Lunch Meat

This is a true story.

It’s about 12:15 in the afternoon on a Tuesday in May 1988. A TV News Reporter and Cameraman are sitting in the station-issued Chevy Blazer news vehicle in the drive-through lane of a fast food restaurant. One of the major chains- I can’t remember which one – aren’t they really all the same anyway? They’re ordering lunch – the typical meat-on-a-bun fare. A staple in the diet of a mid-market news crew that’s always on deadline. It has to be quick as they are on their way to yet another boring interview on another boring story.

A call comes in over the two-way radio (this was in the day before cellphones were standard issue). “Unit six, please respond.”

The cameraman picks up the radio. “Unit six, go.”

The guy on the news desk on the other end of the radio says, “Fam, we need you to head up to Belmont, we have a report of a vehicle hit by a train.”

“Roger that,” the cameraman says. “Do you have the coordinates?”

“Not yet, we’re working on it,” the desk responds. “Start rolling that way and we’ll get back to you.”

“10-4,” the cameraman replies. “You’ll have to reschedule our interview.”

“Got it,” says the desk.

The cameraman sets the radio handset in the cradle as they pull up to the window and pick up their lunch.

The reporter says, “I’d rather do this anyway than interview that city councilman.” A pause. “It’s a good thing we got something to eat first.”

The cameraman replies, “Belmont is about 45 minutes from here. If we spend 30 minutes at the scene and take 50 minutes to get back to the station, we’ll be fine for the early news.”

They head out toward Belmont. It’s mostly on the freeway, out of the city and into the rural area north of town. Mid-day there isn’t much traffic. It’s a nice spring day, a bit on the cool side but with the promise of summer just around the corner. Bright blue skies. A nice day for a drive – albeit toward what is probably a tragic incident.

Along the way the news desk calls back with two pieces of information. First are the coordinates – the crew now knows exactly where to go. The reporter pulls out the map (again, this is the pre-GPS era) and becomes the navigator for the cameraman.

The second piece of information is the outcome. “This one’s a fatal, guys,” the news desk says. “One victim.”

“Roger that,’ says the cameraman. The mood turns somber, but the sense of urgency increases. Now this will probably be the lead story on what had been, to this point, a light news day.

The crew drives on, exiting the freeway and turning toward Belmont, ending up on a two-lane blacktop through gently rolling, wooded hills. After 10 minutes or so, they crest a small rise and see the flashing lights of emergency vehicles ahead. As they get closer they can see the train crossing. The arms are down, lights still flashing. Two police cars, an ambulance and a fire truck are off on the shoulders of the road.

The cameraman parks the vehicle, goes around to the back and pulls out his gear. The reporter joins him, notepad in hand, and together they walk up to the crossing. Glancing about, the cameraman notices they are the news first crew to arrive.

They approach a police officer standing at the crossing. There are two tracks that cross the road here. There is not much traffic on this road, but occasionally a car will approach from one side or the other. The officer is here to wave the cars through, after looking down the tracks, as the crossing arms are locked down while the scene is investigated.

There’s no elegant way to ask. The reporter says to the officer, “What happened?

This is background only. The crew wants to get a sense of what’s going on before taping any interviews. The cameraman has set up his camera on the tripod and is getting some establishing shots of the scene as the reporter talks to the cop.

The officer says, “A vehicle was hit by a northbound train going between 55-60 miles an hour. There was one occupant in the vehicle, who is deceased.”

Hearing this, the reporter glances up the tracks to the north. The cameraman swings his camera up that way, resets his focus and zooms down the line. There’s not much to see, though, as the tracks begin to curve to the east and out of sight.

The officer continues, “The train had no warning. The vehicle pulled onto the tracks while the arms were down. Impact occurred before the engineer could hit the brakes.”

The cameraman is beginning to see, through the camera lens, debris along the side of the tracks. It’s difficult to tell exactly what he is seeing. Nothing he’s seen so far appears to be parts of the vehicle, but there is definitely ‘stuff’ along the tracks, beginning about 50 yards from the crossing and continuing until the track bends out of sight into the trees.

The reporter asks the cop, “How could the driver not see the train coming? The crossing arms were down at the time, weren’t they?”

The officer responded, “According to the train engineer, the arms were down. The vehicle was going around the arms when it was struck by the train.” He paused, the continued, “Apparently another train was on one of the tracks as the vehicle approached the crossing. The first train passed, but the crossing arms did not go up. The driver of the vehicle tried to go around the arms and was struck by a second train, coming from the other direction, on the second set of tracks.”

The cameraman picked up his camera and tripod and walked back to the spot where the vehicle would have parked as it waited for the train to go by. He panned his camera slowly, from what would have been the driver of the vehicle’s point of view. It became clear to the cameraman what the vehicle driver must have seen. The first train, heading south, passed on the near set of tracks. As it went by, it screened the driver’s view of a northbound train as it approached. He wouldn’t have heard it, assuming what he was hearing was the sound of the train that just passed.

The cameraman picked up his gear, walked around the crossing arm, and stood in the road between the two sets of tracks. Looking south, where the train would have been approaching, he tried to imagine the surprise, shock and horror the driver of the vehicle must have felt as he saw the train. He realized he was standing in precisely the spot where the train would have struck the vehicle.

