Cold War stories, 1 of 3

 1. Playing Chicken with Earl

 

My father, Earl Hellerstein, told me this story when I was a young lad, many years after it happened. It was a home-front war story. During World War 2, my Dad served on a secret mission. His mission was to truck supplies for the armed forces. He did not know why he was trucking those supplies, for he did not need to know; but he did need to know what those supplies were, and where he was going. The truck he drove was full of high explosives. His destination was a secret weapons laboratory, in a small town in the American Southwest, named Los Alamos.

He did not know then, but he knew by the time that he told me this tale, that he was working for the Manhattan Project. Young me hung upon his words, wide-eyed.

It was a long drive, through boring empty desert. An approaching driver chose to break the boredom. He shifted into Dad's lane and stayed there. And stayed there, and stayed there. He was playing chicken!

Decades later, I blurted, "What did you do?!"

My father mimicked holding a steering wheel. He said, "I did nothing at all. I kept driving, as if nobody was in my lane, and  pretty soon, nobody was."

Young me had two realizations.

First, that the other guy (and it was certainly a guy) made five mistakes:

1. He played chicken...

2. ... with an Army truck...

3. ... filled with high explosives...

4. ... for the Manhattan project...

5. ... driven by my Dad.

 

The second realization was that it's a miracle that I exist!