Changing Roads Podcast
Changing Roads Podcast unveils the profound essence of travel, exploring not just the destinations, but the personal transformations within. We unravel the various themes, aspects and narratives of travel that define us, shape us, and lead us to the heart of our own stories.
Changing Roads Podcast
There and Back and Again: A Pilots Journey
As the engines roar to life, memories of my father's stories fill the cabin—stories of birds mirroring planes and dreams of reaching the stars. This episode of Changing Roads is a family affair, with my dad, Brad, a retired Lieutenant Colonel and pilot, sharing the cockpit with me. Our tales take you from the rumble of takeoff to the gentle bump of landing, unearthing the stories that pilots carry home.
The horizon isn't just a boundary; it's an invitation for the wanderer in each of us. This episode closes with the echoes of a well-traveled teddy bear named Boris, whose journey to Moscow during the twilight of the Cold War revealed the universal longing for connection. As we ponder the allure of distant lands against the pull of home, we share insights from literary explorers and the wisdom of returning with fresh eyes to the places we cherish most. From the thrill of a near-astronaut encounter to the warmth of a homecoming, join us as we celebrate the aviation, it's lessons, and the indelible marks it leaves on our souls.
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Welcome wanderers, dreamers and fellow seekers of the open road. This is Changing Roads, a sanctuary for explorers of the world and the self. Human beings have long lifted their heads upwards, fascinated and inspired by the never-ending ballet of seemingly weightless birds. Our childlike curiosity was focused on not how they flew but what it would be like. That sense of wonder never stopped teasing our hearts, and with each feather we picked up and studied the more we needed to turn our dreams towards the playful idea of possibility. And then, through faith and persistence, made what always seemed impossible a reality. By patiently watching our aviary friends and learning the lessons they shared, we finally succeeded in building our own birds. For the first time ever, the human race felt what it was like to have their feet leave the ground and soar through the clouds, and we fell in love with the freedom found in the vastness of the sky. Now the modern-day pilot looks out the cockpit window, sees the vapor from winds blowing across the outstretched wings, and the skies become endless roads painted light blue, with the unlocking of new adventures and explorations. However, amidst the thrill of soaring through the air, there's an awareness of the importance of coming back down to Earth. The return is not just a landing. It's a reconnection, a reminder of the solid ground and the nests we left in waiting. The things we've learned and the experiences we've gained in the air aren't kept aloft, they are brought back down. The pilot becomes an always-growing book of stories, adventures, dreams and lessons, shared with their family and children, who then carry that to the rest of the world. A good pilot knows that home is not found on takeoff but on landing. A wise hobbit once wrote a book about his incredible adventures and journeys abroad and he titled it there and Back Again Hi, welcome to Changing Roads.
Speaker 1:I am your host, brad, joined here by my co-host, ranger, my loyal travel companion, service dog and future airline pilot. Today is a very special episode because our guest today is actually my father and is a retired Lieutenant Colonel out of the Air Force and a commercial airline pilot currently. We are going to talk about some things about being a pilot and an airline pilot that a lot of people might not think about normally. So we're going to step outside of the box a little bit and we're just going to let this episode go. You're going to love it. That being said, I would like to introduce you to my father, brad. By the way, I'm Brad. My dad has the same name as me. He is Brad, so he's going to be big Brad and I'm going to be a little Brad for this episode. So how's it going, dad? How are you doing? I'm doing great. How are you, son? I'm doing really well. How was your day? You just got off work, huh.
Speaker 2:No, I just flew up from Austin having to go down there and do some work at the house and take a annual flight physical and DKG and all that part of the job.
Speaker 1:Well, you're healthy. You're healthy enough to fly airplanes Enough. I brought a visitor. He brought a picture of Cooper Dog, simply joined today. Cooper Dog was my old service dog, our old buddy, our old friend, and rest in peace, cooper. Now we have Ranger and Ranger's doing a good job. It's a good dog. So, dad, if you don't mind, would you like to give us some background on yourself and where you're at now?
Speaker 2:Well, background, I guess, come from a family of travelers. Your grandfather we call him Poppy, my dad is an international management consultant and was in intelligence services in the Air Force before he started a family, and so we always had that exposure to the military to travel. My sisters and I grew up in what is now Silicon Valley in Northern California, just down the road from Moffitt Naval Air Station, and Moffitt was a treat because it was also the site of Ames Research Center, which is a NASA facility with wind tunnels and doing a lot of experimental aviation testing. We had the traffic pattern for the Navy's P3 Orion airplanes that would fly over our house about every 15 minutes for 15 years and watching that as a constant presence and then having a chance to go out to Moffitt every year and go to the air shows and see all the special NASA planes that were available their X-15s and U-2s. We're obviously watching the Navy Blue Angels and their F-4 Phantoms. I got the hook early and ever since I think probably about age five I wanted to be a pilot.
Speaker 1:So I grew up as an Air Force brat as well and we grew up on Air Force bases. So we grew up with airplanes flying over us all the time and my dad explaining which planes were which and it was just a really cool experience. That kind of put the bug in us, I think, to think a little bit differently about travel and I think that was a really cool experience that a lot of people don't get to have. So we love airplanes now and we love my dad because he brought us into that whole world. So I didn't mean to interrupt you. It was a really cool aspect to my childhood. You've inspired us a lot.
