Observatory Hill, the high point of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh
Pennsylvania
December 2014
As we are wandering around this array of half-million gallon water tanks and the 63-story tall antenna at the high point of Pittsburgh, I wonder about the mysteries.
How do they get the water into these huge tanks in the first place? What are all those thingies hanging on the metal frame of the antenna? Why do these people in the adjacent residential community let their yards get to be such appalling junk heaps? Where, exactly, is the high point? How do they measure the high point? What is truth? What is gravity? What’s the difference between Oxycontin and Oxycodone? On those models, do they build the ship inside the bottle or do they build the ship first and then form the bottle around the ship? What’s the difference between Greek yogurt and regular yogurt? Who framed Roger Rabbit? Why does your OB-GYN leave the room when you get undressed? If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons? Where is Jimmy Hoffa? Could someone from the Star Wars Universe always conquer someone from the Star Trek Universe?
I say to Lisa, “Sometimes I would like to know all the answers, to be able to provide an explanation for all these phenomena that surround us. I want to be able to impress you.”
Lisa patiently waits for me to catch up with myself.
“Although I don’t know if that’s a good thing,” I continue. “There was this guy who led hikes for the Sierra Club” — let’s call him Ted Smithers. “Ted knew everything. He was a former forest ranger, a game warden and many other things I can’t remember right now. One time on the trail, Ted was explaining to us how to prepare poison sumac for safe eating. It had to do with triple boiling and a few other acrobatic preparations to render the poison impotent. There must have been a score of steps in the process. I wouldn’t recommend it.
“Anyway, he was going on about the sumac when an airplane flew overhead. I interrupted him and, kind of as a joke, asked, ‘Ted, what kind of airplane is that?’ Ted cocked his ear and listened for a second. ‘I can’t tell you what type of airplane that is but from the sound, you’re looking at an air-cooled straight six piston engine, probably a de Havilland.’
“‘Yeah,’ Ted continued, ‘one of the de Havillands was named the ‘Tiger Moth’ after the tiger moth. That’s human engineers imitating nature.’” Or some such.
“Come on! Are you kidding me? How does he do that?!” I exclaim to Lisa. “Going on a Ted hike followed a pattern. They were fun at first. He would teach us a lot about our world. Usually though, about half way through the hike in the middle of one of his soliloquies, our minds would get fuzzy and we’d subtly drift away from him. It was just too much.”
“Yeah,” Lisa said, “You’re okay as you are. Don’t get too smart. I don’t want you to be a bore. If you get too smart, you won’t impress me anymore.”
This just in. Lisa’s sister lives in a comfortable house with a 1.82-acre backyard in Maine. There was once a swimming pool in the middle but, after the kids grew up, they removed it. Since then, there has been a stubborn depression in the ground. The sister’s husband, a union man through and through, and a bit of a know-it-all himself, claims that this is where Jimmy Hoffa is spending his days.