The death zone.

This was the first time, he realized, the cameraman had stood in the exact spot where less than two hours ago another person had lost their life.

He was no stranger to death, of course. He had come to learn the old adage, ‘if it bleeds, it leads,’ is true in local TV News. He had seen his share of dead bodies, crime scenes where murders and grisly accidents had taken place. But this was the first time he stood on the exact piece of ground where someone took their last breath, saw their last sight, thought their last thought – in this case, most likely, “oh, sh--!!”

This cameraman was an introspective, contemplative sort. It was a sobering experience to stand here and record the images that would tell of the last moments of this person. At the same time, he had been around the block long enough to have developed a method of coping, of doing his job and not letting his emotions get in the way.

He finished getting his shots, picked up his gear, and made his way back to the reporter who was still talking to the cop. The two had been joined by the Lieutenant, who was supervising the scene. He agreed to speak on camera, giving the crew the requisite ‘sound bites’ that would be used to tell the story. He repeated the basic facts – a vehicle went around the railroad track crossing arms, which were functioning and in the down position during the accident. One train had passed the crossing, the crossing warning sign arms did not go up, the vehicle attempted to go around the crossing arms and was struck by a second train coming from the opposite direction. One vehicle occupant, killed on impact.

The reporter asked, “What type of vehicle was it?”

The police Lieutenant said, “I can’t release that information until the victims’ next of kin has been notified.”

After a couple of additional questions the interview was completed. The cameraman turned the camera off and asked the cop, “Can we hike down the track and get some footage of the scene?”

The officer replied, “You can go as far as you like, but the train is almost a mile away. This train was heavy and traveling at a high rate of speed. It takes a train like that a long time to stop, even when the brakes are locked up. It’s quite a hike to get to the engine.”

The cameraman and reporter conferred. “We don’t have time to get that footage and still make the early news,” the reporter said. “Let’s just go a little ways doen the line, get some debris footage and head back to the station.”

The officer said, “Be my guest, but watch where you step.”

The reporter said, “What do you mean?”

The officer said, “Off the record?”

“Sure,” said the reporter.

“The vehicle that was hit was a catering truck,” said the officer, “one of those ‘mobile lunch wagons’ that visit factories and manufacturing sites. It basically exploded on impact. There’s all kinds of lunch meat and food scattered down the line.”

He paused, took a breath and continued, “We aren’t sure we’ve found all of the body parts of the victim. We don’t have enough to make a positive ID. We assume there was only one victim because the company dispatcher told us who the driver was. We’re looking right now for something we can make a positive ID with – some dental work, a hand we can get a finger print from, something like that.”

“So, if you want to go down there and shoot some video, go ahead. But please don’t touch anything. And as I said, watch where you step.” He paused, and said, “and I wouldn’t do any snacking if you find something you think came from the truck.”

The cameraman and reporter look at each other.

“Let’s just get some shots from here and get going,” said the reporter to the cameraman. “Do you have enough footage?”

“I need a bit more. Give me a minute or two,” the cameraman replied.

The reporter went back to the news vehicle and got inside. The cameraman took his camera and shot for another two minutes or so, packed up and went back to the news vehicle. After stowing his gear, he got into the driver’s seat, started up, turned the car around and began to head back to the station.

They drove in silence for awhile – the reporter thinking about how to tell the story, the cameraman thinking about what he had seen and felt.

After a few minutes, the reporter reached into the lunch bag he got at the drive through earlier that day. He reached into the bag and pulled out his half eaten sandwich. He looked at it for a moment – the cameraman wondering if he would actually take a bite of the cold, soggy meal. Instead, the reporter looked up and said, “There’s a moral to this story, you know.”

“What’s that?” said the cameraman.

Taking a bite, through a mouthful of food, the reporter said, “It’s better to EAT the meat than BE the meat.”

It’s Great to be The Family Man.

If you enjoyed this post, visit The Camping Machine)to read more like it.

Cool Summer

It’s been quite a summer for The Family Man as well as for the Mann family. How to recap an entire summer in a blog post? Let’s try.

In my last post I described our first trip of the summer in The Camping Machine. Over the rest of the summer we took six additional trips. When all was said and done we visited three National Parks and four state parks, a beautiful mountain lake and a very nice local campground. Chris and Tommy really enjoy camping and have become very good travelers in the car, as many of these trips required several hours over the road. For those of you who have not pulled a large trailer over mountain passes, it adds quite a bit of time to the journey. The good news is you can make a ‘pit stop’ almost anywhere – and believe me, we have.

We took quite a few pictures, but I’ve become a bit leery about posting photos of the boys on this site. Without going into much detail, a couple of emails I’ve received have made me reconsider posting those photos. Which is sad, because I’ve taken some very nice pictures that would add interest and context to this post, but you’ll just have to use your imagination.

Some of you may remember I signed up to coach Chris’s soccer team. We had a great spring soccer season. Chris had a lot of fun, he scored a dozen or so goals and his team went (unofficially) 6-2. I say unofficially because this is a recreational league, and no scores are standings are kept. Still, it’s hard not to keep a running mental tally as the games go on of the score and which team had more goals.