Speaker 2:Oh, I appreciate that and you've given me an opportunity to even hear with this podcast prepping to do a little bit of reflection and think back and kind of keep this whole thing in context. What does it really mean to be an airline pilot, a glorified bus driver, to some people? I look back and I find that the combination of having had the opportunity to be a military pilot and then to follow that career with being an airline pilot it's given me an opportunity to facilitate the opportunity to travel, explore and adventure while simultaneously doing something that is useful and economically productive, and that's really been the catalyst to be able to explore new places, see new things, meet new people, also be able to do something useful in the process to facilitate my ability to keep going back and doing that over and over again. I know a lot of people who work jobs that maybe they're not passionate about and that becomes a resource generator so that they can travel. And for me, I'm able to do a lot of that at the same time and that's been a real wonderful experience.
Speaker 2:Getting in and of itself is a heck of a lot of fun, but also getting from place to place and getting to the next place and meeting the next set of people and seeing the next sunrise, or sometimes seeing more than one sunset on the same evening, because the sun is set and then you take off again and it rises again in the west and you see it set for a second time. These are spectacular things to experience and to be able to do that as part of my career. I could only encourage people to try to find something that they love to do, that they're passionate about, and be able to find a way to make a living doing that.
Speaker 1:Guess what, what? Today I'm going to step back a little bit and for the first time in this podcast, I have two co-hosts. This is a surprise for Dad and I would like to introduce you to my daughters, who are in episode one. My oldest is Ashlyn, my youngest is Kira and they are here to take this episode over.
Speaker 2:Oh, my goodness.
Speaker 1:Ashlyn, can you hear me?
Speaker 2:Yeah, my favorite in the world.
Speaker 1:There you go. Meet my co-host for this episode my dad's granddaughters Ashlyn and Kira. How are you guys doing?
Speaker 3:Good.
Speaker 1:Are you ready to be hosts for the show and take over completely?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You have a lot of questions that you sent me that you have to ask grandpa.
Speaker 3:Uh-oh.
Speaker 1:Being a pilot, and an airline pilot, huh.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yep, and grandpa inspired me, and you're the next generation and I know that he's been inspiring you as a pilot and he's taken you on a lot of airplane rides and you've gotten to go to some really cool places. You even got to sit in the cockpit of a Boeing 737. So here you guys go. I'm going to sit back and I'm going to let you ask grandpa all the questions you want. Oh, my goodness.
Speaker 2:Hi kiddos.
Speaker 3:Hi, hi. So what's your funniest, craziest moment flying?
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh. Really the craziest moment was, I have to say, when we took off in North Carolina and we were going to land back in North Carolina. We were flying to Air Force airplanes and we were doing air refueling. We were going to provide fuel to a bunch of fighters that were going to go all the way across the Atlantic Ocean to England and as soon as we took off, the other tanker airplane had a mechanical problem and so, instead of that airplane going all the way over to England with the fighters and us going back and landing at home that night, we changed leads and we took the lead because they had a maintenance problem and they went back to North Carolina and we flew all the way across the ocean and ended up in England. We were supposed to be at home that night. Instead of landing at home, we had to go all the way and visit England.
Speaker 2:Pretty special, because no one had packed. Oh, there we were at about midnight at the little shop at base trying to buy toothbrushes. It was crazy. When you wake up one morning, you're supposed to be in North Carolina. You know how, when you wake up in the morning and you're groggy, oh my god, I'm in England. That was pretty crazy.
Speaker 1:It was like when you guys did your first episode and you came the first night and you were supposed to be in bed but you were coffee at 3 in the morning with me doing a podcast episode.
Speaker 2:We went up at 3 drinking coffee. That's one of my favorite lines.
Speaker 1:I told Ashlyn to drink coffee tonight. Are you drinking coffee, Ashlyn?
Speaker 3:No.
Speaker 1:It's OK, that's a cool story. What else do you have to ask Grandpa?
Speaker 3:What's your favorite song to play too?
Speaker 2:My favorite Well, probably it would be some of the songs from Top Gun the original Top Gun.
Speaker 1:Do you know what Top Gun is? Ashlyn and Kira.
Speaker 3:It's a movie.
Speaker 1:Have you seen it?
Speaker 3:No.
Speaker 1:Did you know there's a real Top Gun? You should tell the girls about Top Gun Ned.
Speaker 2:Well, top Gun is a school. The Navy has one and the Air Force has one. It's officially called Fighter Weapon School and it's where the fighter pilots go to study and learn very special skills that not all fighter pilots get to learn. And back in, oh, I think somewhere around oh I don't know 25 or 30 years ago a movie came out called Top Gun, which was a fictional story, but it showed a story of a pilot who went to the Top Gun school and how he faced all the challenges and the dangers and worked real hard and did very well. And there's some sad things in there and some great things in there.
Speaker 2:But it was one of the first times that jet fighter planes had been really prominently shown in a Hollywood movie and it was beautifully filmed and the soundtrack was wonderful and I'm sure if I played the songs for you you'd recognize some of the songs, but jet fighter pilot songs when the jets are taken off the deck of the aircraft carrier and it's really motivational. As a side, I took your Aunt Tracy to see that movie when she was in high school and when she was hooked she said I want to go do this, I want to go to the Air Force Academy and learn to fly, and she ended up going on to be an F-16 fighter pilot. One of the reasons that she wanted to do that was because I took her to see that movie when she was a kid, so we'll have to track down some of that music for you.
Speaker 1:Someday we will watch Top Gun. Ashlyn and Kira Ashlyn, I think would like to play Metallico. Ashlyn's a Metallico fan. Could you listen to Metallico or Taylor Swift while you're flying, ashlyn?
Speaker 3:Metallico.
Speaker 2:There's a ACDC in there as well.
Speaker 3:Why do you have to put your phone in airplane mode?
