The Platform (Blog)

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Resolve

I have been focusing on writing extensively of late and part of that includes writing scenes and short stories based on prompts I’ve found online and in books. The following prompt is from Writer’s Digest:

Prompt:  A Broken (Deadly) Resolution—Only two weeks had passed into the New Year and Tim had already broken his first resolution: Don’t kill anyone. Write the Scene

The following is what I came up with:

Resolve

Tim sat anxiously, beer in hand, as the clock began its final countdown. It had been a tough year for him. Not again, not in the New Year, he thought. This year would be different, this year no one would die by his hand.

Two Weeks Later

“Shit! Shit! Shit!” Tim exclaimed.

He walked in circles, his hands pulling at his hair as he tried to figure out what to do. He passed a small metal trash can by the door. He kicked it hard. Unfortunately it didn’t fly into the middle of the room like he was expecting. Instead it hit the cabinet, bounced off, and collided with his right shin. He reflexively pulled back as the can rolled between his legs. Unable to maintain his balance, Tim went tumbling to the floor. This time, the trash can did fly out spilling its contents all over the fallen man who had just broken his New Year’s resolution.

The door to the quiet room opened.

“Doctor Brady, you’re needed in OR two,” the nurse said.

End Transmission.

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Seattle Museum of Flight

Back in 2012 I began searching popular wedding venues in Seattle for my upcoming nuptials. I stumbled across the Seattle Museum of Flight and I knew that was the place for us to say “I do”. Before then I had no idea Seattle had such a museum.

Yesterday my husband and I returned to the museum. We try to go at least once a year and see what’s new. Last year we spent quite a bit of time in the J. Elroy McCaw Personal Courage Wing of the museum. This exhibit features aircraft from both WWI and WWII. I really enjoyed our visit last year and learned a lot about how aviation changed warfare. This year was almost a struggle however.

As I walked though the vast quiet cavern that held war machines of the past, I felt unsettled. So many people died in the two  wars that should have ended all wars. There’s no question the Axis Powers needed to be stopped. There’s no question Hitler was responsible for acts of evil on a scale most of the world had never seen. My grandparents generation had reason to fight, to rally together, to die for a just cause . What the United States was able to accomplish in military buildup between the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII is staggering to say the least. Every single American did their part to support the war effort and because of that, victory was all but certain.

Today we live in a world that is technically at peace on a scale never seen in human history. But I don’t feel the peace my grandparents fought so hard for, not anymore. I feel a tension, a shift in direction, a reversal of course in the cause of peace and I wonder if America will once again be called to set aside their very lives in a war effort. I hope we can turn the tide, right the ship, and continue to find peaceful and diplomatic solutions to the problems facing our world. I want to believe the last great wars are behind us but I have a feeling we as a nation are coming to a crossroads. I have no faith our current leadership will make the right choices in stemming the tides of war.

We wandered over to the Apollo exhibit where I was sure my mood would be uplifted as space exploration has been a passion of mine since I was eight years old. I marveled at the Saturn V engine on display. I enjoyed seeing the standby Viking Lander on loan to the museum. I loved the lunar rover Boeing built for the later Apollo missions. Yet I couldn’t quite shake my melancholy as the accomplishments in space travel today can’t seem to compare to those of the late sixties and early seventies. We won the first leg of the Space Race and we should be leading the race to Mars. The final frontier has a way of bringing mankind together. How far could we go if we spent half as much on our imagination as we do on weapons of war?

As we continued through the rest of the museum I began to wonder what it would look like fifty years from now. Would there be a WWIII exhibit? Would there be a section dedicated to the Korean War, parts I and II? Will there be an exhibit dedicated to the first human Mars missions? I left the museum with a lot to consider and maybe that’s what places like this are supposed to leave you with.

The Seattle Museum of Flight has a lot to see and I would encourage anyone local to plan a visit in spite of my somber mood! They have an airpark where you can walk through an older Air Force One, a Concorde, and a 787 Dreamliner. It’s kid friendly and the gift shop has lots of cool inventory.

End Transmission

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Walk the Walk

This Saturday I will be walking with Team Toby at the Puget Sound Heart and Stroke Walk. Thousands will gather rain or shine and take a three mile trek around Seattle to raise awareness for Heart Disease. I think everyone knows someone affected by heart disease but it wasn’t until March of 2013 that my eyes were opened to an entirely different world.

