The Heart of a Volunteer

“I guess that’s just part of loving people: You have to give things up. Sometimes you even have to give them up.”
― Lauren Oliver, Delirium 

Memorial Day, 2019. We honor a hero, a person in uniformed service of our country who gave the "Last full measure of devotion." This year, our hero is Riley Howell.


Who? Riley Howell was a junior at the University of North Carolina - Charlotte. On April 30th a gunman entered a classroom. Mr. Howell, an Army ROTC cadet, tackled the gunman, buying time for his classmates to escape. In the process, he was killed.

His actions, above and beyond the call of duty, is in the best tradition of generations of service members who have given their lives. It is often said that their lives are given in the cause of freedom.

In Mr. Howell's case, as in so many in the annuls of our history, his sacrifice was much closer to Earth. He gave up everything in the service of his comrades, his friends.

Riley was awarded a Purple Heart, and a Bronze Star. He was a hero who gave his life in the service of his country.

With deepest respect for all of the fallen. 

Here I Am; Send Me

Courage is looking fear right in the eye and saying, “Get the hell out of my way, I’ve got things to do.” Author Unknown

I'm sure that smoke from the conflagration on I-70 was visible to the first responders from nearly the moment they were dispatched. I'm sure the terror in the voices of the witnesses and victims was clearly evident in every call received in Jeffcom. I'm sure that the first units on scene reported they had arrived at a nightmare marring a perfect spring afternoon. Unknown number of cars, unknown number of victims.

What unfolded next is a textbook example of everything that is good about the emergency response system that has evolved in our state. Dispatch professionals sorted through the information pouring in, triaged it to make it manageable, and communicated it to the responding officers. The initial units made split-second decisions about victims, injuries, rescues as the flames shot hundreds of feet into the air. Officers from surrounding jurisdictions, many likely self-dispatching because they share a common comm center, arrived with the ages-old service professional question - "How can I help?"

With hundreds of resources arriving from multiple police and fire agencies, as well as CDOT, someone (or a couple of someones) takes charge because that's what they've been trained to do. They hear the commotion on the radio. They can feel the heat of the flames on their faces. They are breathing air tainted by burning plastic, metal, asphalt and, yes, people. They hear the sounds of combustion, the muffled explosions. They know what is at stake.

There are things to do.

By all accounts, everyone involved displayed courage, competence and professionalism - Police, Fire, CDOT, Comm Center. From the initial calls, the first on-scene's lifesaving efforts, the crash investigation figuring out a massive puzzle and methodically building a case (UPDATE: Including the criminalist who responded to collect evidence and take photos, who donned firefighter boots to make their way through the wreckage - home well into Friday), the PIO who patiently explained a dynamic, evolving situation well into the wee hours to a press corps (representing the public) needing updated information, to CDOT's command structure... The fire fighters wading into the flames, risking (and in this case sustaining) injury in a thousand different ways to ensure that the victims had every opportunity at life. Hundreds of methodically-trained, expensively equipped, experienced pros, doing the job like it's meant to be done.

The loss of life is tragic. Ours is a profession that deals with the very human emotion of grief, both of the family members left behind, as well as our own. We want to save every victim.

On May 1st it will be 40 years since I was first sworn in as a police officer. I can say this, without blinking. We are - the First Responder System in Colorado - exceptionally well prepared to serve the citizens of this state. The men and women who have stepped up, who have accepted the challenges of a career in emergency services, who have answered the question "Whom shall I send?" with:

"Here I am, send me."

I admire every one who responded. 

Flying into History

"I could never be so lucky again." Jimmy Doolittle.

Among the darkest times in living memory was the early part of 1942 -- when Hitler's armies were nearly to Moscow; when German submarines were sinking our oil tankers off the coasts of Florida and New Jersey, within sight of the beaches, and there was not a thing we could do about it; when half our navy had been destroyed at Pearl Harbor. We had scarcely any air force. Army recruits were drilling with wooden rifles. And there was no guarantee whatever that the Nazi war machine could be stopped. Historian David McCullough, Jefferson Lecture (2003).

Mourning the passing of the last Doolittle Raider.

It isn't that Richard Cole isn't important. As the last of the Doolittle Raiders, his passing at one hundred three years old is a monument to him and his life. There was a time, seventy-seven years ago, when he did something incredibly brave, incredibly meaningful.

They went together, the Raiders. Eighty fliers, sixteen specially modified B-25 Mitchells. Most got through the raid and returned to the US. Some didn't.

It is impossible for anyone not living then to understand what America was like. We can read the history books, the personal accounts. But, it is impossible for us, today, in a United States that has been the world's preeminent power for nearly eighty years to understand what early 1942 was like.

