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Rolling Stop
Apr. 28th, 2010 08:00 pmIn my years tending bar, I've found that there are a few reasons people will drink out, and they fall into some pretty distinct categories.
When people go to a lounge, they're there to dance, make friends, maybe get lucky for the night. The guy with way too much gel in his hair will buy something fruity for the girl and she'll giggle and flirt and maybe go home with him, if he's smooth and she's lookin'.
When a guy heads to a seedy bar and slaps a twenty down, ordering the strongest thing you have, he's there to drown his sorrows away, and most likely doesn't want any attention or company aside from the liquor. Those ones need to be watched, now - you never know if they're gonna drink themselves to death, start a fight, or otherwise turn a perfectly fine night upside-down.
Then there's this third group of people, the interesting ones. They'll pick a respectable, decent pub (as I'd like to think mine is, the Rotor n' Prop — we get a lot of pilots, being right by the airfield), order a few strong drinks for courage, and keep looking around at the others, occasionally trying to break into their conversations. I figure the 'friendly bartender' tradition started because of people like this — there's a lot of downtime and you want your patrons to keep coming back, so you might as well jaw a bit. And, sometimes you can even help out.
So I talk with them. Or rather, most of the time, they just want an ear and can't find one elsewhere, and drying glasses means that I have plenty of attention to spare. So they'll talk their bit, I'll nod sympathetically, and they figure things out on their own, and everyone's happy. Their stories run the gamut of problems at work, problems in their relationships, bad sex, homicidal relatives, everything you can think of. I've noticed one thing, in these years — the details may be different (hell, there was a story last week that was just insane), but the human story is to find meaning in some shape or form. Always a quest for the meaning of life, you know?
Every once in a while I'll get some whiner, and there's little to do but tell the boy to man up and take some goddamn responsibility. Sometimes, they even come back after growing some cojones, and become pretty regular patrons — I like those guys. The ones that come back will have pretty decent lives, I figure, because they can take advice when they need to. Not saying that nothing bad's ever gonna happen to them, but they can at least roll with the punches.
And then there are those on the other end of the spectrum. Cocky-ass flyboys that think they're invincible because they've just gotten their wings. Don't matter much what they're flying; Cessna or Beechcraft, or even the Learjet pilots or Navy jocks, hubris is hubris. They think they could land anything with wings after a minute in the cockpit; they think they could fly through a tornado and come out unscathed.
Sometimes, there's a senior airman that will lay it on them, tell them what flat-footed incompetent pants-on-head SOBs that they are, give them the sound verbal ass-kicking that they need. And sometimes, there isn't anyone around to bring the strutting rooster down, and I figure it falls on me.
So I tell them the story:
-
About twenty-five years ago, there was a twenty-two year old rookie pilot named Sean who had just earned his pilot's license. Sean had wanted to fly since he was five or six and saw his first air-show, and pretty much ate, breathed, and dreamed planes. When he got his pilot's license, he thought he was some hot shit. Granted, his pride wasn't entirely unjustified; the instructors had praised him often for his quick learning and fast reactions, and agreed that he'd probably make a hell of a pilot in ten years, if he kept learning. But Sean took it as meaning that he was a hell of a pilot already, and strutted around with aviator glasses, a pilot's cap, and a bomber jacket, despite the fact that he had never flown a military plane.
There was one thing that Sean cared about other than flying, and that was his fiancée, Amber. They'd been childhood friends and after getting over the usual awkwardness of youth, they started dating their junior year of high school. They loved each other, and rarely for a young couple, recognized what they had. Amber had reconciled with the fact that Sean would be in the skies for most of his life and didn't hold his dreams against him; in turn, Sean made sure that if he wasn't flying, he was with her as much as she wanted.
It was to no one's surprise when they got engaged at the end of college, a few months before their five-year anniversary. Sean wanted the day to be something special and called the small airfield, pulling a few strings, and given that he had more or less grown up there, they let him have what he wanted. A Cessna 152 would be waiting for him that Saturday for a two hour flight.