I received a phone call from my sister that fateful March day. Her unborn son had just been diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. I had no idea what that was or what it would mean for him but I knew it didn’t sound good. I went to work learning what I could while packing up my things in preparation to move back home and help her out.

Prior to Toby, my understanding of the human heart was limited to almost nothing I could remember from my high school health class. I quickly learned heart defects were more common than most of us probably realize. Nearly one child in every one-hundred is born with some kind of heart defect. Fortunately most aren’t life threatening and many don’t require any intervention. Unfortunately some go undiagnosed and by the time they are discovered, the damage is done. How many of us have heard stories of the high school football or soccer player falling on the field, never to get up again? In most cases, CHD or a congenital heart defect is to blame.

Thankfully in the case of my sister and Toby, he was diagnosed in time for palliative measures. HLHS is a condition in which the left side of the heart is severely underdeveloped. In effect, Toby was born with only half of a heart. He had his first open heart surgery when he was five days old. His heart was stopped, he was placed on bypass, and a surgeon delicately began to manipulate the defective organ in such a way to keep him alive. The procedure was called the Norwood and it was only the first in a three stage series of operations Toby would need.

Research continues to find the cause and cure for congenital heart defects but research needs money. People give money to the causes they care about and the causes that affect them most. CHD is a cause that affects so many yet doesn’t get the funding it needs. I walk to raise awareness for children like Toby who live with broken hearts. Will you walk with me?

End Transmission

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About a Girl

A Recap of The Orville Episode 3

When I first heard about The Orville I was super excited. The trailer made it look like a series version of my all-time favorite movie ‘Galaxy Quest’. It would be a space adventure but it wouldn’t take itself too seriously; after all Seth MacFarlane was behind it. But after watching episode 3, “About a Girl” I am simply blown away. ***Spoilers ahead, read at your own risk!***

The first thing that struck me about the episode was who directed it, Brannon Braga. He was an executive producer on Star Trek: Voyager. It wasn’t long before I noticed how the musical cues seemed Trek like in theme and tone. Even the shooting style of the episode screamed Star Trek (the 1990’s style not Kelvin). As for the story, I never thought MacFarlane would jump into something so controversial, especially for a show that’s advertised more for humor than drama. In fact, the episode’s humor felt almost out of place against the high stakes drama involved in the storyline.

Orville’s second officer Bortus and his mate Klyden just had a child. The only problem? It’s a girl and Moclan society doesn’t accept females. Initially both Bortus and his mate want an operation to change their daughter into a son. Their human counterparts aboard the Orville are shocked at the mere suggestion and after a little bonding over beer and an old Earth movie (Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer) Bortus has a change of heart. This leads to a tribunal where first officer Kelly Grayson must defend Bortus and his daughter against the Moclan status quo.

The episode brings up issues about gender choice versus culture and equal rights for women in society; and there is absolutely no subtlety about it. There is an attempt to play down some of the heavy drama with the use of humor. Grayson uses Orville’s human pilot as an example that not all men are smart. “The tribunal must acknowledge that there is no valid claim for gender based superiority,” Grayson argues.

As far as I could tell, the bias Moclan society has toward woman only seems to apply to the Moclan species. Grayson, a human woman, seems to have no trouble making a case during the tribunal. She appears to have the respect of the Moclan legal system. Grayson calls Orville’s security officer, a Xelayan female, to the stand and there is no objection to her testimony. Yet at the end of the episode when Captain Mercer finds a Moclan woman to testify, there is chaos in the courtroom. When it turns out that female is actually the Moclan’s greatest writer; those gathered react in stunned silence.

If this had been Star Trek, I believe the outcome would have been different. The testimony would have worked in favor of Bortus and his daughter and the child would grow up free to choose her gender. But Orville is not Star Trek and in the end, the entirely male jury sided with Klyden and the sex change operation was carried out. There were no jokes in the end, no way to make light of that outcome and I am grateful they didn’t try.

All this from a series that’s supposed to make fun of traditional space adventures! Nearly everything about The Orville feels like Star Trek including the use of social commentary. In a time when so many different issues test our faith in government and each other, it’s nice to see a TV show shine a unique light on difficult subject matters. I look forward seeing more of what MacFarlane and The Orville have to say!

End Transmission

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What is right about bearing firearms?

The 2nd Amendment to the United States Constitution reads:  A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

In 1791 the bill of rights was ratified to the constitution. At that time we had no army. In fact, the framers of the constitution felt that maintaining a standing army would be a detriment to democracy. History had shown that armies had a tendency to over through the governments they were sworn to protect. But today is not 1791 and we do maintain an army and were we to draft a new constitution, we would never allow the people such a right as the second amendment.

