The way you wear a cap, especially older men-like me, means something.
Early this morning, while running on the beach towards North island Naval Air Station, I passed a man. He was an old man, at least mid to late seventies-maybe in his eighties. He was walking in the opposite direction, away from the air station. I noticed as I ran by him, he had on a San Diego ball cap. Men his age, who wear ball caps, say something about who they are, just by the way they wear it.
But there was something else.
First, whenever you pass an elderly person on this island, you always use the word 'sir.' It just is natural here. You never know who you are talking to and every last one of them deserves the word. This is a warrior village and some of these people are retired warriors. There was the cap this man was wearing but there was also the man that was very telling.
He walked with a bad limp, like the hip replacement worked on one side but not on the other or he was waiting for the other to be replaced as well. He was walking like a man who, in years passed, probably ran this beach in the morning before his morning flight mission, although he might of been a surface warfare man-the guy was just too big to drive a plane. Even at his age, he was still tall, over 6'2". He could have been a commander of a ship, maybe a cruiser, or even a carrier during Gulf War One. He was on the bridge when he got word of a sonar 'ping' of an unknown target about five miles out. He would have calmly called 'general quarters' and as the bridge crew made ready for a fight, a young seaman would have walked over to him with the old man's battle cover. He would have looked at the kid and simply shake his head. the seaman would have stored the cover where he always stores it, thinking the same thing he always did 'the old man never wears it.' The man would have his ball cap of the ship's moniker on its front, just like the 'SD' he wore today. He would have pulled it off and adjusted it once, just like he was hitting an approach shot at Augusta, a nervous habit just before he gave the first combat order.The bill of the cap properly curled the way caps should be curled.
The old man walking down the beach had a squared away jaw, white hair, and steel blue eyes. His skin was mottled from sun exposure and age. He was an old man now. We see them everywhere, walking down the center of the sidewalk, taking up the entire lane. We get frustrated because we want to pass them but can't squeeze by on the right and the left has people coming towards us.
Sure, this guy could have been an insurance salesman from Topeka. He might have been nowhere near war and the only gun he ever touched was a gold embossed hunting rifle his great grandfather willed him from their estate in Nantucket.
But this place is holy ground. Men like that don't like it here, at least this part of the beach, so close to a warrior village. Something happens to them, and they turn back before they get close to the fence separating the base from the world. This man I passed, I felt, knew the launch codes to the cruise missiles on his ship as well as where the hole in the perimeter fence he and his buddies used to get down to the beach, bypassing the guards at the gate. I had to test it.
I made the turn and ran to see if I could catch him. In the predawn light, I could see the silhouette shuffling up the beach. The distance from the running part of the beach and the water started to narrow and other runners were up and down the beach. The old man, of course, was right in the middle of the space. As I came up behind him, I began to pass on his left. I called out as I began my pass 'by your leave sir.' His response was automatic and telling-'carry on'.
Apparently, he was not an insurance salesman from Topeka.
I like this a whole lot. So much in that tiny interaction. You honored him so well.
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