After his retirement from USAir on November 1, 1995, Dad began writing down memories of his days as a mechanic for Mohawk Airlines. I thought it was a great idea but had no idea at its inception that I would learn so much and so many valuable lessons from his efforts.
When people ask me where I'm from I always reply with two answers. First that I grew up in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania and second that I was born in upstate New York. I think that even after 24 years, I still include the upstate New York partly because it was such an important part of my life, as was Mohawk airlines. Even our move to Pittsburgh was by virtue of the airlines after Allegheny took over Mohawk and the Utica base was shut down.
I think most kids are proud of their Dads and I'm not the first to say that I was unusually proud of mine. I boasted that my Dad is an airline mechanic on more occasions than I can count. I thought it was the coolest job in the world. I thought he stood yards above doctors and lawyers and presidents! My Dad could fix planes and actually understood how they could fly! What a fantastic thing to be able to understand the miracle of flight. When I was five or six years old, I remember driving in the car with Dad and learning about flight. "Stick your hand out the window and flatten it with your palm down, like this", he would say as he demonstrated from the driver's seat. He continued, "Now tilt your fingers up and feel the wind pull your hand and arm upward. Now tilt it down and feel it forced downward. That's how airplanes fly!" WOW! I thought I now possessed the world's biggest secret, compliments of my Dad.
The Saturday he took me to the Instrument Shop with him was one of the best days of my life. I remember playing on the wheeled desk chairs and driving them from desk to desk filling them up with imaginary gasoline from the air hoses, which served as pretend fuel pumps. I thought I accidentally broke an expensive testing instrument that day. I never told him about it until years later. He smiled and told me that he knew it all along and that it wasn't really broken.
My Dad's hands seemed huge to me then, and I can still feel my tiny hand enveloped in his monstrous one as I walked into the Instrument Shop with him. When he hurt his back I took pride in rubbing liniment on it and taking long walks hand in hand with him while he healed.
Our vacations were big events and the envy of most of the kids in my school. My Dad used his flying privileges as much as possible and my brother and I got quite an education out of it. I think that traveling is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself or your children. It teaches an awareness of and openness to the world, which can't be found in any book or film. I would be given special permission to leave during the middle of the school year for one or two weeks, provided I would write reports on my travels. It was great! Not only did I get extra vacation; I got to brag about it to my whole class to boot. Being an 'airline brat' was indeed a special honor and one I hold very dear.
I think I may have learned more about my Dad while compiling this book than I have in the past 36 years. I learned that he is a likeable, down to earth guy who is, in many ways, much like a lot of the guys I've worked with over the years. I think there is something very settling to learn that your Dad is human and laughs at farts passed through an air tube or that he pulls off brilliant practical jokes with a straight face. It was a real eye opener to learn about all these goings on while I was a starry eyed child envisioning the perfect Dad. Well Daddy, maybe you're not perfect like I imagined you, but you're perfect just as you are!