Speaker 2:Well, the real reason is that technology. So a lot of people will say it's going to interfere with the navigation instruments and it might make the plane crash. Well, a tiny chance that could happen. But the real reason is that the technology for telephones is growing so fast it's growing faster than the Federal Aviation Administration can test to make sure that there's not going to be a problem. And so, even though we're confident that there are no problems because the testing hasn't been done to verify that, the safest thing to do is just go ahead and put them in airplane mode or shut them off, because they do transmit radio waves and usually different frequencies than the navigation instruments. It's probably perfectly safe, just be careful. We want to shut those off.
Speaker 1:They're made for flying airplanes. I just put my phone on airplane mode so my email didn't ding while we're doing the podcast. Put your phone on airplane mode right now, dad. That's perfect. Ok, sorry about that, you should know better.
Speaker 2:Airplane mode engaged.
Speaker 1:Kira, do you have a question for grandpa?
Speaker 3:I do. Why did the airlines take away the honey roasted peanuts?
Speaker 2:Well, there are people out there that have peanut allergies, and so sometimes the dust from the peanuts gets into the air circulation, and if people breathe that in, they can have reaction to it. So that's the main reason to take away the nuts. Also, when they're placed with pretzels, I think pretzels cost less, so they're saving a little bit of money by doing that as well.
Speaker 1:Do you like honey roasted peanuts more or normal peanuts, dad Honey?
Speaker 2:roasted. Yeah, the sentence used to call those pilot pellets. Bring them in and feed the pilots, your pilot pellets.
Speaker 3:What is your favorite? I mean, what is your funniest story while traveling internationally?
Speaker 2:Funniest story. Ok, I'll tell you the. Probably one of the funniest is I was in France, in a coastal town, in Normandy, which, for you, when you start learning about your history, you'll learn that's where big battles were fought in World War II, where the allies retook Europe from the Germans. Pretty special place, so we were visiting. I was there with my sister and her husband and my friend Carol. We were there in Normandy going to have breakfast and we were in a place called a creperie where they make crepes, and Carol really is a big fan of good butter, so she wanted to order a crepe with butter and, being the studious international traveler that she is, she wanted to say it in Ask, in French. So she asked the person at the counter. She ordered a crepe and buyerre, which is how you say butter in France buyerre. She didn't quite pronounce it quite correctly, though, because a moment later the waiter person brought over a tray and had on it a crepe and a Heineken beer.
Speaker 1:That's funny. You said that because Ashlyn and Kira wrote that down on their list of questions for you and I told them not to ask you that question.
Speaker 2:That would be the story I would say. So they handed Carol the tray it's got a Heineken and a crepe on it and rather than be rude and try to, she just said you know, Merci, thank you, and walked over and had a crepe and a beer for breakfast. Byerre and buyerre sounded too close together.
Speaker 3:What's your favorite place to fly to?
Speaker 2:Austin. Why? Because of all the people that I love that are nearby, the best time to fly to Austin is when you're in the plane with me coming down from Kansas City.
Speaker 1:Well, why don't you ask Grandpa and talk about being on the plane with him when he's flying? Because it's fun to travel with family, and you've traveled with Grandpa on the airplane a lot of times.
Speaker 3:I like it, me too.
Speaker 1:What's your favorite memory of flying with Grandpa?
Speaker 3:We go to sit in the cockpit.
Speaker 1:That was pretty cool. You know that I'm using that picture for the picture for this episode. That's one of my favorite pictures. Not many kids get to sit in the cockpit of a Boeing 737.
Speaker 3:I have one more question for you. Sure, funniest dog interaction while traveling.
Speaker 2:My funniest dog interaction. Wow, it's got to be something with Ranger Cooper. I'm sure You're saying funny, so I've got to think about something that would be, oh, okay, ready. I think the funniest thing that I saw was when we were taking Ranger down to National Park of American Samoa. And well, in order to have enough space on the plane, if we're flying on Southwest, then I buy an extra seat for him, which is the right thing to do. We have enough space, we sit on the front row in the bulkhead and he has enough room to lie at our feet. But Southwest doesn't fly to American Samoa in the South Pacific.
Speaker 2:So we were on Hawaiian Airlines and the only way to really ensure that you have enough space and be sitting in the front row is to either buy an extra seat or to buy the front row, and the front row on those airplanes is in what's called first class, which is bigger seats and nicer service and more expensive tickets. But as the only way I can ensure that we have enough room for Ranger, so I bought first class tickets. There's the only dog that I know that's there. The flies first class and they have these seats. They're called lie flat seats. They're actually seats that convert into a bed. They're electrically powered and they roll back and see anything so cute as Ranger with lie flat seats in first class on Hawaiian Airlines Airbus 330. The fly to lie. Just laugh, he was so cute, he was in heaven with all that space.
Speaker 1:I don't think many dogs get to fly first class. He's one of the very few lucky ones.
Speaker 2:He's a good traveler. He's a great traveler.
Speaker 1:I don't know if you were there, dad, and Ashlyn and Kira. I think you might like this. One time we were on a flight and the person behind us had a cat with them and Ranger was right in front of us at our feet, and the people behind us with the cat were very upset that there was a dog in front of them and they thought that Ranger was going to cause problems. And Ranger just laid down and he didn't care about the cat and the cat was actually who misbehaved on the flight.
Speaker 2:Hi Kimmer, was that you on Delta, or is that us on Spirit Going down to the Caribbean? I think that was Spirit. How's it to be a Caravans?
Speaker 1:That's actually a good segue into this, because I know you wanted to talk about service animals on airplanes and the girls both know about that because they've traveled with both Cooper and Ranger on airlines before, and that's an important thing to talk about, because taking animals on airplanes is a pretty big thing and I want to know your perspective on it, dad, and I also want to hear the girls' experience with flying with Ranger as a service animal as well.
