December 7th 1986

On Sunday morning, December 7th, 1986, I recall taking off from Hickham AFB in a C-141 bound for New Zealand.

We took off at exactly 8:00 am.

The flight was scheduled to take off at 8:00 am on the departure board.  I had been waiting a week or more to on a standby flight list and this was the one I was selected for, 4 hours ahead of departure time.  During that time I wondered how many of those to be on board as well as all the others in the terminal were aware of the gravity of the date as well as the planned departure day and time of the aircraft.

Sitting in the plane ready for takeoff I thought about the significance of that day, date and time.  I was not the only one aware of it although nobody had mentioned it either in the terminal prior to the flight or on the aircraft.

The pilot was certainly aware of the significance.

At exactly 8:00 he (she) pushed the throttle forward and we rolled for take off.

Rolling down the runway and finally lifting off my thoughts were overwhelming about time, place, then and now.  Simple conjuncture of time and place.  Then and now but my mind could leap the difference like time travel to be at the same place at the same time on a Sunday morning whose date would live in infamy.

I am old enough to remember Walter Cronkite saying:  "And you are there".

I was actually there at the time when he was also saying profound "And you are there" things about Vietnam.

Reporting on history in the making.  In time and in time travel.  Amazing, the places we can go........to places and time where people were.

Jane's father was on a ship in Pearl Harbor on that day in 1941.