an executioner, he got the same answer. Only this time, “have you considered the Army?”
“I just came from there. I want to be a Seal. The Rangers thought I was too small.”
“You know they are right. A Seal, as with a Ranger training, is arduous beyond believe. Very few men or women make it. Why don’t you get signed up for the Navy if you don’t want to join the Army? You can serve you country well there.”
Braydon turned on his heels and walked out. “Nothing doing, I’m going to do what my country needs me to do, even if I don’t know what that is any more.” He still muttered to himself.
“Only one more place to go. Air Force. But then I have no idea how I would serve there. None of the training I have fits this branch of the service.” He said to the thing.
It started right up and purred then quit before he left the parking place. The Thing had never done that before. He checked the gas, it was good, the oil was ok and there was no possibility of overheating because it was an air cooled engine.
He gave an angry turn of the key and nothing. So he sat there in the one hundred and five degree temperature roasting inside and out. Today was Murphy’s Law in action, if something’s could go wrong it will go wrong. Then gripping the steering wheel until his hands went red, he said to George, “Your right, I need to think this trough more, I might be missing something.”
There was billboard advertising for Boulder Dam hanging right in front of him. “That might just be my cup of tea right now, but I hate tea. Well, maybe I could jump off the new bridge and hit nothing for over eight hundred feet, but then if I landed on my head it would destroy the landscaping.” It was a passing thought; he knew he would never be that desperate.
He turned the key again and the Thing jumped to life. “George, it’s just a good thing you started. I am not having a good day and thus would hate you forever. At least you seem to agree with me.” The car gave him no response as they pulled out of the parking lot and headed east to Boulder Highway then south toward Hoover Dam. Boulder Highway was not busy at this time of day so the traveling was easy. He could have taken the Freeway but he didn’t want to think about driving, just let George take him. The went by the Railroad Pass Casino and he thought to himself, “If I was ever going to take up drinking this would be a good time to do it, I’ve had a monstrous day.” He got off the Highway and made a left turn into the casino parking lot. He left George cooling and went to the casino but it was so smoky, it would take a knife to cut through it, and besides that, he hated smoke, he just turned and walked out, back into the Thing and kept moving, making a left turn on Boulder Highway and on to Boulder City.
He arrived in the City in about twenty five minutes, pushing the speed limit, if George could do such a thing. Now Boulder is a quaint little town on the edge of Lake Mead and is a world apart from Las Vegas, no gambling just a wholesome down to earth family community.
Braydon took his time and looked around. The ice cream cone from the Dairy Queen helped cool him down. George’s air conditioning was so good that between that his frustrations and the one hundred and fifteen degrees temperature outside the ambient temperature inside was over two hundred degrees.
“It’s amazing what a large cone of Vanilla Ice Cream can do to reduce stress and eliminate pain; it was also great for dossing steam coming from the ears. “Ice Cream, as far as I’m concerned, and it’s a medical fact, is the best thing I can do to reduce body temperature, so I’ll just have to force myself to indulge”, or so he reasoned with himself. Sometime sugar, like caffeine, would hype him up. What the heck, he needed a little hyping and he had to eat it fast so it didn’t melt. It was a quick U-Turn and back to the Dairy Queen. One more king size cone and he was on his way, again.
The town slipped by and Lake Mead appeared on his left. The blue spread out before him for miles. The suns reflection shimmered on the surface and the glass texture of the water seemed endless. Several spires of red rock popped through the surface like trees through clouds.
At first he was going to cross the new bridge that spanned the Colorado River some 800 feet of suspended fright above the river. He was not afraid of heights, at least most of the time, but he would just as soon take it slow and easy. Over the dam would be just fine with him and George at 25 mph speed, it would take longer but he would see more. By taking the turning road along the edge of the gaping canyon on his right he was able to see the bridge high above him and the dam below. It was spectacular.
“I’ve always wanted to see the dam” he whispered to George.
In a few minutes he was there, the dam looming before him. He could have driven over the dam and seen a lot of what he wanted to see as he passed by or he could park in the lot and see everything first hand, so he stopped at the overlook and walked the short distance to the dam. He left George to think about things by itself. He knew George was concerned about the future just a he was. Going home was innocuous to him.
Hoover Dam was an amazing feat of man verses elements. Over three million cubic feet of concrete was used. He could not phantom how it was done from the depth of the canyon to the rim, hundreds of feet above. On his left, the blue was bluer than before and the cliffs were implanted with white strokes of heavenly paint. God truly had a beautiful paint brush. On his left side was the abyss that fell hundreds of feet and spewed out clouds of water holding rainbows in place by the grasp of their misty hands.
Even taking this time out, his mind wouldn’t relent, there was no dissuading him, he was out to help America and do whatever it would take. So far his hopes had been slammed into a rat hole and covered with an iron cap. He just needed some time to collect himself and what better place than this glory of God and man.
“What the heck, I’ve never been here before so I’ll take a tour.” He had only heard stories about this mega project and heard there were over 100 men buried in the concrete because they fell in while the concrete was being poured and no one knew they were gone, or maybe they didn’t care, whatever, they were left to guard the secrets of the dam. “Of course that was just malarkey. They wouldn’t bury people alive, would they?” He began to tingle up and down his spin as he started the walk across the dam. “You dead had not better be talking to me,” he said to himself and then chuckled.
The short stroll from the parking lot to the dam reduced the constriction in his mind, but the body tingling didn’t abate.
“There’s got to be something for me. I know I am needed, my gut tells me so and my gut has never let me down before. Food does sometimes override senses. This tingling is because I know I am needed, but where. I usually tingle if there is danger near, just like the wolf feels environmental changes when he is being hunted or is hunting.”
He moved towards the two towers that seemed to guard the dam’s eight hundred foot drop off to the churning white water below, sentinels in the sky advising visitors to beware, no one has ever survived a drop over the top. In reality they were the entrances to the elevator shafts that took people to the very heart the dragon.
“Besides that I’ve seen the ‘Fugitive’ and Harrison Ford jumped over and got away from the U.S. Marshals. Someone had to really do that stunt, didn’t they, and I’m certain they survived. But then again they could have hired Superman for the stunt.” Braydon could only smile at his own stupid thoughts.
“What the heck,” he said to himself, “I’m here I might as well see what this thing is”. His guts gnawed at him.
He purchased his ticket and waited the ten minutes for the elevator to come. It wasn’t a big crowd,