The attack on Pearl Harbor was seen by even sober observers as an existential threat to our country. Americans felt powerless in the face of armies that never seemed to retreat. Serious people with important jobs actively prepared for not only the invasion of the Hawaiian Islands. They were planning the defense of the West Coast, hoping to stop the onslaught somewhere in the Rocky Mountains.

The Raiders embarked on the aircraft carrier Hornet, one of the few big American ships left in the Pacific. The planes together carried about as many tons of bombs as one Vietnam-era F-105 fighter/bomber. The ships were discovered several hundred miles short of the aircraft's intended departure point. There wouldn't be enough gas to attack Tokyo and then find the bases in China, to make safe landings.

They took off, anyway.

The damage done to Japan was incidental. American planes would not arrive in large numbers over Tokyo for nearly three more years. Yet... The psychological impact on The US was substantial. We were fighting back. We would be okay.

Now, all of these men of courage have passed into history. They were giants, titans. They got into their airplanes, took off from a pitching carrier deck and delivered a message to the militarists in Japan - America will fight.

God bless you all.

A Voyeur's Perch

"Ere he shall lose an eye for such a truffle. For doing deeds of nature. I'm ashamed. The law is an ass." English dramatist George Chapman, Revenge for Honour, (1654).

"If the law supposes that," said Mr. Bumble, squeezing his hat emphatically in both hands, "the law is an ass - an idiot." Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist, (1838).

There are very good reasons people sometimes distrust lawyers.

I recently commented on an article, posted on a web site called Powerline, about something that I found offensive. The situation was right out of Dickens, a bizarre bit of legal tartuffery. A blog writer proffered arguments that are clothed in the niceties of legal jargon, but devoid of any sense of human decency. A week or so ago, one of their feature writers warned against the use of profanity (ass apparently falling into that category, Dickens or not. My comment was removed), warning dismissal from the site and inviting people who don't like it to write their own blogs.

Your proposal is acceptable.

What could have caused such upset that I would risk eternal Powerline damnation? A trial began last week in Minneapolis involving the allegation of murder by a police officer of an unarmed person. The facts are horribly tragic. A woman from Australia called police to report the possibility that a sexual assault was taking place in an alley. A two-officer team responded, arriving minutes later. It was dark. At some point the RP approached the police car. For reasons that have never been explained one of the officers - an inexperienced young man - shot her.

The judge in the murder case ruled recently that a brief bit of evidence collected at the scene would be made available to the jury, but not to the public. This provoked outrage among the legal beagles at Powerline, both blog authors and commenters. The judge was suppressing evidence, many wrote in high dudgeon, citing Periwinkle v. Pumpernickel, or some such, in support. One writer helpfully added the citation (the volume and page number of the decision) in the event that someone a whole lot like me would want to look it up on their own. The judge, they opined, had made a ruling that was searching for legal justification.

What, you ask, could have provoked  such ire? There is apparently police body cam evidence detailing the woman's dying moments, complete with video of her lying naked from the waist up. The officers are performing CPR, to no avail. The judge refuses to make that portion available to the public.

I say - good for her. All of us in the business have met judges like her. They make a ruling in their courtroom out of a sense of justice, proportion and common sense. When one of the attorneys questions the decision, the judge says, "This is my courtroom. I'll not allow that. If the appeals court disagrees, fine."

But saying the law is an ass on Powerline when they want video of a naked, dying woman played in open court is offensive to the lawyers who write there. This is why the average person often thinks lawyers are assholes.

Most people, hearing this tale, will have an immediate emotional reaction to it. It is the Dr. Jonathan Haidt "Elephant v. Rider" idea - that people start with their feelings (the elephant) and then justify that with rational argument (the rider). I'm no different. I can offer a thousand legal reasons why evidence that proves 1) The victim died, 2) the cops tried to save her and 3)  she was naked - isn't necessary and can be kept from public display. One and two can be proven by other evidence. Three is not relevant to the case.

But, I have an emotional response to this...evidence...that is instant and visceral.

A man called our dispatch some years ago, reporting that he was having trouble breathing and requesting an ambulance. Whatever had taken him ill struck him fatally while he was on the phone with us. We found him, phone in hand, sprawled on the floor of his kitchen. A coroner's investigator, standing next to me over the body, remarked, "Really, there is no dignity in death."

Well, no shit. Make all the legal arguments you want. The law can sometimes be an ass. It doesn't mean we lawyers have to also be assholes.

Good for you, judge. Stick to your decision. It's the right thing to do.   

Nostalgia Ain't What It Used To Be

"Learn to write the same way you learn to play golf. You do it and keep doing it until you get it right."
Novelist Tom Clancy.