Speaker 2:Sure, my experience I've seen it from both perspectives, both as a traveler with you and Ranger, and both as an air crew member and captain of the flight. One of the things that hasn't helped over the last several years is the number of animals that are traveling had gotten out of control. People were bringing all their pets with them and saying they were necessary for emotional support. We had emotional support Animals people would bring. There was an emotional support peacock that was brought on board, an emotional support horse. Someone brought a miniature horse on the plane and not our plane but that got to be so out of control that now you're not allowed to bring animals just for emotional support. They need to be medical service dogs and they need to be trained and they need to have paperwork that's registered with the Transportation Security Administration to formalize a process that's helped a lot to bring the numbers down and the craziness down. So the thing is, when people bring those animals with them, they're protected under law. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act. They're allowed to bring those animals with them.
Speaker 2:But each airline has its own procedures on how to accommodate those animals. If you think about a typical commercial airliner that has three seats side by side and if there are three people sitting there, if you have a service dog, where's the service dog going to go? It's got to go at your feet and it's not allowed to spill over and encroach on the area where the person sitting next to you is sitting. So there's physically really no room to put three people and a dog in a row, unless it's really a small dog. So if you have a German Shepherd or a Labrador or I don't know a Kelpie Australian Cattle Dog, it really needs that extra space. So what I try to do having seen flight attendants have to deal with this on a full flight with no room, I always buy the extra seat and make sure that we're not trying to make other people's travel experience cramped and uncomfortable by trying to put a dog in when there's no space. So Air Carriers Southwest has done this in the past, I believe. If the flight is not full then and you didn't actually need that seat you can apply for a refund and they'll give you the credit back to the seat, but at least it lets them know there's a service animal coming on board.
Speaker 2:Also, each airline has their own procedures, so rather than listening to what your friends has experienced or someone that you know. It's always a good idea to go to that Air Carriers website and pull up their policies for how to handle service animals, because it is different. The procedures are different, the paperwork is different, the notification requirements are different for every carrier and you want to definitely make sure you don't get to the airport and have to go through the hassle of finding out that you didn't get your paperwork in soon enough and now there's a problem. So do a little research, be prepared, have your dog trained and make sure you've got the space available for him and everything will go fine, when, if the dog is well behaved, they'll be popular, people walking by are going to wave and smile and try to pet him, and the flight attendants will go crazy. It's a great experience. I love having service animals on board, as long as there's room for them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and Ranger is my service animal, legitimately, and he's actually been on 32 flights in his life. He just turned two years old and he's been on 32 flights, which is pretty cool, but Ranger is also an ambassador for service animals and helping people understand what it is to be a responsible service animal owner and what a true service animal is. So if we do bring service animals on the airplane, it is important to respect other people and the policies and the rules, not abuse the system, and make sure that our service animals are well behaved and they're for the right reason.
Speaker 2:And that makes you an ambassador too, Brad, not just Ranger.
Speaker 1:Ashlyn and Kira is best friend. Yeah, Ashlyn just shook her head. Yes, what do you think about service animals on an airplane? Ashlyn and Kira.
Speaker 3:There should be a log, yeah.
Speaker 1:Do you know why? They also help people. That's the most important things that service animals do. Is there there to help people who have medical conditions or disabilities, and that's the only reason that they're allowed on airplanes because people need them, to keep them safe, and they're cute. All the flight attendants love Ranger.
Speaker 2:We're going to have to get Ranger a logbook. He's flown so much. Oh yeah, enough hours to get his pilot license.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he has earned his wings, that's for sure. So have the girls. The girls have earned their wings as well.
Speaker 2:Speaking of which Ashlyn you're, oh, I don't know 11-ish. Yeah, you're only five years away from being able to solo and get your pilot license.
Speaker 1:Five years Yep, and Ashlyn can get her pilot's license Yep, wow. What do you think about that? Ashlyn, it's crazy. Grandpa can teach you how to fly an airplane. Are you going to?
Speaker 2:learn to drive a car first.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know your Aunt Tracy. When she was at the Air Force Academy she learned to solo and fly the gliders down there before she ever had a driver's license for a car.
Speaker 3:Really.
Speaker 2:Just flying the plane before she got a driver's license for a car.
Speaker 1:I didn't know that let's go. I think I'm going to buy Ashlyn an airplane for her car, her first car. What do you think about that, Ashlyn?
Speaker 3:That'd be crazy.
Speaker 1:Kara would be a good copilot.
Speaker 2:She's not going to be too far behind. A couple years later, you'll be flying too.
Speaker 1:You had a good question when we were talking about this interview with Grandpa that you forgot to write down on your list of questions, and you had asked about the steering wheel in the airplane.
Speaker 3:How do you?
Speaker 1:You asked about what it's like to hold the steering wheel.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, what is it like to steer the airplane?
Speaker 2:It's a lot of fun. Different airplanes handle differently. Sometimes when you ride around and it's dropped, it feels different than if you're in a small car. Airplanes are the same way. The airplanes that I fly now for the airlines have hydraulic power that helped move the control surfaces out on the wings. That helped turn the airplane and make the airplane go up and down, Even though there's a lot of air pressure out on the wings and the tail. When I move what you call the steering wheel, it's we call it a yoke. When I move the yoke it's actually not directly turning the airplane, it's actuating some hydraulic pressure that pushes on these pistons and these cylinders that then move the parts of the wing that change the aerodynamics, that make the airplane roll to the left or to the right, or on the elevator to pitch up, pitch down. It's a little hard because you know a car it's you just turning left and right. But on an airplane you're turning left, you're turning right, or you're pushing forward to make the airplane go down, or pulling back to make it climb.
