I had just finished debriefing CPT Mike O’Connor, my section leader, about my first flight of my first AT with the Jersey Guard. I left him in the Planning Room on the second floor of the old wooden hangar at Wheeler-Sack AAF, walked out the door and down the single stairway onto the hangar floor and promptly came nose-to-nose with – Mike O’Connor.
“Geez, Mike, how’d you get *down* here so fast?”
“Easy – I’m twins.” *leprechaun grin* And he continued walking across the hangar floor towards the ramp.
I turned around to head toward our own aircraft parking area and promptly came nose-to-nose with – Mike O’Connor. Who had just descended the stairs from the second floor.
*blink*
I glanced over my shoulder to see if Rod Serling was standing behind me, waiting to cue the theme from the “Twilight Zone,” and suddenly realized that the Mike standing in front of me was wearing a red baseball cap (as I was, since we were both in the DivArty Aviation Section) while the Mike walking toward the ramp was wearing a black (Air Cav) baseball cap.
That was in 1976, and that was my introduction to Charlie O’Connor, Mike’s twin brother.
Imagine the consternation in their old unit in Vietnam. Generally, Army policy won’t place two siblings in the same combat outfit, but Charlie and Mike wangled billets in the same Assault Helicopter Company at the same time, agreeing, sensibly enough, that they wouldn’t fly CAs in the same aircraft. And probably agreeing that they wouldn't double-team anybody with their jokes.
I saw Mike every drill and most Night Flights, but usually only saw Charlie during AT or when I had a flight up to the Picatinny Facility. I saw him only sporadically after he left the Guard, but every so often I’d get the chance to pop into Teterboro to see how he was progressing up the corporate aviation ladder. And, of course, to cadge free coffee in the pilots’ lounge. And, of course, to hear his latest non-PC-and-definitely-not-suitable-for-mixed-company jokes.
Early last week I dropped in at my old unit and found that most of the gang had taken up new digs at Lakehurst. I ran into one of the OSACOM fixed-wing guys, though, and he brought me up to date on who was where and what the latest rumor was about their next deployment.
And he told me that Charlie had pancreatic cancer. And he’d started a site to raise funds for research, called – in typically blunt Charlie fashion – “Charlie O’Connor’s Pancreatic Cancer Sucks Site.”
I started scratching out this post yesterday, intending to put it in the Spirit of America category as a “Someone You Need To Meet” bit.
I should’ve done it sooner.
Charlie died on Valentine’s Day.
Oh – almost forgot. The reason I figured it for a great Spirit of America bit was that Charlie set a fundraising goal of $5,000.
He raised almost twice that. And that's why he's grinning that leprechaun grin on his site.
Heads' up, Fiddlers Green contingent -- Charlie likes Tullamore Dew with Guiness on the side...
Therefore, now is the time at Castle Argghhh! when we dance: In Memoriam.
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