Decades before the good TV shows had the production quality of films and the story qualities of thick novels, there was, for those the Complete and Total Loser's age, The Rockford Files. The show would open with a call to his answering machine—a novelty at the time—on which he left a greeting that was the template of cool greetings for the 70s and 80s: "This is Jim Rockford. At the tone leave your name and message, I'll get back to you." Then came the opening credits and music, which you can hear all of here.
The Loser remembers reading an interview in which Garner recounted a few of his Korean War adventures. At one point, he had to lie still for over a day. He talked about eating but the food not moving through his digestive system because of his physical position and what an odd feeling that was. He also talked about how he had to pretend to be the prisoner of a South Korean soldier as the two bluffed their way out of enemy territory.
All interesting. He was quite a man.
Maybe one day I'll stop having to remember to add "would have been" when speaking of my late parents' birthdays, but on this second birthday after my mother's death that day hasn't arrived.
In the photo she's twelve. It's February of 1943 and the man she's looking at is her big brother who is a Marine fighter pilot during the war. Later, he would fly early jets in Korea, fighter bombers. He was an excellent pilot and taught others to fly. One he taught was so good that my uncle made him his wing man: Ted Williams, the baseball player. The two were friends for life.
My uncle died in November of 2011, just a few weeks after my mother.