Guns were simple tools in 1791, a necessary tool used during the American Revolution. The common folk needed guns to fight in the militia because the government didn’t provide them. In that context, the second amendment makes sense. The people need guns to protect America because America uses militias to fight wars therefore, the government shouldn’t infringe on their right to have firearms.

But we don’t use militias to fight wars today, we have the most advanced army in the world to do that. Guns aren’t simple anymore. Like America, they’ve grown in size, scale, and lethality. Weapons of war are not meant to be wielded by civilians, they’re meant to be used in the defense of one’s country. They’re made for one thing: the killing of humans.

Now I’m not saying we should do away with the second amendment entirely. I think hand guns serve a vital purpose in personal defense. Hunting rifles also serve a useful purpose. These weapons, while they can certainly kill humans, don’t produce the level of carnage we’ve seen in places like Orlando and Las Vegas.

Because assault rifles are available to pretty much any American who wants one, our movie theaters, schools, and night clubs have turned into battlefields. I don’t believe that’s what the framers of our constitution had in mind. Hand in hand with the right to bear arms must be the responsibility that right entails. It is not unreasonable as a civilized first world nation to restrict the kinds of firearms available to the common man.

I realize that changing gun regulations isn’t enough. The people who have committed the acts of terror we are seeing in our country are broken. To fix the problem with guns we must also address the mental health issues faced by so many of our countrymen. Help needs to be made available for the broken among us and we as a people need to exercise compassion when someone needs mental help.

The purpose of our laws and our government is to act in the service of the people. We want to feel safe in our homeland and I imagine very few people in Las Vegas felt safe when the bullets started raining down on them. Thoughts and prayers aren’t enough. It’s time for real sensible change where firearms and mental health is concerned. Too many have died under the misguided principal written into our constitution. It’s time we the people demand that weapons of war remain only in the hands of those men and women in uniform, trained in their use, and who have taken an oath to defend our country.

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Discovering Star Trek: Discovery

NOTE: Minor SPOILERS ahead for the first episode. You have been warned!

A few of my friends and I gathered with pizza and ice cream on Sunday evening to watch the premiere of the latest iteration of Star Trek: Discovery. We settled around the television excited as we waited…and waited. The football game on CBS ran long so the premiere was delayed. Why a football game delays broadcast television is easy to understand. Why said game delayed the launch of Discovery on the streaming service CBS: All Access still leaves me scratching my head.

I could probably spend this entire post griping about how much I hate the fact I have to pay for yet another streaming service to get my Trek fix but I will save you all my grief and just say KHAAAAN!

I began watching Star Trek: The Next Generation in the sixth grade. Thanks to Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise I was able to watch Trek through high school and into my naval service. In fact I got to see the premiere of Enterprise while deployed on the USS Enterprise! Needless to say, I grew into an adult with Trek as my guide and my friend. Until Sunday evening, it had been more than a decade since I had seen a new episode. I’ll admit, even with the All Access crap, I was a little excited. How would my perspective of the show differ than the sixth grade version of me? Would I catch all the subtle social commentary? Would it be profound?

The playback started and there were Klingons (they were speaking Klingon anyway). There was a really cool music theme recorded not with computer generated instruments but with a live orchestra! There were Vulcans and starships and the prime directive and phasers ! It was all those things I remembered about Star Trek (except for the albino Klingon). A female captain AND first officer?! And neither of them is white?! Talk about where no Trek has gone before!

It felt different, modern, new, Kelvin. Wait, the ‘Kelvin effect’ was done with a budget, this show has a budget? It must, it looks so amazing! (for those that don’t know, Kelvin is what Trek fans call the J.J. Abrams reboot films as they take place in an alternate “Kelvin” universe, “Prime” refers to all other iterations of Trek (original series, next gen etc.)).

As for social commentary, the premise behind the show is a war with the Klingons. T’Kuvma, a devote follower of Kahless, contrives a way to unite the 24 noble Klingon houses in a conflict against the Federation. He does this with the help of a mantra “Remain Klingon” as if the Federation were somehow polluting the Empire. That sounds familiar. Qo’nos first!