Speaker 1:When I was about your age, grandpa took me up in an airplane that's called a CESTA. It's a very small airplane and I will never forget I was sitting in the co-pilot seat and Grandpa told me that I could hold the wheel of the airplane. And Grandpa stepped back and he let me hold it and he let me steer it and it was the coolest feeling of my entire life. When you have control of an airplane in the sky, it's a really special feeling and if I was going to crash, grandpa had the ability to grab his wheel and make sure that daddy didn't crash.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But it's an amazing feeling when you have control of an airplane.
Speaker 2:You're right, because you're not constrained by having the road right there. It's not just left or right, forward or backwards, it's also up and down. So it's free movement within three-dimensional space. It's almost like dancing in the air and it's a wonderful feeling of freedom to be able to move any direction that you want left or right, up or down, depending on the airplane. You can spin it up, you can do a loop or a roll, roll it upside down. You're free. So it's a wonderful experience that I've thoroughly enjoyed in my career.
Speaker 3:That's cool.
Speaker 1:Looking forward to sharing it with you. You want to go up in an airplane with grab bones to it.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think he will do that with you. I will. What is your favorite part of flying?
Speaker 3:Me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what's your guys' favorite part of flying? We talked a little about it in your episode, which was episode number one, but what's your favorite part of flying?
Speaker 3:It's fun when they turn and you feel sideways and you feel like you're down.
Speaker 2:At one point when we go flying, if I can get the right kind of airplane rented for us or bought for us, instead of just turning so you can look down, we can go all the way upside down. As long as you're strapped in and the airplane is designed for it, you can fly the airplane upside down. That's always a lot of fun. You can see everything. The sky is below you instead of above you.
Speaker 1:Grandpa did that with me once, I believe one time. It's called a barrel roll. You would love it. It's amazing.
Speaker 2:Your dad has also had a chance to fly several of the simulators. I have.
Speaker 1:They're like video games girls that train you how to fly an airplane and let you practice.
Speaker 3:Really, that's cool.
Speaker 1:Maybe we can get you in a simulator someday.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You want to hear a really cool thing about Grandpa.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Did you know that Grandpa wanted to be an astronaut and he almost tried to and was?
Speaker 3:Really.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he wanted to go to space and be an astronaut and wear a space suit. You want to tell him about that, dad?
Speaker 2:Well, I always wanted to the next step in exploration. I grew up. I was, I think, five years old when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon for the very first time. I remember watching it on TV. I always wanted to do it.
Speaker 2:One of the things that you do if you want to do something extraordinary like that is you have to learn the pathway it takes to get there. What school do you need to go to? What classes? How hard do you have to work? What training and experience do you need to be able to be competitive to get one of those jobs? Because there's very few astronaut jobs. I didn't really follow the exact correct path. I was making it up as I went along, but I got to the point in the Air Force where I met all the requirements. I was fully qualified, I'd taken the astronaut physical, I'd passed, I had the academics. That would have been good. I'll tell you.
Speaker 2:There's a story that kind of is a little bit weird, but it's an important story in my life, so I'll share it with you. There was a point when we were living in San Antonio and I was. I went down to a school to try to get your dad into a private school for middle school. We didn't really like the school that he was in. This one was a good school, but there were not very many slots and a lot of people wanted to put their kid in the school.
Speaker 2:So what you do is camp out overnight waiting in line for them to open the doors the next morning, to be first in line to register. It's a little crazy because there's all these parents standing in line. They let us in early and put us in a sort of a break room and said, okay, well, you guys can wait in here overnight and then, when the night caught, in the morning you can sign up for school. So that's kind of the backstory. But anyway, it's the middle of the night, I don't know one, two in the morning and I'm sitting at this table by myself.
Speaker 1:That's when Ashland's drinking coffee.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:I should have had some coffee. Two in the morning is when Ashland drinks coffee.
Speaker 2:I had my backpack with me and inside my backpack was my application for the astronaut program. My plan, how I was going to spend the night while I was waiting to sign your data for school, was I was going to spend the evening filling out my application for the astronaut program and writing the essay. The essay was about why I want to be an astronaut, that kind of thing. So I'm sitting there by myself at this table and this woman comes over just randomly. She could have sat anywhere in the room. She said you mind if I join you, sure? So she sits down and we start talking and she finds out that, yes, I'm an instructor pilot at Randolph Air Force Base and she says do they still have the T-38s out there? I said well, yes, they do. She said oh, I used to fly in those. Oh, really, I said she was currently a dentist teaching at the dental school at the Air Force's medical facility there in San Antonio. So that's interesting. When were you flying in the T-38s? She said well, before I became a professor here teaching at the school, she said I used to be in the astronaut corps. That was a little weird because I was there that night getting ready to fill in my astronaut application. So I asked her about her experience in the astronaut corps and she said okay, the way it works when you get selected to be an astronaut, you go through training for about a year. Once you're done with your training, you wait until you get assigned a mission. Not everybody gets assigned to go on a flight mission, but while you're waiting to see if you get selected to go on a mission, you have additional duties to keep you busy and productive to help out the other astronauts. Ellen, which is her name.
Speaker 2:Ellen's job on the 28th of January in 1986, a few months before your dad was born, ellen's job was to be an escort for the families of the astronauts that were going to go up on the Challenger mission. I don't remember if you remember your history or if you've studied about this, but on that particular day it was a very sad day. Astronauts took off on the Space Shuttle Challenger and just a couple of minutes into the flight they had a problem and the fuel tanks blew up and the Space Shuttle crashed back down into the sea. Ellen's job she was escorting the family of one of the astronauts named Ellison Anazuka. She had to go through that experience of comforting them and handling that whole experience while they've got to watch their dad in the Space Shuttle die from the explosions very tragic. To top it all off, ellen's job, since she was a dentist. Her other job was she was the chief of the dental clinic at Patrick Air Force Base, which is nearby Cape Kennedy, where they used to take off the shuttle. One of the ways you sadly identify the remains of people that have been burned or damaged when they died is you look at the dental records, because the teeth still often remain intact. Her job was to help identify the astronauts' bodies when they came in. She said it was such a traumatic experience that she simply had to resign from being an astronaut.
