...for we will say goodbye to a special friend, in a manner of his choosing.
I awoke this morning to mists in the valleys, unusual in July here in Kansas - presaging the smoky vistas we'll create this afternoon as we fire the Howitzer of Argghhh! and through the smoke and flame send Preston on his way across the Bifrost Bridge to Valhalla. He really did want a viking funeral, but that not being possible in the grander scheme of things was happy to ask one last favor - he who granted so many more than he asked for. What follows is a pastiche of remembrances by myself and Preston's sibs...
The Third.
First-Born.
Warren Preston Sights III was born of a Canadian mother and a Kentuckian father on a chilly spring day in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on April 24, 1957. It’s difficult to say if his Canadian half or his American half had more influence on his persona. At any rate, it’s safe to say that he was “all boy” with a soft heart for all the ladies in his life.
Unlike his father, “Presty” as he was called in his boyhood, was not dubbed “Little Doc” from the moment he was born. His father and grandfather, after whom he was named, as well as his great-grandfather, were well-known physicians in western Kentucky. But his father would have preferred to be a naturalist rather than a successful neurosurgeon. Therefore, Warren Preston Jr. decided that his namesake would be able to choose his own path in life. At the same time, he shared all his favorite pursuits with his son. Preston always shared his father’s canoe on float trips, and his father’s blind on duck hunting trips. His relationship with his father left an indelible mark on his intellect and personality. Plus, Warren Jr was an "Armorer" kind of guy - he owned a 20mm Lahti anti-tank gun. Sweeet.
Preston was destined to not to be an only child, and soon learned to share everything with a younger brother, Ian Keith, born less than one year after him, followed by two sisters in 1959 (Galen) and 1960 (Ann). Being the oldest of four closely-spaced siblings was another important factor in his childhood. His siblings felt as if they were lower in seniority (they were!) and they got beat up on the most (it’s true), but from his vantage point it was much different. We always knew that being the oldest and named after our daddy was a pressure position – but only Preston knew really how much. He dealt with that pressure with a trademark stoicism that became uniquely his most prominent and frankly – handy – personality trait. Although the downside to it was in the end, it was his stoic, enduring nature, that caused him to ignore the fire in his belly until it was too late. In this, as in all things, Preston was classicly male.
Perhaps being born on a chilly spring day had something to do with his love of cold weather. He and his brother played in 4-foot snowdrifts in Montreal at their Nana’s house, ice-skated and snow-skied until everyone else’s fingers and toes were blue. It was this affection for brisk temperatures that created one of his early nicknames: “Prestone Antifreeze”. He decided in his childhood that a spring temperature or 32 degrees felt much warmer than the same temperature in the fall. He theorized that we develop a resistance to the cold during the winter, and that therefore we really didn’t need winter attire at all because we could develop a resistance to all winter weather if we just gave it a go. This is a theory the Armorer subscribes to, as well. We both drew startled looks in winter as we walked together sans jacket and hat. The neighbors on Tracy Drive probably thought his family neglected or abused him by making him walk to school without an overcoat in every sort of Missouri weather. He retained that crazy love of freezing temperatures as an adult by becoming famous for jumping into Stephens Lake during the Polar Bear Plunge to benefit the Special Olympics Missouri. He threw off the stoicism and just had fun.
Another way that Preston was influenced by his parents and in turn influenced his siblings was through music. His dad played trombone, baritone and tuba with a Dixieland Jazz Band of off-duty medical professionals called the “Boone Docs”. We grew up listening to their practices as our bedtime lullabies. Preston picked up the trombone and was extremely successful at it. If he had not been in the band, it’s hard to say whether Ian (baritone), Galen (clarinet) or Ann (flute and piccolo) would have joined. Ann even made music education her career. While the parents definitely had an influence, one cannot deny that having a big brother pave the way was a huge thing. Preston and Ann even went to a band camp in Kirksville together when Ann was a rising 9th grader and Preston was a rising high school senior. Ann lied about her age and made it into the top high school band, conducted by Colonel Arnold Gabriel. While Preston did not influence Ann’s decision to lie about her age, he certainly inspired her to aim high.
He taught the Armorer how to work hard, but have fun working. Working the shipping department of the MIssouri Book Store in Columbia, Preston and the Armorer would make a game of always being ahead of the textbook department when it came time to do returns.
Then there was Prestonius Maximus, a doughty warrior of a very strong lawful neutral cast, who made a point of hunting down and killing a certain thief named Kevin who was wont to pick Prestonius' pocket, pack, horse, and home.
He had his quirks. And he indulged his friend's quirks. There's the time Ian, Preston, and the Armorer set up a .22 caliber bullet trap in the basement, while Ian, the photographer, set up a unique method to try to capture a bullet in flight. A piece of cardboard, cut to a frame, with tin foil taped to both sides, wires running from the foil to the strobe. The bullet, on passing through, would complete the circuit, firing the strobe. The camera would have the shutter "pre-fired" so that it was open. An object, such as an apple, an orange, a glass of water, were put in the path. The Armorer manned the .22 rifle, committing the crime of discharging a firearm inside the city limits (hey, statute of limlitations has passed...) By now the perceptive among you have figured out that for this to work... it had to be dark before we tripped the shutter and fired the rifle. It was. Pitch black. Preston's job was to... worry. We got some great pictures, and I never missed the target or the bullet trap.
Then there was the famous roll-over. Coming home late at night from some still-too-embarassing-to-mention revelry, we're taking the big curve back east down to West Broadway when a car coming uphill cut the curve too tight - Preston swerved to avoid the car and in doing so caused us to go off the road and roll. In a Volkswagen Thing. With no top. I'm in back, and pull Kevin down into the car and toss him on the floor (where he got a good noggin-knock, I got to be the high point of the car after the windshield collapsed and bunged a rib, Ian, in the front passenger seat managed to leave his arm outside the car and had a really nice compound fracture. Preston got a strawberry mark under his left arm. After making sure we were all alive, he was seen kicking the tires and bitching loudly about having to walk to work the next day.... