be a bother to anyone, I can’t help thinking it was the latter.) Not two weeks into the new year, she was suddenly gone. Everything changed for all of us. We have mostly coped well, but as you can imagine, every family get-together now has a hole blown in it the exact size and shape of her.

My mother now rests on a hill in the town cemetery, in a site that had been bought years ago by my folks as a family burial area. A couple years back, they had a gravestone made and had a granite perimeter installed and gravel poured in. I remember the day I saw that grave marker for the first time, with my parents’ names and dates of birth, and below it the area where, someday, another date would be carved in. It was sobering, for here was a hard, cold reminder that my parents’ days on this earth would someday run out, and they had prepared. This thing I hadn’t wanted to think about? It was no longer unavoidable. I had no idea it would be needed so soon, that within a couple years that second date would be carved in. But we’re not the ones writing the script.

Family burials aren’t new to me. My great-grandmother, who lived with my great-grandfather in a house next door to my grandparents, died when I was eight. It was my first close experience with death and maybe I was too young to really grab its meaning. Two years later my great-grandfather, who had spent two years in mourning, passed away. I remember going to the visitation for him, seeing him in his casket, this man who had been so gentle to me, told me stories, sang funny songs to me, had this marvelous hearty laugh when I’d say something he thought was funny, who always had a stick of gum in the front pocket of his bib overalls that he’d tear in half and give half to me…he was now lifeless in that box, wearing his best suit on the voyage into forever. Somehow I had accepted it and yet was still numb to it. I missed him, I knew I’d never hear that laugh of his again, and yet I somehow knew there was no escaping the reality. I knew he hadn’t been well, and there was one memory of visiting him in the hospital that had genuinely scared me. Somehow I got the concept of death as release. I thought I was supposed to cry, but I was oddly logical about it. I knew crying wouldn’t bring him back.

The next time was almost a decade and a half later. My parents had to rescue my paternal grandfather, who had fallen victim to Alzheimer’s Disease, and we took care of him at home until he could get accepted at a care facility. When he passed away there early in the new year, it was more a relief than anything. The man I had known was long gone. He was buried next to the site my parents had bought for the family, and after the funeral service we gathered as a family and embraced, and many in the circle wept. Again, I couldn’t. I was sad for them, and I knew it was a grim milestone in our lives, but his passing had been a release. The man I had known was long gone before he died. I had already mourned. I was sad for my father, who grieved a man he hadn’t known that well (to make a long story short, his parents separated when he was young, and my dad wasn’t reunited with his dad until he was almost 40 years old). But I hadn’t known my grandfather that well, hadn’t seen him that often, and what I did remember of him was gone. To me the shock came not at his passing, but when my parents brought him home after rescuing him, when this man from my childhood memories was suddenly this frail shell of a man who was no longer occupying this plane. It felt, to use a phrase I sometimes overuse, like walking straight into a plate glass window.

After that, the passings came more steadily. My father-in-law died a few years later, after a long final illness. My paternal grandmother (with whom I had never really gotten along) died a few years after that. A few years later, my mother-in-law passed away. And then my maternal grandparents passed away, though I had known their days were numbered, especially my poor grandmother after a sad, decades-long struggle with progressive dementia. And thus were my parents the last line standing. Now that line is half gone, and emotionally I am preparing for the inevitable.

But, really, the relatives are only half the story of why things feel so different now when I’m back home. It’s because so many of the people I remember from the town where I grew up are now up on that hill, too. Some of them are relatives, but others were part of the fabric that made up the town I knew as a youngster: the eccentrics, the gossips, the neighbors, the people who knew how to do a particular something and could do it really well, the men who helped build the house I grew up in, the folks who were there when you needed them, no matter what it was you needed. The friend, confined to her home with chronic illness, who used to call me to talk about baseball (and whom I loved even though she was a Yankees fan), and her mother, a very sweet woman who looked like Imogene Coca. One by one, they filled the empty spaces in that graveyard. Someday, sooner rather than later, those still among us will join them.

In my younger days I’d go on long walks around town on sunny summer evenings. It let me get out of the house and also gave me some exercise. Most evenings, the far point of my journey would be the cemetery. I’d wander through the paths, stopping sometimes to visit the tombstones of people I remembered or to read decades-old inscriptions on overgrown headstones. And, often, this song would be in my head, for it captured exactly how I felt:

Sometimes I’d hear that the neighbors had noticed me walking up to the cemetery so often. In the way of small-town gossips they wondered what was behind it, as if there was something weird or occult about me being there. I’m not sure they would have bought my explanation: I was up there so often because it was peaceful there, because I was fascinated by the little clues about the lives of those who were now at rest there. I was fascinated by the grave markers of the long-gone Woodmen of the World members, carved to resemble hewn timbers; the ornate marker, tall as I was and longer still, for a family of obvious means; the heart-shaped marker with a lamb atop, the resting place of an infant. Some of those graves were a century old, even then. It was soothing to be there, the stories telling themselves on a warm summer evening, the setting sun glowing gently, the crickets singing away. The people in those graves were long gone, in some cases more than a century, and yet I still felt their presence somehow.

Three decades later, so many of the people who are now there are people I knew somehow. One or two were more or less from my generation, cut down by cancer or chronic disease, and that makes it cut even deeper. If that’s how I feel, I can’t imagine what it’s like for my father. He visits my mother’s grave just about every day. A few months ago I rode to the cemetery with him on the secondhand golf cart he uses for short trips in town. After we’d spent time with Mom, he took me on a meandering tour through several gravesites. Every turn brought us to another grave of someone about whom he had a memory. I’d often hear a sad “he was a good fellow.” Dad is 82 now, has survived a couple of health scares in recent years, and is in good health. His mind is sharp and he can still get in a day’s work in the field on the tractor. And yet there are times when I understand why living a long life is a double-edged sword, why you never want to wish for immortality: you will live to see so many of the people you love be lost. The Green Mile will seem so long.

In my own mind, I find myself fighting waves of nostalgia, and the older I get and the more complicated I find the modern world, the more tempting a refuge it becomes. On occasion it’s made me wonder if someday I’ll move back to the tiny town where my story began. Almost as quickly, though, I remember that town no longer exists. Yes, it’s in the same place on the map. Many of the landmarks are still there. The house where I grew up is still there. But it’s not the same. Most of the people who made it the town I remember are now up on that hill. New people have moved in and, in their way, made the town theirs – and that’s good, for it keeps the town alive, and it’s also not right for me to expect that town to live up to my expectations. My nostalgia also elides the frustrations I so often felt, that I had to get out and experience a bigger world than I could ever find there, that the images in my mind from a childhood reading the encyclopedia had to become my own reality that I could experience firsthand, and I knew I couldn’t find that if I stayed there.

I’ve built a decent life, on my own terms. I’ve done not only so many things I wanted to do, but so many things I never imagined I could. I’ve been, as the song says, blessed and lucky. I’m also still hungry for things I haven’t yet been able to do, but it gives me something to keep going, and sometimes that’s as important as anything else. Be that as it may, it’s a life I’ve lived on my own terms. That little town will always be my hometown, and I’ll always be thankful it was. Not for the riches of Nineveh and Tyre would I trade growing up there, in a place that will forever live on in my heart. But in many ways, my idea of my hometown now belongs to history. Now, the rural acreage we happened into many years ago and the goofy little house we built there, the expanse of pines and the wildlife that frequently ambles through…over the last two decades, through financial and emotional commitment, that’s become home, the place that re-centers me, the place where (barring some kind of unforeseen calamity) I’m content to spend the rest of my days, on my own terms.

My little hometown will always call me back. I’ll always relate to Martin Sloan, age thirty-six, vice president in charge of media, wanting to escape to his days of childhood, giving in to that errant little wish, needing to be reminded that where he came from, there were merry-go-rounds and band concerts, and that maybe he hadn’t been looking in the right place.

The more I’ve been looking behind me, the more I’m reminded I have to look ahead.

Yesterday I had the urge to go back in time, and a URL in my browser’s history popped up and took me to the Sept. 23, 1957 issue. It has an amazing picture of Suzy Parker on the cover:

Suzy Parker was a top model of the day, her name immortalized in a Beatles tune. I first became aware of her because she modeled for Revlon and sometimes appeared in the live commercials on The $64,000 Question. Later she was married to Bradford Dillman, who I remember most for playing Dirty Harry’s officious superior in two movies.

I mean, look at her. Wow.

This week in September 1957 brought more than just a look into Suzy Parker’s world. There was a neat feature in which a photographer took modern-day photos with one of Mathew Brady’s cameras. I was especially interested that the famously grumpy John Foster Dulles was an agreeable sitter, for a comparison with Robert Seward’s portrait.

There’s a big feature about the American court system, featuring portraits of prominent jurists.

If you’re into duck hunting, there’s a photo feature on favored hunting sites:

Robert Frost went to England:

…and quiz show champion Charles Van Doren reflects on his experiences as a winner on Twenty One and whether the quiz show craze helps or hinders education. Two years later he would testify before Congress about how the whole thing had been rigged. It’s interesting to read this piece, knowing what was to come and knowing how his life was going to change after his confession.

As another sign of the quiz show craze, here’s this ad that fulminates against the federal electric utilities. (This post goes into the campaigns of America’s Independent Electric Light and Power Companies, and features some really strident ads that imply that government utilities are but the vanguard of creeping socialism that will take away your freedoms, your Bible, etc.)

In consumer goods, Columbia was promoting its big new stereophonic systems under the “Listening in Depth” campaign. I mean, look at that glorious monster spread over two pages. Columbia Records backed this campaign with a really awesome LP that featured samples from various stereophonic albums, but also had some bespoke tracks. (The special version of Duke Ellington’s “Track 360” started with the sound of a train traveling from the left channel to the right channel. If you’re wearing headphones, the train travels through your head. It’s fun!)

Not to be outdone, RCA is not only promoting its own sound systems…

…but is also promoting the washer-dryer systems it’s producing through its partnership with Whirlpool.

And let’s not forget Philco. Otherwise, they might make various threats. (As they did when they complained NBC’s Today program being broadcast from the RCA Exhibition Hall was unfair competition; as they did when Philips tried to do business in the United States, which prompted the birth of the “Norelco” brand name. Although many, many years later Philips bought what was left of Philco, and that’s why you see “Philips” more and seldom see “Norelco.” So there.)

Schlitz urges you to go bowling! Enjoy a Schlitzframe! Have some Schlitzfreshment! Be a Schlitzer! Get Schlitzfaced!

Colgate reminds you that the real reason you’re striking out on the romantic scene isn’t your personality, your clothes or any other cause except your HORRIBLE BREATH:

Mutual of New York can not only set you up with affordable insurance, but also with inspiration for song titles!

Conn – the same folks who brought you Mr. B Natural (and all the important debates pertaining thereunto) – promises that you’ll be playing music the very first day! (But Conn very carefully doesn’t promise how well you’ll play.)

Chrysler Corporation is promoting The Forward Look, although it conveniently elides any commentary on what will happen if your car ends up being possessed. Or any guarantees about its durability should it be stored in a below-ground time capsule for 50 years.

While these guys are eyeballing each other’s cars, Sputnik is only a couple weeks or so from being sent into orbit. (And to add to the quiz show craze, that same comparison is the opening scene to the movie Quiz Show. Which – as if that’s not enough – prominently featured another Chrysler product!)

If you need an outboard motor, throw renowned all-around lovable guy Carl Kiekhaefer some business:

All this, however, means I’m burying the lede. The big story is Little Rock, the integration of Central High School, and the role of Gov. Orval Faubus. Life sent a photographer down, has this lengthy up-close piece about Faubus, talks to his family.

Meanwhile, real people are suffering. The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth was beaten with fists and a chain; Dorothy Counts was threatened and gave up her attempt to attend a Charlotte school; a bomb exploded in the library of a Nashville school because a young Black student had been enrolled there.

Life‘s editorial page examines the events of the week. The second piece got my attention, and it’s why I’m writing about this today. And it’s not because of the legal aspects of it. It’s because the last two grafs touch on the role of the human heart.

It’s interesting to reflect on this same passage 67 years later. For the past few weeks, we have been sorting through the aftermath of the 2024 election. There are those who feel vindicated. There are those who feel distressed. As nauseated as I am by what modern political discourse has devolved into, I’m in neither camp. Instead, historian that I am both by inclination and training, to me it’s the cycle repeating itself. It’s nothing new. Yes, the methods and the media have changed, but the fundamentals haven’t.