But there’s more to the soccer story. Tommy turned four years old this summer, making him old enough to play in the city rec soccer league just like his older brother. Chris also has a summer birthday, and he turned six. So just as Tommy finally became old enough to play, Chris turning six moved him up into the next age group in the same program. That means both boys were going to play soccer in the fall session, running from mid-August through mid-October, but they could not be on the same team. Chris asked me if I was going to coach his team again, and of course I said yes. Then Tommy says, “You’re going to coach my team too, aren’t you, Dad?”

Well, how could I say no?

So the past seven weeks I’ve coached two soccer teams. Two different weekly practices, two games on Saturday. It’s been very busy. It’s also been a lot of fun, even if it has been hectic at times. This Saturday will be the last game of the season for both boys, both teams. Form a win/loss perspective this ‘season’ has been a disaster. Chris’s team won their first game 2-0, and has lost every game since. Tommy’s team has done even worse- they have not won a single game, and they have failed to score a goal in 6 of the seven games. They have been steamrolled every time. Now I see why we don’t keep an official score and standings for these leagues – the teams that are just aging into a new age group get crushed during that first season.

I took a new job over the summer. It’s a much better position for me, a much better fit for my skills and temperament than my last position. The unfortunate thing is that this new job requires a 30-mile commute each way. So I am enjoying my work more but I am missing out on family time. Not the happiest situation, but life is a series of trade-offs.

We had to spend a small fortune to have new windows installed and the stucco finish on our home removed and replaced. We were having some leaks around some of the windows. Once the windows were installed and the stucco removed we discovered the builders had used substandard material when building the house, so we had to replace nearly all of the wood outside the frame of the home. The project took six weeks and completely emptied our savings account. The good news is we prevented serious mold problems from developing in the home – which would have exacerbated Tommy’s asthma problem significantly.

MBW had one of those ‘zero’ birthdays last month – you know, a birthday when you turn a year that ends in a zero. I won’t way which one, but you can probably guess. Actually, if you were to see her you would guess 10 years to low, so she continues to look fabulous. I will be the first to admit that I am the last person you should ask for advice regarding the big issues of life, but guys, listen to me on this one – choose your life partner carefully. If you marry well, anything else that happens to you will be easier to deal with if you have selected the right partner. Conversely, if you choose your life partner poorly, no other run of good fortune will compensate for a bad marriage.

I continue to struggle with the same themes/issues I have talked about in this blog for the past year or so. A middle-aged man on the downhill side of life expectancy, working in Corporate white-collar America, blessed with good health, a wonderful family and a decent income; but feeling trapped in the industrial bureaucracy, beginning to think he has forfeited a chance to do something he is passionate about. Wondering, in fact, what he is passionate about. Between the job, family responsibilities and a failing struggle to stay in shape, finding there is not any time to ponder what he really wants to do. Worried the sand is slipping ever more quickly through the hourglass, trying (sometimes unsuccessfully) not to dwell on the many missed opportunities in his life and hoping not to miss the next opportunity that may or may not present itself. Comforted by the fact he is doing the right thing (most of the time) for his family, wondering if that is all there is left for him.

So you can see it has, in fact, been a busy summer.

One of the other themes I’ve touched on in this blog is the desire for our family to be a family that does things, not one that watches things. That’s why we bought The Camping Machine and made a strong effort to get out and go places this summer. I feel good about what our family did this summer. I really hope that once our kids are off to college (hopefully on some kind of scholarship!) they’ll look back on these years and remember the trips we took and the fun we had. They may not remember this summer specifically - watching Old Faithful erupt, running their hands over dinosaur bone fossils, standing on a ledge overlooking the Colorado River 1,000 feet below. They’ll have the photos, if not the memories. I hope they will look back at what we did, and want to continue to be active and engaged in life, not passively watching life go by.

That’s one reason why I’ve not been a more active blogger. I’m trying to do things, and that leaves less time to write about things. And I don’t seem to be able to sit down and write a quick update post and think anyone will care enough to read it. I’ve tried to make each of my posts substantial, to tell a story, convey an idea or thought. That sort of writing takes time for a blockhead like me. When I first started this blog it was new and exciting, and I was passionate about it. But it has become more and more difficult to keep up, and the passion has waned. While I’m not prepared to give this up altogether, and do hope to post more frequently than I have recently, I really don’t know how often or substantially I’ll be able to post.

So for those of you have continued to check back once in a while, thank you. I’ll keep the blog up on Blogger and try to post when I can. I’ve long since stopped checking the site stats every day like I used to. Way back when, in the days when Waiter Rant linked to this blog, I have about 250 readers a day. It fell off and held steady at about 50 or so a day for a long time. Last week it was down to 8. If I posted more often, it wouldn’t have dropped off so much.

But honestly, I’ve been too busy to worry about that. Still, for those of you who continue to check in every so often, thank you. If I don’t think I’ll be able to post again, I’ll take this down so you don’t have to wonder. As long as it’s still up, it is my intention to try to post something when I can.

So – until the next update,

It’s still Great to be The Family Man.