Speaker 2:After I said well, it's been a while. Did you ever think about getting back into the program? She looked at me with these piercing, focused eyes and she said I'm a mother now. I have other responsibilities. That hit me right between the eyes. That was a message from someone, I don't know who, but it was all about me needing to recognize I had responsibilities to that. I'm a father now and I have responsibilities. Maybe the most selfish thing I could have done was to go off and be an astronaut, leave my family on the ground and subject them to the same risks. I listened and I did not fill out the application and I did not turn it in. That was the end of my aspiration to be an astronaut. I still would love to have done it, but I got that message from the universe through Ellen. That said, to focus on my priorities and my priorities with my family. But sometimes you just got to listen to when the world speaks. It speaks in different ways.
Speaker 1:Family is everything, but you can still go to Mars, girls.
Speaker 2:I will go tomorrow as well, because the kids are all grown up now. You've got to be a little bit more careful.
Speaker 1:Maybe you could teach the girls how to fly to Mars. That would be fun. I think Ashlyn and Kira are the future of the space program. I think they're both going to be on Mars and we're all going to be very proud of them. What do you think you guys want to go to Mars?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Ashlyn wants to be a surgeon on Mars. That's what she's been talking about. Yep. What about you, Kira? What do you want to do on Mars?
Speaker 3:I don't really want to go to Mars, but if I did, I would do the same thing as Ashlyn, because I would do Surgeons? Yeah.
Speaker 1:They might need them. That's really cool. You do whatever you want with your lives, Whether it's a surgeon on Mars or a pilot. Grandpa did with his life what he loved and wanted to do. He worked really hard to do it. You guys can do whatever you want in the same way. That's the example that Grandpa set for me and your uncle and your aunt. I know that he's setting that example for you. I'm trying to set that example for you too. You should know that you can do whatever you want in life. As long as you love it and you work hard at it, you can do that.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, Actually. I wanted to bring up one more thing, Actually, now that we're talking about it, this you can't see it on this podcast, but I'm holding up Ashlyn's Stuffed Fox. It's a stuffed animal fox and I take it everywhere I travel on all my flights. Someday I'm going to give it to Ashlyn and it will have traveled. It has traveled all over the world already. I wanted to bring up Boris because Ashlyn and Kira both know who Boris is. It's one of the most special stories in my life and your aunt's life. We have to bring up Boris because he's the most famous flying stuffed animal that ever lived.
Speaker 2:Okay, so you want to hear the story of Boris? Yes, okay, we're back in, I think 1990, probably in the fall I was asked to fly a mission over to Russia to bring a bunch of US senators and the Secretary of Defense to do some work with the Russian government and military. Maybe I'd be able to go over Russia, because there wasn't a whole lot of interaction up to that point. The Cold War had kept the sides apart and people didn't travel back and forth, so it was really a rare thing to be asked to go. So I thought, okay, if I'm going to go, I'm going to bring with me a teddy bear. A lot of the school groups or scout groups would have traveling teddy bear that they would send out on Air Force planes and the Air Force flight crews would fly them around the world and they would send postcards back and take pictures of them in exciting places around the world the Cub Scout troop or the Girl Scout troop or the school group. And it was a lot of fun. So I thought I'll do this. I'm wearing a Cub Scout pack. So right before I left, went over to the store and found a bear and it was a gray, silvery, gray bear and I thought we're going to Russia. I'll name him Boris. So I took Boris with me over to Moscow and Boris got to walk around the streets of Moscow with me and he also spent some time on the plane and we have pictures of him on the plane with getting his oxygen mask, training and filling out his travel vouchers so he could get paid when he got back. But anyway, we're over in Moscow and in order to have my hands free for taking pictures and looking at maps, I zipped up my jacket halfway and stuffed Boris under my jacket, with just his face and his nose sticking out. So I'm an American in Moscow, which is a very gray kind of bleary, dreary, post-communist city, not a lot of color, and I'm wearing a green, white and blue Nautica sailing jacket, which didn't exactly blend. I've got this bare face sticking out.
Speaker 2:I'm walking the streets of Moscow we're just a couple blocks away from Red Square in the Kremlin and I look across the street and there's a group of look like about fourth graders and they were out on a field trip and I don't know where they were going. But the kids started pointing at Boris and they could see this crazy person walking with a teddy bear sticking out of his jacket, and the teachers let them come over and they all wanted to meet Boris and pet Boris, and none of them spoke any English and I didn't speak any Russian. We found that it didn't matter. I had one of my American flag patches in my jacket pocket and I was able to point to the American flag and let them know yeah, that's where we're from, and I told them, boris, and we just had a lovely, marvelous time interacting and you know this may be a little off topic, but it really was one of the most profound moments of my life because up until that point in time, the US and the Soviet Union had been involved in what's called a Cold War. We were on the brink of war for 50 years and never a shot was fired, but there were all these weapons pointed at each other and it was a very tense situation.