Something else that hasn’t changed: the fact that it comes down to what’s in the heart and the conscience of each of us. No election, no referendum, no regime can alter the reality that each of us must answer to ourselves – can we live with the person we see in the mirror? – and we also have to answer to an authority higher than any governor or president or king or overlord, and someday we’ll have to answer for how we treated one another in this life. We have to answer to that voice in our heads that keeps us from being able to sleep if we’ve wronged somebody else. Some folks will be able to meet that test. Other times, though, I’ve felt like the traveler in this song, unable to believe the inhumanity humans willingly visit upon other humans:

We hear a lot about the horrible things that happen. News, as I teach my students, isn’t when the river remains within its banks. But what we don’t see anywhere as often are the little acts of kindness, charity and goodness that take place when nobody’s looking. Yes, the people who say horrible things and do cruel acts and scream the loudest are going to get the attention, and to some extent they’ll set whatever the perception is. But what we don’t see are the everyday acts of goodness: the extended hand, the kind word when it’s needed, the gentle moments of human connection that remind us we’re all occupants of this same life and this same little marble that’s drifting somewhere in the great vastness of space.

I don’t get to choose my students. I have to take who comes my way, no matter their race, creed, color, background, politics, identity…you name the variation and I’ve encountered it in my classroom in some way, shape or form. I’m obligated to set all that aside and treat every one of them the best I know how. That’s not only as a professional, but also as a human being. I have to be able to look back on my day and not regret what I said or what I did. That, and I have never discounted the possibility that God sent someone my way because there was something I needed to learn from them.

Anybody who thinks they know how the next four years, let alone the next decade, will go is fooling themselves. Nobody knows. Some of it will involve things that are in our hands, but so much of it won’t be in our hands. What is always within our hands, though, is how we treat one another. I’d hope that underneath all the loudness and tumult that hearts haven’t hardened, that there’s still a fifth column of decency that remains at work, even if we seldom hear about it.

Or, as a couple of more recent observers would remind us: be excellent to each other.

The ocean liner United States has been a long-standing fascination for me. It started innocently enough, during my senior year in high school. I had befriended the head librarian as soon as I started attending the school and became a library assistant during my senior year. (It tells you everything about me that I had closer relationships with some of my teachers and with the librarians than I had with most of my classmates.) During my senior year, she let me and a friend eat lunch in a work room in back of the library.

Along the back wall of this room were bound volumes of most of the original run of Life magazine, and several years of Time from the late 1940s and early 1950s. More often than not I’d spend part of my lunch hour with some of those volumes pulled down, and I’d happily leaf through these little time capsules, losing myself in another era: not only the stories of what was in the news then, but the photography and the ads. Spend enough time immersed in those ads and you find yourself longing for products that haven’t been offered in forever.

One day I was looking through the June 1952 issues of Time, and one cover stuck out: a ship’s captain, brow furrowed with responsibility, watchful gaze fixed on something in the distance; behind him was a porthole with frolicking vacationers visible, as bon voyage streamers fluttered by, a mildly surreal mash-up of the sort Time covers of the day specialized in. “Commodore Manning of the ‘United States,'” the caption read.

As I looked inside to see what the story was, I couldn’t feel the hook being set. I started reading about this amazing ship and all the modern features, including some the Navy didn’t want to disclose (and which, I’d learn in time, had to do with more than just claims of national security). Then throughout other issues, the advertisements, breathless with anticipation, from United States Lines about the ship’s entry into service. Then to the coverage of the ship in Life.

Inevitably I started wondering: what happened to this ship? It’s what I tend to do when I find out about marvels from the past; some itch makes me wonder what became of them. Nowadays, you could just pull out your smartphone and have the ship’s entire story at your fingertips. But in 1991, a “smartphone” would have meant Don Adams talking into his shoe.