So I liked it, no question. There’s action, drama, conflict and a myriad of social issues taking place today for the writers to weave into a Trek narrative. It doesn’t feel like the Trek of the 1990’s, but I think that’s a good thing. There is a generation of kids and young adults who need to experience Star Trek in a way that is relevant to them. I sincerely hope Discovery can do that (it could do it even better on broadcast television, stupid All Access).

Star Trek has been in hiatus far too long and America needs it now more than ever. We need a shining example of what our future could be, a future where we can live in peace with one another (except for maybe with the Klingons…and the Romulans…the Borg… gee maybe the future’s not so peaceful after all…).

LLAP (Live Long And Prosper)

End Transmission

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Take a Stand, Take a Knee

Prior to my enlistment in the Navy, I had a good sense of patriotism and the significance of the National Anthem. But as I took the oath to defend the United States with my life, suddenlythat theme meant a whole lot more to me. Even now when I hear the anthem I can’t help but swell with pride in what our nation has accomplished above all others.

I will be the first to admit I was a little turned off by Colin Kaepernick sitting out the national anthem last year. He did so not at the height of his career but when it was in decline and he had little to lose. He was also a 49er and as a dedicated fan of the Seattle Seahawks, I was already bias against him. But that was the extent of it. I didn’t actually object to him sitting down, I served our country to maintain his right to do so. I didn’t agree with his form of protest but I certainly wouldn’t condemn him for it. For his own reasons, he felt compelled to act in a way that he believed was right, and let me be clear, he was RIGHT to do so (even if he was a 49er).

So what does it say about our country when so many are now choosing to sit or kneel rather than stand? Is respect for the flag more important than demanding from our country everything that flag represents? Is standing up and paying honors to a symbol more important than living by what that symbol stands for?

Don’t be angry at those who take a stand by sitting down, I may soon be among them. Listen to their protests, their concerns, are they wrong? Well, ARE THEY? Be mad they are sitting down but don’t be mad at them for doing so, be mad at the reasons why. Use that anger to take a positive action, help them stand back up, not by shaming them but by doing something about the causes that compel them to protest. We have the power to change how we treat those whose skin color doesn’t match our own and how we enforce laws. We are all Americans and we all want to be wrapped equally in that blanket of freedom.

The flag of the United States doesn’t just represent our fallen heroes, it also represents what we aspire to be: a nation of liberty and justice for all. We’ve struggled with that promise and there are those among us who feel that promise hasn’t been kept. Maybe we all need to take a knee until real change is made and every American is treated equally regardless of race, religion, or sexual orientation. It is my hope that those who feel they aren’t represented in the red white and blue will one day soon be able to stand with pride when The Star-Spangled Banner is played.  It’s up to all of us to safeguard and uphold the rights and freedoms our fallen heroes fought and died to protect. Sometimes that means sitting down to take a stand.

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USS Turner Joy

My husband and I recently visited the USS Turner Joy in Bremerton, WA. The Turner Joy is a Forrest Sherman class destroyer built in Seattle in 1957. Most notable about her time in service: she fired the first naval shot of the Vietnam War, and the last.

As a former United States sailor, I couldn’t help but be reminded of my own time in service. The boat ‘smell’, the decking, the paint, sound-powered phones, battle lanterns, very little has changed from the days of the Turner Joy’s service to today.

Navy destroyers have been in the news a lot lately with the incidents involving the USS Fitzgerald and the USS John S. McCain. Both of these ships were involved in collisions that resulted in loss of life. It amazed me how these mighty warships were shredded by the ships that hit them. While aboard the Turner Joy, I would discover why.

At one point as I toured part of the engine room, I noted a change in temperature. I was on the starboard side of the #2 engine room and as I moved aft into a narrow space, it felt warmer however, no equipment was running. I reached out to the outboard bulkhead and it was warm! The sun was out and I could feel significant heat radiating from the bulkhead! It didn’t take me long to find an information sheet about the hull and learn why. How much metal stood between my hand and the sunshine outside? 3/8’s of an inch! THREE-EIGHTHS of an INCH! It’s no wonder they call destroyers tin cans and it’s no wonder the collisions mentioned above were so devastating!

These ships were designed for speed and evasion so to keep them light they give them just enough of a hull to hold everything together. The downside to this design, they crumble if they hit something or something hits them. After touring the Turner Joy I gained a lot of respect for my shipmates serving aboard tin cans!

I highly recommend visiting the Turner Joy for those of you in and around the Seattle area. It’s a short walk from the ferry pier in Bremerton and almost 90% of the ship is accessible!