Speaker 2:And it got me to realize, interacting with these kids, that you know, people are the same all around the world and people just want most people just want to be able to raise their families, interact with their kids, raise their kids to be good and happy and productive people. They're no different really than we are and in that moment, interacting with those kids, it became clear to me that there must be a better way. There must be a better way for people to work their problems out than fighting, and became resolved. From that point I still believe in peace through strength, that the stronger you are and the better prepared you are, the least likely you are to have to fight. But those kids really touched my heart and it was one of the most profound experiences of my life. You'll hang out with those little fourth graders on the streets of Moscow and share Boris. I wish them all well. They're all adults now. They're all about your dad's age and hopefully they have fond memories of seeing that little bear there to brighten their day as well.
Speaker 1:I think teddy bears are the universal language and I think that we should send everybody in the world a teddy bear. The world would be a much better place, and Boris is a very special member of our family. He's in the room over there and he will never stop being an important part of our lives. Like I said, ashlyn, I have your fox right here and the same reason we. He travels all over and he's well traveled and people see your fox and they ask about him, and I explain the situation and that it's for you and that it's your fox, and I think that it makes other people want to travel as well. So that's what we're doing we're inspiring other people to travel and live their dreams and go for their goals, and sometimes all it takes is a teddy bear or a stuffed fox.
Speaker 2:And I carry a little teddy bear too that your uncle, andrew, gave me when he was a little boy, and my little bear little guy, has been riding around in this silly airline captain suitcase for the last 20 some odd years, going with me everywhere I've been around the world and it's been fun to take him out and show him. Look where we are. You're in Israel, or you're in Europe, you're in Australia. So he's been a well traveled bear as well, yeah, it's important.
Speaker 1:I think that well. I know that we, that our experience plays a very important role in our influence on our family, and you've definitely done that for me and my brother and my sister, your other kids, and I hope that you know that you're playing that role in Ashlyn and Kira's life. But Ashlyn and Kira, I believe, have something to teach you as well, and from the mouths of two young ladies that see the world differently than us adults, I would like to know, ashlyn and Kira, what you have to say to grandpa right now.
Speaker 3:Always be happy.
Speaker 1:Always be happy. What about you, kira?
Speaker 3:Have fun.
Speaker 2:Have fun, always be happy. Have fun, I like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I have a post it note here that says flying is fun, that. What do you have to share with these girls about your experience in life and as a pilot, what you've learned, what you've passed on to us, because they're sitting here listening. What do you have? One thing you had to say one thing to them. What would it be?
Speaker 2:I guess it's about part of me that is drawn to adventure and exploration and it's part of your heritage. We trace our heritage. We go back to the Vikings and from over the years, from nomads to horsemen, to railroad engineers and ship captains, our family has been involved in movement, purposeful movement. There's a part of me that gets drawn to go visit and see what's on the next side or the other side of the hill, what's out there, what is there to be discovered, what new places and new people to meet, and that's all wonderful. There's another part of me, there's another part of me that says not only does the ability to travel shrink the world and help you discover new places and new things, but it also reminds us. There's another piece that brings us, wants us to come back, come back home, and it reminds us of just how precious the places that we've left are as well. So it's not always about going forward. Sometimes it's also about returning.
Speaker 2:I've discovered one of the best, one of my favorite characters in all of literature. The one that I'm finding as I'm reflecting on and preparing for this is Bilbo Baggins. If you've ever seen the Hobbit.
Speaker 1:He says Lord of the Rings, girls in the Hobbit Remember Bilbo.
Speaker 2:Bilbo lives in a hobbit hole and he lives in a community of people that like to stay home but that don't like to go and venture and go travel and go on crazy expeditions. And Bilbo, of course, gets roped into this expedition by Gandalf the Wizard and he goes off and travels to distant places and has extraordinary adventures and in the end he learns so much about the world. But he also wants to come back and when he returns back to that comfort, that comfortable place of his fireplace and his books and everything in his home, he's a better. He's a better hobbit for having had the experience. But it's balanced and when he wrote his memoir he titled his memoir there and Back Again.
Speaker 2:To me that's the brilliant piece. It's not just about going there, it's about coming back and what are you bringing with you when you come back? And a lot of times it's about perspective. You learn, and I'm going to drop into a quoting a passage from a writer named TS Elliott. That's one of my favorite passages and I know you've all heard it probably before, but it's so profound that I want to share it with you and with all of Brad's listeners. What Elliott said was we shall not cease from exploration and the end of our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. And I'll think about that, how, when you go someplace else, the things that you learn, the people you meet, the way you see other people live, you come back home and it makes home all that more special when you come back to the border.
Speaker 2:When you've left the United States and you come back, one of the first things you do in the airport is you have to go through immigration, show them your passport. You'll get to do that someday. And one of the most special things in life after you've been out of the United States with all of our problems, that immigration officer will hand you your passport back and you'll say welcome home. And that, son, you know that's one of the most special moments when you cross back into America and you hear that those magic words welcome home.
Speaker 2:So travel. I encourage you to travel, visit, learn, interact with different people in different cultures and use it to make your own life richer, to enrich their lives, and then, when you return home, a little older, a little wiser, a little richer. That's what travel has done for me in my life and I'm proud to be part of that legacy, that trailblazing legacy, to move, open up those paths for you and let you tread on those paths and visit those places at your own pace and in your own time. Yeah, the world is out there for you.
Speaker 1:That's good advice, grandpa, to that girls it's always important to go out and adventure and see the world, but it's important to come home and your family's always here and you're going to learn everything about the world. But always take the time to come home and rest by the fire. And I'm raising some little adventurers here. They're restless. They want to see the world, that's for sure. Grandpa has taken me to Germany and Austria and the Czech Republic and Switzerland and Canada and the Arctic Circle and the American Samoas and all over the country. Grandpa is my travel companion and I hope that someday I will be your travel companion and I will take you all over the world. You're in good hands, young ladies. We're going to Antarctica with Ranger. I'll chase the penguins.