Somehow I found out the ship was still around. There had been plans to convert the ship into a cruise liner, but nothing had happened. The ship was languishing away in Virginia and hadn’t been to sea since 1969. I got interested in writing about the ship and planned to go to Virginia to do some research at the Mariners’ Museum, and hoped to get some photos of the ship while I was there. But since I was the baby of the family, my parents said no. Eventually we worked something out (oh, was that a story) and it became a hastily-arranged family vacation that turned out to be pretty nice, probably the best vacation we took together. We took a harbor cruise and I saw the big ship with my own eyes. I’d been aboard big ships before, having been to many a ship museum, but there was something about seeing this ship up close, in person. The ship was still powerful, looked fast and majestic just sitting there, but so sad: faded, rusted, abused, neglected.

I got involved in the nascent efforts to save the ship from being scrapped, which really picked up when a federal court put the ship up for auction. There were all manner of strings being pulled, but to no avail, and in April 1992 we prepared for the worst to happen at auction. Instead, a Turkish-based group bought the Big U. Two months later the ship went to Turkey, and from there to Sevastopol for drydocking and to have the asbestos-laden interiors stripped out.

Well, the plans went nowhere, and the owners had begun selling parts of the ship for scrap (which is why, among other things, the lifeboats and davits were gone). Another eleventh-hour rescue and the ship ended up in Philadelphia in 1996. The following year, a friend and I went up over Memorial Day weekend to see the ship. When her dad retired from the Air Force in 1962, they got to travel back home from England aboard the ship. She still remembers watching Birdman of Alcatraz in the ship’s theater.

Years passed and various plans came and went, and the ship dodged various brushes with doom. At one point it seemed tantalizingly like the ship would get converted to go back to sea again, but that didn’t work out. At another point, plans for the ship’s refurbishment and preservation seemed so close. But that, alas, was not to be. And then, the owner of the pier where the Big U was moored got tired of this big ship being there, and more legal wrangling ensued. Alas, we know how it ended; with sale to a Florida county that will scuttle the ship as the world’s largest artificial reef.

Back in July, we didn’t know how this was going to turn out, although since January, when the word about the pier situation really started getting dire, I had been bracing for the final act happening sometime this year, and I had a feeling the ship was running out of lives. The e-mails from the ship’s preservation organization were sounding more concerned than usual.

There had been occasional opportunities for guided tours aboard the ship, but they often involved more money than I had available, or they required some kind of “in,” such as being a former passenger. But in mid-year, the Conservancy opened things up: for a minimum donation, you could go aboard. I thought the odds of me getting a slot were long, but I figured I’d regret if I didn’t try, and so I sent an inquiry. To my surprise, I got the first date I requested. All I had to do was make the donation, which happened moments later. Then came all the logistics: oh, crap, I gotta plan a route, book hotel rooms, get a timeline together, etc., etc. Which, all of that came together, but since I do tend to fret, it got interesting.

The morning of July 19, I loaded up the car and set out. On any trip this size, I’ll usually spend about the first 20 minutes wondering why am I doing this crazy thing? and then, at a certain point, something will shift and I’ll ease into travel mode. Certainly by the time I was on I-77, I was ready to go. My trip followed much the same route my friend and I had taken in 1997: I-77 to I-81, and then on to the Pennsylvania Turnpike to Philadelphia. It was hours and hours and hours of travel, with TCM’s splendid podcasts about Pam Grier and John Ford keeping me company much of the way. Since I had started out early, though, I was able to make it across the Pennsylvania line and spend the night in Chambersburg. The next morning, I was up early, got on the Turnpike and it was on to Philadelphia. Mission-driven person I am, I was there at 9:15 for the 10 a.m. report time, and killed a little time at a Lowe’s near the rendezvous point. Across the busy four-lane street from us, there was the Big Ship. It had been so long. I was glad to see my old friend again, even if my heart broke a little more.

There was a group of about 20 that morning, from various places; some of us were experienced with old ships, while some were just curious about this big old ship they kept seeing from the Walt Whitman Bridge. One was an artist who had become fascinated with the ship and was making a repeat visit to take pictures for her projects. Eventually all were accounted for, and we made a convoy over to the pier, and parked where we could. I was finally up close with the ship, and I could scarcely believe it. There’s my car, all of a sudden, parked alongside s/s United States.

