Chapter 2
Page 12
Page 12 
Instead of understanding these reasons why, Jenny was convinced that her lack of success in attracting someone to share the wine of life was her petite, slightly turned-up nose. From her Italian heritage she had been blessed with a starlet quality cascade of raven black hair. From her Scots ancestors had come frank, blue eyes. The combination was stunning. But, still, Jenny just knew that her dammed pug nose was the cause and effect of her loneliness.
What she wanted -but would not admit to anybody out of a self-conscious fear of being misunderstood- was a man like her father. A real man. A life long partner. Someone strong enough to share happiness, or tears. An individual secure enough to allow her also to be an individual, in a relationship where the sum of the parts was greater than the whole. Someone who loved her for herself, just the way she was, pug nose and all.
"I love you, Dad. I need your help," Jenny whispered to herself as she watched the aircraft captain, dressed in natty blue and gold, with just the right amount of grey showing in his sculptured hairdo, make a security surveillance of the passengers. However, as he passed by, the positive effect beginning to register in her mind was destroyed by a whiff of expensive pseudo-cologne aftershave. What Jenny longed for was the scent of spruce smoke.
The essence of pungent, pitchy spruce was Jenny's strongest recollection of Lieutenant Colonel Harold MacPherson, otherwise know as "Hap," or, more importantly, as Dad. The remembrance of this scent dated back to what was often quoted as an "epic of survival."
As the newspapers had reported, by skill alone, Major MacPherson had brought his disabled jet in for a deadstick landing, uphill, in a snow covered basin, on an unnamed peak of the Alaska Range between the headwaters of the Kuskokwim and Skwentna Rivers.
He had learned the technique of landing on a glacier from Don Sheldon, the Alaskan bush pilot known for his rescue of climbers from the slopes of Mt. McKinley. Hap had helped the master of mountain flying by freighting supplies from Talkeetna to build, of all things, a tea house for tourists, set on a rock island in McKinley's Ruth Glacier. Don had showed him the importance of setting down a ski-wheel Cessna 180 by going uphill, and the timing of making a 45 degree turn -to keep from sliding backwards- just before coming to a stop.
As red-hot jet fighters have the characteristic of falling like a rock when the flame thrust of an engine blows out, Hap had neither the time, the power, or as Sheldon was apt to describe, "the resources," to make a "look-see" pass before setting it down. One of Don's tricks had been to drop evergreen branches to give a visual perspective upon the deceptive, white, surface.
What she wanted -but would not admit to anybody out of a self-conscious fear of being misunderstood- was a man like her father. A real man. A life long partner. Someone strong enough to share happiness, or tears. An individual secure enough to allow her also to be an individual, in a relationship where the sum of the parts was greater than the whole. Someone who loved her for herself, just the way she was, pug nose and all.
"I love you, Dad. I need your help," Jenny whispered to herself as she watched the aircraft captain, dressed in natty blue and gold, with just the right amount of grey showing in his sculptured hairdo, make a security surveillance of the passengers. However, as he passed by, the positive effect beginning to register in her mind was destroyed by a whiff of expensive pseudo-cologne aftershave. What Jenny longed for was the scent of spruce smoke.
The essence of pungent, pitchy spruce was Jenny's strongest recollection of Lieutenant Colonel Harold MacPherson, otherwise know as "Hap," or, more importantly, as Dad. The remembrance of this scent dated back to what was often quoted as an "epic of survival."
As the newspapers had reported, by skill alone, Major MacPherson had brought his disabled jet in for a deadstick landing, uphill, in a snow covered basin, on an unnamed peak of the Alaska Range between the headwaters of the Kuskokwim and Skwentna Rivers.
He had learned the technique of landing on a glacier from Don Sheldon, the Alaskan bush pilot known for his rescue of climbers from the slopes of Mt. McKinley. Hap had helped the master of mountain flying by freighting supplies from Talkeetna to build, of all things, a tea house for tourists, set on a rock island in McKinley's Ruth Glacier. Don had showed him the importance of setting down a ski-wheel Cessna 180 by going uphill, and the timing of making a 45 degree turn -to keep from sliding backwards- just before coming to a stop.
As red-hot jet fighters have the characteristic of falling like a rock when the flame thrust of an engine blows out, Hap had neither the time, the power, or as Sheldon was apt to describe, "the resources," to make a "look-see" pass before setting it down. One of Don's tricks had been to drop evergreen branches to give a visual perspective upon the deceptive, white, surface.
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