I've hit something of a writing lull. Part of it is the natural ebb and flow. Right now, there isn't a lot to write about, unless one wants to take on Russian collusion...I don't. And part of it is that I'm reading more. Thanks to Audiobooks, I've had a chance to revisit Tom Clancy.

I began my writing efforts trying, in a certain way, to mimic Clancy and his methods. The guy has sold millions of books. So, why the hell not. Some of my favorite reading moments involved his books, back when the real thing represented the medium.

I subscribed to the Book of the Month Club, and would routinely order the latest Clancy book - spaced about a year apart. Ripping open the tough, book-sized cardboard shipping container, along half inch perforations - rarely entirely successfully - I'd relax in my Red Grandis wooden slat rocking chair. Pouring a glass of middle 90s Kendall Jackson cabernet sauvignon into an Arches Winery stem glass, I'd open the book. This wine is perfect for the occasion, I thought. By twirling it in the light of the 60 watt bulb of the portfolio barada floor lamp, I could examine the legs, denoting relative dryness. It occurred to me at that moment that some things in California are done well.

Reading was a welcome respite from the toll a law enforcement career takes. Each day, I'd look over my Gen 2 Glock 19 9mm semi-automatic pistol, ensuring that I had fifteen pristine 145 grain hollow point Federal premium duty rounds in the Glock factory magazine. I would tuck the handgun into a Safariland concealed carry holster and head for work.

But, at night, after the tiny humans were asleep in our tri-level four bedroom single family home - now warmer after our vinyl siding remake - I'd open the new book. At my feet, our diluted breed forty pound Golden Retriever, officially named Darwin. A difficult early life rendered him a somewhat bemused creature, I always thought. His nickname was "Two Dog," because no one dog could be as dumb.

The cloth binding, white pages printed in offset lithography...

I can't keep this up.

I loved the early Clancy novels. They celebrated, aside from the military hardware that commonly dressed the set, the kind of selflessness that accompanies armed service. 

In one book (I don't remember which) Secret Service agents battle an armed assailant, bent on some sort of mayhem. Several are killed. As an investigator stands over one body, he mutters "Nice job, buddy." To Clancy, the good guys were good, the bad guys bad and in the end good triumphed.

Some of Clancy's preferences found their way into my writing, at least as much as my editors would allow. In Out of Ideas, a friend of main character Karen Sorenson gets out of a BMW 3 series sedan and hands her a bag containing an H&K 417 rifle chambered in NATO 7.62, with Leopold combat optics. Some habits are hard to break.

Clancy sold a hundred million books writing the way he wrote. A new genre evolved from his novels. But, as I plug my Samsung S8 into the auxiliary jack of my gray 2010 Toyota Tacoma TRD double cab 4X4... I'll be ready for this book to end, and I can find one that allows my own imagination some elbowroom.

Getting Out The Vote

Don't buy a single vote more than necessary. I'll be damned if I'm going to pay for a landslide. Joseph P. Kennedy

I avoid political posts here on Bikecopblog for a number of reasons - mostly because what I have to say doesn't seem especially interesting, even to me. I am as inclined toward talking about current events as the next writer, perhaps less so than the pros, more so than others who have exciting, enriching things to do with their lives. So - fair warning, this is a departure of sorts. I'm writing because this law is an abomination.

The Colorado Legislature just voted approval of, and our governor signed into law, our inclusion into the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. As near as I understand it, this legislation commands that the electors for the state - those votes commonly called the "Electoral College" that determine who will be president - will be chosen based on the national "Popular vote." In other words, if a majority of the voters of the State of Colorado choose Candidate A, but a majority of country-wide voters choose Candidate B, the Electoral Votes are - by law - cast for Candidate B.

Setting aside that this is clearly not the method contemplated in Article II of the Constitution, nor is it something the Framers envisioned or advocated...

Our country was founded on the principle that government derives its just powers from individuals who have a voice in creating the laws under which they are governed. "Taxation without representation" was the rallying cry of the generation who decided they were not all that into taking their orders from afar.

A great deal of evidence suggests that, in the last election, voter fraud existed in any number of polling places. Ineligible voters cast ballots, concocted ballots were counted. People have recently gone to jail for such things. In one district in Michigan, "voter discrepancies" led to a miscount, appearing to show that more votes were counted than individuals registered to vote.

How does all of this happen? In some cases, human frailty led to good faith clerical errors. In others, blatant partisanship has manipulated the process until it is a sham. Lax (or non-existent) enforcement of laws has allowed voting to be influenced, suppressed or artificially inflated.

A number of states are employing imaginative methods to increase voting. One such method, called "Ballot Harvesting," allows for collection of mail-in ballots by third party activists. California is one state that experimented with it in 2018.

