sky pilot

Sky Pilot

In my brain rang the majestic ballad,

Nights In White Satin by the Moody Blues which ended the album,

Days Of Future Passed in 1972

Mt. Baker from Twin Sisters Range © Ken James McLeod

The world was no longer the same, I was home fresh from military life having spent the past two years overseas in the US Army, and needed a drink of booze . . . something to wet the whistle so to speak. Later, I climbed into my '65 Chevy, even that didn't seem the same; its dice dangling from the rearview mirror didn't dance to the same radio tunes anymore and the ballads like Sixteen Candles had been replaced by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, as well as the band Chicago. But then, music had evolved perhaps for the better and nobody listened to that bubblegum crap anymore. It was definitely not the same world I had left, gasoline was about the same price when I pulled into the station, it was 30.9 cents per gallon, just about the same price as cigarettes. There, beside me was a puke lime-green VW Beetle bug, a foreign car, and I thought how ugly it was compared to Chevy's and Ford's; cars with power to spare under the hood, ones with classic lines! After I filled the tank, I roared through Seattle to Everett with the speedometer reaching 100 mpr, fleeing from the world I did not know any longer and of an uncertain future as I rode.

Hours later, I found myself driving by the old high school I had attended, then by my old girlfriend's house, and onto Green Lake where some of the high school parties were held . . . trying to cherish the memories I held dear to my heart and of the world I remembered. I stopped into the greasy spoon cafe "Hasty Tasty's" I use to work at and in I strode. The owner remembered me, but nobody else did, the clientele had changed, and no longer did the pinball machines clang and ring . . . they were gone with the era and I thought I was lost forevermore. Into my pocket I reached for a quarter and threw it into the jukebox to hear my "now" favorite songs by the Moody Blues, Nights In White Satin and the soothing words of Late Lament . . .

Breath deep the gathering gloom,
Watch lights fade from every room.
Bedsitter people look back and lament,
Another day's useless energy spent.
Impassioned lovers wrestle as one,
Lonely man cries for love and has none.
New mother picks up and suckles her son,
Senior citizens wish they were young.
Cold hearted orb that rules the night,
Removes the colours from our sight.
Red is grey and yellow white,
But we decide which is right,
And which is an illusion???

Out the door I went and back into my car heading for the mountains: that of the mountain realm I knew hadn't changed. And upward I climbed on the trail to reach the plane where pinnacle meets the sky . . . where indeed I was my own Sky Pilot.

KJM
(McPilchuck)

excerpt from novel Den of the Damned