We got out of our vehicles and stood pierside, then walked around for photo opportunities. I was overawed. This is so big, I kept thinking. But that cut two ways: yes, the ship was a marvel, but only up close could I really appreciate how much damage the years had inflicted: the mangled railings, the busted portholes, the streaks and pocks of rust. In a heartbeat, my awe turned to sadness: This is so big. The vastness of the job was suddenly so apparent, like a giant hole had consumed me and all I had to dig out with was a toy shovel and pail. I had the feeling you’d need probably a billion dollars to truly do this project right. It was a billion dollars I didn’t have.

Every so often, the inevitable becomes heartbreakingly clear and you have to brace for it. It’s a feeling I knew in early 2019 when the veterinarian at the emergency clinic told me that our senior cat’s heart was giving out and that I was about to lose my bestest buddy of 15 years, and I suddenly had to make one of the most heartbreaking decisions I’ve ever made. It’s a feeling I knew not two weeks into this year when I got the phone call that my mother, who had been in the hospital but seemed okay when I visited two days before, was in the ICU and was crashing quickly. It’s the feeling that you’re about to have to let go of something you have loved so dearly for so long, that last-minute happy endings don’t exist outside Hollywood, and even the first glimmers that maybe it’s all for the best, that the unforeseen costs of answered prayers could end up worse than just doing the right thing and, as a friend of mine often says, letting go and letting God. It’s the coldness of reality grabbing you by the collar.

Now, granted, this is different because a 990-foot ship will never love you back. But, still, when you’ve invested 33 years into caring so deeply about something…yeah, this hurt.

In time our tour guide led us down the pier to a metal gangway. After all these years, it was about to happen. Up and over, and I’m aboard. “We meet at last,” I tell the ship, giving a gentle pat as I step aboard, into a crew area called Times Square. A couple of men who help take care of the ship greet us. There’s some paperwork we have to sign (of course), and we’re all given flashlights since there’s a lot of areas without lights ahead, and after a briefing we set off.

(Side note: Some of what I’m about to cover was also covered by Steven Ujifusa, author of A Man And His Ship, in this post a few days ago. Check it out, as Steven got coverage of a few areas I mention here but didn’t get pictures of.)

First we have to climb a spiral stair up, and then we emerge into…vast emptiness. Where passenger cabins once were, now there are outlines of where walls used to be. Light streams in from the cabin ports. The stubs from where the toilet and bath plumbing used to be stick up from the decks. The ship’s decor and many other artifacts were auctioned off in 1984 and are now scattered among hundreds of museums and private collections, and good luck ever getting all that stuff back; much of what was left, notably the marinite asbestos panels that made up walls and other interior divisions, was gutted in 1994 during the yard period in Sevastopol. For the most part, we’re touring an empty hull, communing with ghosts. Here and there, there are signs of what once was – the different patterns on the decks that corresponded with which class you were in (first, cabin or tourist). It’s like finding little traces of a lost civilization. It made your heart hurt. At one point, in a now-denuded lounge, I embraced one of the countless structural stanchions that shoot up through the public spaces like trees. Very quietly, I whispered: “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” If it’s true that ships have souls, I hope that ship heard me.

There’s something else I haven’t mentioned. If you’ve been aboard enough ships, you know they have a distinct smell. Just about every ship I’ve been aboard has had some variant of that smell, even active Navy ships that are well-maintained. It’s a mix of grease, fuel oil, sweat, stale air and who knows what else. It’s hard to describe, but the closest thing I’ve found is the smell of old color-printed magazines that have sat in storage for a long time; a pungent, slightly mildew-y, slightly ashy smell that gets your attention. Now imagine that on a ship that hasn’t been climate-controlled in decades, neglected and open to the elements. Even through a KF94 mask I could pick up that smell. It soaked into my hair and my clothes, and even days later I could detect the smell in that mask. It became poignant.

Some of the public areas were evocative. At one point we went into a little room that looked out over what had been the first class dining room, where everybody who was anybody would have dined back in the day, wearing their absolute best, the truly important folks getting invited to sit at the table with the Commodore (or with the captain when the Commodore wasn’t at sea). The tables were long gone; only the sockets remained from where the table legs were secured to the deck. The little compartment we were in, one deck up, was a loft where the musicians had once played. And now we looked out over an empty dining room; the best we could do was reconstruct the scene in our minds.