Does ballot harvesting lead to voter fraud? While it is too soon to have a definitive answer, there is certainly enough evidence to merit further examination. But...

I have no say in how Californians are allowed to vote. Neither do I have any say - ANY SAY - in who is allowed to vote in California. People who are not eligible to vote under Colorado law surely could be given that right if the people of California decide to make it so. Yet...

In the great scheme of the Popular Vote Compact individuals permitted to vote in their state, who would be ineligible in mine, are counted with the same weight mine is, and as an accumulation will render my vote meaningless. A majority of eligible voters in Colorado could vote for one candidate, only to have State Electoral voters commanded to vote for someone else.

Before our legislature, one witness testified in support of The Compact, saying "(Candidate A) should be president." Of course, Both Candidate A and Candidate B campaigned knowing the rules and expended their limited resources to take advantage of the system as it presented. There is nothing to suggest, were the rules as The Compact envisions them, that Candidate B's campaign efforts would not have been as successful. There is only conjecture, and the disappointment felt by impassioned individuals who believed in their own causes.

The Constitution could be amended to make these changes. But, that is a cumbersome and chancy proposition. Better to circumvent the Constitution in an effort to... What?

That is the great unanswered question. 

Turning Pages

"Still, there are times I am bewildered by each mile I have traveled, each meal I have eaten, each person I have known, each room in which I have slept. As ordinary as it all appears, there are times when it is beyond my imagination." Jhumpa Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies (1999).

I have grown lazy, accustomed to - perhaps even embracing - the ease with which I can search a billion files and come up with a recipe for mashed sweet potatoes. I hover over the print button, produce a color version and consult it periodically as I cook. Once it has accomplished its insular and clearly defined task, it is thrown away with the skin peels.

One might think that a writer who navigates mostly the digital world - all of my novels are available on Kindle - would seamlessly move into the world of zeros and ones. One would be mistaken.

We have accumulated dozens of cookbooks, into which we have increasingly jumped with twin feelings of nostalgia and reverence. There is just something about a cook book. The search began.

I flipped through Emeril Lagasse's Louisiana Real and Rustic. Pat and I purchased it at the old Tattered Cover in Cherry Creek, stopped at a pub for a beer and poured over it. Our first dish - Red Beans and Rice. I was not optimistic at first. Four hours later I was hooked. The spine is falling apart (twenty years later) and many of the pages are stained with some of the many fabulous dishes we've created from this book.

We're doing a prime rib roast today - it's Jed's ninth birthday and he is allergic to chicken - and I looked first for cooking instructions in Ray Lampe's Dr. BBQ's Big Time Barbeque Cookbook. I bought it many years ago, ahead of making a brisket for daughter Beth's college graduation. Eighteen hours later (including mostly overnight) the meal was a success. The book has notes, tabs, loose printed recipes and the evidence of the dozens of ribs, rubs and side dishes it has described.

I have two autographed cookbooks that are in general use - one called Blue Crabs was a Christmas gift out of which I've made both crab cakes and a seafood gumbo that is a sort of coastal decadence only a visit to Baltimore can replicate. The other, an Emeril book that my mom stood in line to have signed by the man himself.

Yet, it is two homemade books and an old recipe I cherish the most. 

The first is titled Beth's Florida Cookbook. It contains pictures, recipes and recollections from her time in Ft. Myers. She rescued it just after it was written when she evacuated ahead of a hurricane. It has multiple dishes we've made over the years (including a simple but breathtaking shrimp marinade). My favorite, which we've actually made just ahead of a vacation, is "Beth's Hurricane Dinner."

1. Take everything out of the fridge or freezer that will go bad.
2. Cook it all on the grill.
3. Eat as much as you can while drinking warm beer.
4. Feed leftovers to the cat.

We substitute the dogs into step 4, since out cat usually looks at us and struts away when we try to feed her people food.

Beth's Maryland cookbook contains a Salmon with Grapefruit and Coriander sauce dish whose author is Martin Ginsburg. Never heard of him? Look up Supreme Court Justice Ruth Ginsburg.

Finally, we have put on the wall of our kitchen a recipe for Beefsteak Pudding, which my brothers and I ungenerously renamed "Lard Stew." It is an old rendering of a dish from the Nineteenth Century, a conglomeration of suet, inexpensive beef cuts and flour. Yes, it is as greasy and chewy as it sounds. But, in beautiful handwriting is this phrase:

"If you get stuck, ask the boys. They've watched me make one."

The boys are my grandmother's sons...my dad and my Uncle Jim.

The internet has its place. Ultimately, I found what I was after online - Paula Dean's recipe for mashed sweet potatoes. But, nothing compares to opening a book to connect with a time, a place and a loved one.