Greetings loyal airmen.  At the risk of sounding too melancholy, I'm going to jump around this week and discuss a few things that have been on my mind this past week.   Last week-end, Labor Day, we closed up the pool once again.  Now when looking out the kitchen window to the back yard we no longer see the clear reflective rays off the sun off the shimmering water, but rather a long, drab gray piece of canvas locked down to the patio as if burying some unwanted family secret.   An all too short season having come to a close again.

Now we enter that undecided period where you could wake up to cool morning and think a false frost was on the way and then by noon time be sweltering in hot, dog-days September weather.  Lots of state fairs popping up all over the region these days.  Veggies unpicked in gardens are starting to turn overly ripe and in danger of spoiling on the vines.  And if those tomatoes haven't turned red yet, most likely they never will.  Time for a little fried GREEN tomatoes.  Another big change are the return of those noisy, cumbersme yellow school buses roving our streets in the wee hours of the morning collecting their raucous, energetic and often times sour faced riders.  Yup, school is back in session, oh joy, oh joy.  If you're Mom & Dad, you are probably dancing a jig about now.  If you're Junior and Sissy, you are wondering where the hell summer went to and how can a teacher be so heartless as to give out homework assignments on the FIRST DAY BACK!!  That's just wrong!

Of course with the return of school, so too come the afternoon soccer games.  Both our granddaughters, Krisit and Chelsea play and we try to make as many of their games as we can.  Kristi started her sophomore year of high school the other day, Chelsea entered seventh grade.  It is obviously clear that they are not little girls anymore and overnight, or so it seems to Val and I, they have morphed into beautiful young ladies.  Kristi even has a steady beau! Watching her march off the soccer field the other night, surrounded by her laughing and giggling girlfriends, another much more serious thought crossed my mind.   Kristi is learning to drive now, as are most of her peers.  Soon she will be applying for and taking her driver's test.  And that does scare me.  Oh, not because I think she is unprepared or irresponsible.  Quite the opposite.  But unfortunately she is not every teenage girl and boy getting their licenses this year.  And it seems, by all accounts and recorded data, more and more of these wonderful, innocent young adults are getting into tragic accidents resulting in the loss of life.  I'm sure all of you airmen, from wherever part of the country you reside in, are familiar with dozens of stories of young people dying in such collisions, the promise of their lives cut short in one frightful moment of recklessness.

Automobiles are not toys.  Driving them requires care and concentration at all times.  And it is the responsiblity of every parent out there to teach that to their young teenagers before they get the keys to the family car.  Sadly in a world where most adult drivers don't practice good driving habits (…ah..the cell phone to the ear while trying to navigate at high speeds through a traffic jam).  Those are the kinds of examples we give our kids.  Shame on us. All of us. If you have a son or daughter, niece or nephew, grand kids, getting their licenses this year, please, take a moment with them to explain the severity of what they are about to take on.  Teach them not only to be good drivers, but to always, always look out for the other guy.  That's all any of us can do.  Then maybe we'll be attending lots more soccer games and graduations as we should, with happy hearts and not tears.

I'm off to the dentist once again in a few hours.  A couple of old fillings need replacing.  Wish they could come up with some kind of “stuff” that was permanent.  Now wouldn't that be something?  Oh, and before I leave you all. Two really cool new movies are out today.  One is a cartoony shoot'em up called…SHOOT'EM UP.  What else?  Looks like pure escapist fun for all us action junkies.  The other is a remake of a classic western, 3:10 TO YUMA, that starred Glenn Ford and Van Heflin and was based on an Elmore Leonard story.  I plan on seeing this new, action heavy remake, but would urge you to find the original if you've never seen it.  It really is a classic. I hope the remake lives up to it.

Have a great week, Ron, Over and Out.