Saturday was bright and sunny and the couple headed to the airfield at about ten in the morning, ready to spend a few hours flying. Sean wanted to get them into the air as soon as possible — and yes, you guessed it — skipped the visual walk around and most of the preflight check. That was his first mistake, though when he taxiied out and took off, the plane responded just fine. For the better part of half an hour, they cruised around, the 'captain' keeping it steady at first, and then trying to impress Amber with his skills. No loops or spins - he wasn't that stupid. But he rolled side to side, took a few dives that were completely unnecessary, and generally behaved like a young idiot with a toy that he didn't fully understand the limits off. Luckily for him, the plane held together...
...until he started the descent for landing. The engine stalled and shut off as he was parallel to the runway, about to make the two final right angle turns to land. "Shit," the tower heard, but that was it. The official report commented that the Cessna acted like it could still make the runway, cutting in and taking the turns early — too early, according to what should have been done — and was going too fast when it approached the runway.
The report stated that with radio silence, it was impossible to tell, but it was likely that the pilot was panicking, especially with someone else in the cockpit with him, and due to that, forgot about the crosswind. A strong gust came in, one that could've been compensated for under normal conditions. The left wing hit the ground, dragged the Cessna to nosedive into the ground, and the plane lost the other wing and ended up rolling about a hundred feet from the point of impact, shedding debris along the way.
Sean woke up from a coma two weeks later; two days after Amber's funeral had happened, and never flew again.
-
It's not a happy story, and I watch their faces as they slowly lose the confident smirk. When I get to the ending, they're somber and reflective, a staggering reversal from the loud and obnoxious 'captains' that came in. They see, I think, a bit of where they could have been and what it means, and take off their pilot's caps, put away their aviator glasses, shrug uncomfortably in their bomber jackets.
And then they shuffle off, their attitudes changed for the afternoon, at least, hopefully longer. Every once in a blue moon, before he goes, the hotshot will ask me a question.
"What did Sean do with his life? Was he ever happy again?"
And I pause for a second, wondering myself, before I respond.
"Well, life goes on. He stumbled around for a while, lost in his guilt, and almost drank himself to death before a friendly bartender set him straight and told him to take responsibility and live his life in a way that Amber would've wanted him to."
And then I pause again, making sure I meet their eyes as I continue.
"Eventually, though, he found something that he could be content with, and became the bartender of a small pub on the edge of an airfield."
When people go to a lounge, they're there to dance, make friends, maybe get lucky for the night. The guy with way too much gel in his hair will buy something fruity for the girl and she'll giggle and flirt and maybe go home with him, if he's smooth and she's lookin'.
When a guy heads to a seedy bar and slaps a twenty down, ordering the strongest thing you have, he's there to drown his sorrows away, and most likely doesn't want any attention or company aside from the liquor. Those ones need to be watched, now - you never know if they're gonna drink themselves to death, start a fight, or otherwise turn a perfectly fine night upside-down.
Then there's this third group of people, the interesting ones. They'll pick a respectable, decent pub (as I'd like to think mine is, the Rotor n' Prop — we get a lot of pilots, being right by the airfield), order a few strong drinks for courage, and keep looking around at the others, occasionally trying to break into their conversations. I figure the 'friendly bartender' tradition started because of people like this — there's a lot of downtime and you want your patrons to keep coming back, so you might as well jaw a bit. And, sometimes you can even help out.
So I talk with them. Or rather, most of the time, they just want an ear and can't find one elsewhere, and drying glasses means that I have plenty of attention to spare. So they'll talk their bit, I'll nod sympathetically, and they figure things out on their own, and everyone's happy. Their stories run the gamut of problems at work, problems in their relationships, bad sex, homicidal relatives, everything you can think of. I've noticed one thing, in these years — the details may be different (hell, there was a story last week that was just insane), but the human story is to find meaning in some shape or form. Always a quest for the meaning of life, you know?
Every once in a while I'll get some whiner, and there's little to do but tell the boy to man up and take some goddamn responsibility. Sometimes, they even come back after growing some cojones, and become pretty regular patrons — I like those guys. The ones that come back will have pretty decent lives, I figure, because they can take advice when they need to. Not saying that nothing bad's ever gonna happen to them, but they can at least roll with the punches.