Speaker 2:Never know that penguins might chase Ranger, that's true, that is very true, all right.
Speaker 1:So, girls, we kind of talked to Grandpa, kind of talked about this earlier, and we have these decisions in life and sometimes it has to do with family, sometimes it has to do with who you are and sometimes it's a back and forth poem. Grandpa shared this poem with me once and it's my favorite poem in the world and it has inspired me to travel and made me think about how to travel the right way. And grandpa knows a lot of things and he shared with me this poem and I think that you would like to hear it because it's beautiful, it's Grandpa's favorite poem and it's my favorite poem. Would you like to hear it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm going to give a shout out to one of my inspirational heroes, the late great Jimmy Buffett, who referred me to this poem. I think it was part of one of his books, a Pirate Looks at 50. And Jimmy was a great traveler, musician and a pilot himself, and shared with me the whole idea about how wonderful it is to explore and meet new people and travel around, but also the beauty of home. And he ran across this poem that he shared and I'll now share it with you. It's by a poet named Don Blanding and it's called the Double Life. Listen carefully and see if it reminds you of anybody you know.
Speaker 2:The double life by Don Blanding, a very simple life would be if only there were two of me A restless me to drift in Rome. A quiet me to stay at home. A searching one to find his fill, a varied skies and new found thrill, while sane and homely things are done by the domestic other one. And that's just where the trouble lies. There is a restless me that cries for chancey risks and changing scene For arctic blue and tropic green, for deserts with their mystic spell For lusty fun and raising L.
Speaker 2:But shackled to that restless me, my other self rebelliously resists the frantic urge to move. It seeks the old, familiar groove and habits make. It finds content with hearth and home and dear prisonment, with candlelight and well loved books and treasured loot and dusty nooks. While with puttering and garden things and dreaming while the cricket sings and all the while the restless one insists on more exciting fun, wants to go with every tide, no matter where, just for the ride. Like yowling cats, the two selves brawl while I have no peace at all. One eye turns toward the forward track, the other eye looks sadly back. I'm getting walleye from the strain. It's tough to have an idle brain, but one says stay, one says go, one says yes, one says no, one self wants a home and wife and one self craves the drifter's life. The restless fellow always wins. I wish my folks had made me twins, can you?
Speaker 1:please explain to the girls what that means briefly.
Speaker 2:It's like we talked about, with the tug of war that goes on inside of you, wanting to go, wanting to travel, wanting to always leave, being antsy and wanting to sail away and see what's on the other side of the world. But that's not all of who we are. We also have a peace inside of us, people in our family that want to treasure and value home and being here and staying with family and doing all those wonderful things that being at home is all about, and that's the family you come from is. You have people in your family. You have a wide range of people in your family that have traveled the world.
Speaker 2:Your grandfather, poppy, is vice president of international management consulting company and he worked in Asia, canada and Africa and Australia and Europe and all over the United States. And as an Air Force pilot, I've flown almost all the way around the world not quite. We had Tracy's, an F-16 pilot, her husband's an F-16 pilot and a United pilot, and you're at Sandy's, a flight attendant. We're all involved in travel. We all treasure the time that we're home as well, and if you can go through life and find that balance, then you'll be well-served If you don't let one take over the other. That's why Bilbo Baggins is my, my new found hero, there and back again.
Speaker 1:Perfect. It's amazing advice. Ashlyn and Kira Play this episode over and over again and listen to it over and over again. That's the best advice that grandpa ever gave me and that's the best advice that I could ever pass on to you.
Speaker 2:It's in your DNA, young ladies.
Speaker 1:What's the most beautiful thing you've seen out the window of an airplane, home, perfect. Thank you, dad. Thank you so much for being here. I'm so, so honored to have you on here. This is important. This podcast exists because of you, and my little girls are on this podcast because of you as well. You've inspired all of us and thank you, ashlyn and Kira. You are the best co-hosts I've ever had and you're gonna continue to be my co-hosts Next time we're interviewing grandma. Thank you, girl.
Speaker 2:You totally derailed all my hours of preparation with a much more delightful and enjoyable segment. Having my grandbabies on is always a treat, and having them as the co-host was definitely a special experience for me, so thank you for setting this all up. There's, you know that what we do in life is pave the way and blaze trails for the generations that come behind us, and people have been doing it for us, laying the groundwork for everything we're able to do. How much we owe the Wright brothers and Isaac Newton and Einstein and the founding fathers and everyone who made this all possible for us. And it's our job to then pass that legacy down to you guys and to try to be good leaders and inspire you. Travel's in your DNA, and I encourage you to explore and make the most of this little tiny blue dot that we call our planet Earth.
Speaker 1:I agree. Thank you guys, both of you so much. Ranger is thankful too. He misses you. He loves all of you. He's sitting here chewing on a bone, missing you guys. Kira, the last time we did an episode, you told everybody where to find our podcast. Do you remember where people can find our podcast?
Speaker 3:Can Spotify.
Speaker 1:Apple podcasts and Spotify wwwchangingroads. Please find us there. We're grateful to have you for listeners. Thank you so much for tuning in today and listening to my beautiful daughters podcast and the things that they have to say and the things that my dad have to say To me. This is the most special podcast we've ever done and very grateful to have you and we look forward to everything that comes next. So thank you again. I love you. Ashton loves you, kira loves you, grandpa loves you, ranger loves you, woof, woof and would everybody like to say goodbye?
Speaker 3:Bye, bye.
Speaker 1:Woof, woof, love you guys. Thank you so much again for being here and we will see you all next time.
Speaker 2:Thanks, brad, love you Thank you Bye, jonathan.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for the best. Thank you, brad. Thanks, it's so close.