 

 

 

 

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Trench Warfare

In order to give my works of speculative fiction a degree of authenticity, I find it important to research how things happened in the past. From there I can project how things might happen in the future. Currently I am working on the beginnings of a galactic war and I must ask what drives all these alien races to fight one another. To help answer that question I turned to our world’s first Great War: World War I.

Prior to my research, my knowledge of WWI could be distilled down to the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand and something called the ‘Treaty of Versailles’. I knew it led to WWII and that it took place in Europe but the particulars of the ‘Great War’ had been long since lost to me.

One of the first things to jump out at me as I began my research was the concept of trench warfare. I’d heard of trench warfare before and WWI saw this kind of tactic like never before. Unlike wars of the past that involved armies sweeping across vast landmasses, WWI saw the widespread use of the machine gun and suddenly all those soldiers could be mowed down from a considerable distance. The only way to avoid the massacre was to literally dig in below ground and out of sight of the deadly guns.  Both the allies and the central powers did just that in WWI often with little more than the length of a football field separating the two side’s trenches. The space in between was appropriately called ‘no-man’s land’ for anyone caught between the two sides would surely be killed.

This effectively turned WWI into a war of attrition, a stalemate.  With both sides entrenched and neither wanting to risk certain death by crossing to the other side, they sat and waited hoping the misery of the trench would drive the other side to surrender first.

It occurred to me how appropriately trench warfare is analogous to the current political climate in the United States. In 2017 we are engaging in trench warfare with each other. The trenches aren’t physical, they’re ideological. Instead of guns, we hurl words and protests at our ‘enemy’. Anyone who isn’t in our trench must be in the enemy trench. If you’re a republican but don’t support Trump, you’re in no man’s land. If you are progressive but don’t like the establishment of the Democratic Party, you’re in no-man’s land. But being caught in no-man’s land means certain doom so pick a trench because right now, there is no middle ground (at least that’s the current perception). It’s a war of attrition and one side will either win or both sides will lose horribly.

What did WWI teach us about trench warfare? It was stupid, a lot of people died for no reason and by the end of the war nothing was really gained by it. In the case of WWI, the central powers ultimately lost. While they had better trenches and better weapons, they lacked the necessary influx of supplies to sustain war indefinitely. The allies technically won the war but with so many dead and so little disputed territory changing hands, what was it all for? Everyone was broke by the war’s end and with so much focus on fighting, resources weren’t sent to the real threat that emerged; the Spanish flu which ended up killing more people globally than WWI!

What lessons can we learn then in our ideological trench war today? Does one side have to completely surrender to the other? Do we hold our line so firmly the entire country falls apart by the end?  Do we turn our ideological war into a physical war and shed more blood to test the constitution of this country? Or do we lay down are weapons and climb out of the trenches, see our ‘enemy’ as the neighbor they’ve always been? Trench warfare doesn’t work. No one truly wins in the end and if we continue on our current course, we will not have learned the lessons so many died to teach us.

The media, the President, even friends and family may tell us we have to pick a side and no matter what, we have to stay there. I say bullshit. I want to believe that most of us are actually in no-man’s land right now; that only those in a position of power and authority over us are truly engaged in the trench war. The difference between the soldiers of WWI and the American people today is that unlike the soldiers of the past, we have the power to get out of the trench and pull our leaders out with us.

“Okay Jen, how do you suggest we get out of the trenches?”

I think it starts with listening. We hear the words, how can we not? Both sides are shouting at the top of their lungs but are we truly listening? The truth is we may never agree on everything or maybe not on anything but somewhere along the road we stopped listening to the other side and they stopped listening to us. At some point we begin building our trenches and now we’re entrenched. But the idea is not to convince a Trump supporter that he is wrong or a liberal that she is naive; that’s just trying to drag one person out of one trench and into another. The idea is to hear the other side and truly empathize with why they feel the way they do. No man’s land really is the common ground between trenches. From common ground we can work on common goals. Only if we work together can we end our ideological trench standoff. We’re in this test of democracy together after all.

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Hello world!

Greetings Earthlings and welcome to the epic blog of J.A. McLendon! Okay maybe it’s not epic yet but it will be as soon as I figure out how to use this WordPress interface! I intend to stand on my orbital platform (soap box as it were) and preach to you all on politics, toys, and the virtues of Star Trek and other things of a geeky and sci-fi nature. I’ll probably talk about a lot of other things too…probably. So stay tuned for further updates from my orbital platform!..or don’t, it’s your choice.