Married Twice in One Year
My wife and I had our family wedding planned for October 13, 2012. However, the part of IBM I worked for was sold to Toshiba. The official transition date was at the beginning of August. In order for my wife to be part of my separation benefits from IBM we had to have our legal status set before the transition date. So, we got married at the Wake County Courthouse on May 30 and then had our family wedding in October. My wife, Lucy, now gets two anniversaries every year.
Tornadoes and Hurricanes
In the late 1980’s a tornado went through parts of Raleigh. At the time I lived in a top floor apartment at Bartons Landing near the intersection of Lynn and Ray Rd. The tornado came through at the end of Thanksgiving weekend in November. It was a warm night so I had windows open. I heard about the tornado warning on TV. Later that night the wind picked up and did not subside as usual. Then I heard the roar that tornado survivors describe as being similar to a train. The power went out, the wind was howling and the rain was hammering the apartment. I took shelter in an inside hallway and then the tornado struck. It was unbelievable – the whole building shook and the roof over my apartment was torn away with the rain continuing to fall. We were lucky. The tornado was skipping along and did not hit our building squarely. In the morning I checked outside and it was a mess – cars tossed from the parking lot, debris everywhere and people starting to move about to assess the damage. My building still stood but was later condemned. The remaining ceilings in my apartment collapsed due to the rain. It was mostly open sky above my apartment.
In 1996 Hurricane Fran came through Raleigh. I owned a house in the Stonehenge neighborhood. It was similar to the tornado – the wind was howling, the power went out and my house shook while I could hear trees crashing down outside. My cat and I took shelter in a closet under the stairs. In the morning I went outside and found that the big pine trees (one was 3 ft in diameter at the base and 50 or 60 feet tall) had come down parallel to my house due to the wind direction. One of my trees clipped my neighbors house when it went down. My house was mostly unscathed. I had to have some trees taken down or cut up but we luckily survived intact.
Color Vision
I have a color vision weakness. When I started with IBM they sent the new employees to the IBM medical center for basic medical tests. One test was what I call “the book full of dots” to test color vision. As usual, I failed completely and it was just a book of dots to me. The IBM medical team had never had someone fail the test so badly. They called me back to take it again. Same result. They contacted my manager and were considering putting a permanent restriction on my employment since IBM at RTP was a manufacturing site at the time. They didn’t want me driving fork lifts out there or something of the sort. My manager told them I was a software engineer and it didn’t matter. The first year I joined IBM I went with other new employees to see the 4th of July fireworks at the state fairgrounds. While we were there they described various colors of the fireworks. That was when I discovered that fireworks have color which I had never seen. Today my wife is adamant that there are shades of white and other light colors when we do painting in our home. I’m no help to her of course. Light and dark colors are difficult for me. Driving at night becomes interesting because I can see traffic lights when they are yellow or red but they look like streetlights when they are green.
Attacked by a Cat
My first cat, Zeke, used to go outside for walks on a leash. When I first moved into my house in Stonehenge in Raleigh neighbors would call the police because they saw me out at night but did not see my cat. They thought I was a prowler or something. Usually Zeke and I would see a police car cruise through the neighborhood after we got home from a walk. The neighbors finally got used to us and police cars stopped coming by.
One night Zeke and I went our for a walk as usual. When we reached the end of the driveway I caught a glimpse of a dark colored cat streak up from behind us and attack Zeke. Zeke did not have front claws so this was not a fair fight. I reached into the melee and pulled Zeke out. The other cat decided it still wanted a piece of Zeke and went after me to get to him. I retreated up the driveway while the cat circled us and repeatedly attacked my legs. I was bitten and mauled by the claws. I was struggling with Zeke and protecting him so I could not defend myself well. I finally got us to the house and inside. The other cat glared at me from the porch and then hopped up on the bench and just stared at me. I called Animal Control and they sent a truck out. The cat ran off when they pulled in the driveway but they saw it. They set a trap and told me to call them if it caught the cat. Fortunately it didn’t take long for the cat to return and the trap caught it. I called Animal Control and they returned to pick it up. The cat went into quarantine since it was possibly rabid. I was able to go to a nearby urgent care clinic to have my wounds taken care of – fortunately this was during the winter and I was wearing jeans. Still, my legs were covered in blood and the bites swelled up a bit. A week or so later Animal Control called me and said the cat was not rabid so no rabies shots for me. It was a pretty terrifying and painful experience. Zeke came out fine with no serious injuries for which I was very grateful.
Glen Klamer 