And then there are those on the other end of the spectrum. Cocky-ass flyboys that think they're invincible because they've just gotten their wings. Don't matter much what they're flying; Cessna or Beechcraft, or even the Learjet pilots or Navy jocks, hubris is hubris. They think they could land anything with wings after a minute in the cockpit; they think they could fly through a tornado and come out unscathed.
Sometimes, there's a senior airman that will lay it on them, tell them what flat-footed incompetent pants-on-head SOBs that they are, give them the sound verbal ass-kicking that they need. And sometimes, there isn't anyone around to bring the strutting rooster down, and I figure it falls on me.
So I tell them the story:
-
About twenty-five years ago, there was a twenty-two year old rookie pilot named Sean who had just earned his pilot's license. Sean had wanted to fly since he was five or six and saw his first air-show, and pretty much ate, breathed, and dreamed planes. When he got his pilot's license, he thought he was some hot shit. Granted, his pride wasn't entirely unjustified; the instructors had praised him often for his quick learning and fast reactions, and agreed that he'd probably make a hell of a pilot in ten years, if he kept learning. But Sean took it as meaning that he was a hell of a pilot already, and strutted around with aviator glasses, a pilot's cap, and a bomber jacket, despite the fact that he had never flown a military plane.
There was one thing that Sean cared about other than flying, and that was his fiancée, Amber. They'd been childhood friends and after getting over the usual awkwardness of youth, they started dating their junior year of high school. They loved each other, and rarely for a young couple, recognized what they had. Amber had reconciled with the fact that Sean would be in the skies for most of his life and didn't hold his dreams against him; in turn, Sean made sure that if he wasn't flying, he was with her as much as she wanted.
It was to no one's surprise when they got engaged at the end of college, a few months before their five-year anniversary. Sean wanted the day to be something special and called the small airfield, pulling a few strings, and given that he had more or less grown up there, they let him have what he wanted. A Cessna 152 would be waiting for him that Saturday for a two hour flight.
Saturday was bright and sunny and the couple headed to the airfield at about ten in the morning, ready to spend a few hours flying. Sean wanted to get them into the air as soon as possible — and yes, you guessed it — skipped the visual walk around and most of the preflight check. That was his first mistake, though when he taxiied out and took off, the plane responded just fine. For the better part of half an hour, they cruised around, the 'captain' keeping it steady at first, and then trying to impress Amber with his skills. No loops or spins - he wasn't that stupid. But he rolled side to side, took a few dives that were completely unnecessary, and generally behaved like a young idiot with a toy that he didn't fully understand the limits off. Luckily for him, the plane held together...
...until he started the descent for landing. The engine stalled and shut off as he was parallel to the runway, about to make the two final right angle turns to land. "Shit," the tower heard, but that was it. The official report commented that the Cessna acted like it could still make the runway, cutting in and taking the turns early — too early, according to what should have been done — and was going too fast when it approached the runway.
The report stated that with radio silence, it was impossible to tell, but it was likely that the pilot was panicking, especially with someone else in the cockpit with him, and due to that, forgot about the crosswind. A strong gust came in, one that could've been compensated for under normal conditions. The left wing hit the ground, dragged the Cessna to nosedive into the ground, and the plane lost the other wing and ended up rolling about a hundred feet from the point of impact, shedding debris along the way.
Sean woke up from a coma two weeks later; two days after Amber's funeral had happened, and never flew again.
-
It's not a happy story, and I watch their faces as they slowly lose the confident smirk. When I get to the ending, they're somber and reflective, a staggering reversal from the loud and obnoxious 'captains' that came in. They see, I think, a bit of where they could have been and what it means, and take off their pilot's caps, put away their aviator glasses, shrug uncomfortably in their bomber jackets.
And then they shuffle off, their attitudes changed for the afternoon, at least, hopefully longer. Every once in a blue moon, before he goes, the hotshot will ask me a question.
"What did Sean do with his life? Was he ever happy again?"
And I pause for a second, wondering myself, before I respond.
"Well, life goes on. He stumbled around for a while, lost in his guilt, and almost drank himself to death before a friendly bartender set him straight and told him to take responsibility and live his life in a way that Amber would've wanted him to."
And then I pause again, making sure I meet their eyes as I continue.
"Eventually, though, he found something that he could be content with, and became the bartender of a small pub on the edge of an airfield."