Elsewhere on the tour, we visited what had been the first class lounge. You could still make out where the musician’s platform had been, and the circular dance floor, though worse for wear, was still evident. I was likely to never get another chance, so when no one was looking, I did a quick Natalie Merchant twirl on the dance floor and rejoined the group.

Eventually we emerged on deck. Once upon a time we’d have been walking on green-colored weather decks covered in Neotex. But over the years the Neotex gave up, crumbled away. Some of it rests as little gray-green flecks of gravel collected in nooks and crannies, while some larger pieces hold on. The temptation was strong to pick up a little piece of it and slip it into my pocket as a souvenir. But…my conscience told me it wouldn’t have been right. The only thing I felt was right to take was photographs, and so I did.

We explored other areas: where the lifeboats and davits once were, now it’s just a long and open run of clear deck, with beaten-up railings along the edges. The pilothouse, where the ship was guided on record-breaking voyages and through stormy seas, is now empty. Atop the pilothouse, you could look up close at the giant forward funnel, whose last sheets of weather-beaten paint from the final yard period 56 years ago are hanging on for dear life. Brave souls could try to climb up the foremast, but my dread of heights kept me a live coward instead of an vertigo-plagued hero.

We explored aft, too: overlooking one of the giant propellers now resting on deck; a good view of the aft railing that was bent in Sevastopol; the shoots of green that have grown in nooks and crannies; the rust that has eaten away at unprotected metal. Then the vacant promenade deck, once all full of life, but now empty and ghostly, empty light fixtures now hanging down.

Back inside and back down to Times Square we went. The tour had already gone longer than expected, but there was more to see. As we waited for the next leg of the tour, there was a cooler with iced-down bottles of water and Gatorade, and we were welcome to help ourselves. I hadn’t had anything in hours, and walking around this unventilated ship on a humid summer day had worn me low. It took me no time at all to drain a bottle of Gatorade.

Then we were off to visit one of the engine rooms; once a forbidden area, now we were merrily climbing through it, exploring things, finding wonders hidden in the dark mustiness. Along the way, I’d look up and see paint hanging down in giant sheets from the overhead, or see where cables and wiring had been chopped out. I got to thinking about the hundreds of miles of wiring and cabling that would have to be replaced, the countless passages and corridors and nooks and crannies that would have to be scraped and repainted…well, there went my heart hitting the deck once more.

The last stop on the tour was the swimming pool. When the ship was new, this kind of became famous, with the stylized flags spelling out “Come on in – the water’s fine” on the bulkhead at the rear of the pool. Well, the pool basin was still there, but the flags and a whole lot else were long gone. Some in the group climbed down into the basin, while I was content to soak in the ambience from above. I’ve never learned how to swim, anyway, and with my luck I’d have found a way to go under in a dry pool.

And with that, the tour was over. We threaded our way back up to Times Square and our tour guide gave each of us a folder with some information and a sticker, our souvenir of the visit. I waited behind to let others go ashore first, and to thank the gentlemen who had helped us while we were aboard. But then I had a moment of panic: I couldn’t find my glasses. I looked everywhere in Times Square, unable to remember where they might be. At last I thought to check the top of my head; sure enough, I was still wearing them. Yeah, it was a brain failure, but in its way, it gave me a private moment with the ship. On the way out, I gave a bulkhead a gentle, loving pat, told the Big U to keep her courage, and reluctantly joined everyone else on the pier.

There was time for a few more pictures, and we lingered and talked for a little while, and then the convoy headed out. The two men who had hitched a ride over with me met back up with me, and I delivered them to their vehicle, wished them well on their ride back to Virginia. And then I gave our ship one last, loving look as I drove away. I looked up at Uncle Walt’s bridge, with “Song of Himself” gamboling through my head, then pointed my car the other direction, toward I-95 and the hotel room that awaited me in North Carolina.

That night, as I prepared for bed, the smell of that ship was still with me: in my clothes, in my hair. As, too, were the tangled emotions: wishing I could pick the Big U up, take that ship home with me; trying to cope with the likelihood that the ship could well be torn apart in a ditch in Brownsville, or that the ship that Mr. Gibbs designed to never sink would meet that very fate. But even with all that, I could know that, even if the worst did happen, at least I had this day.

Given what I know now, I’m glad I had it.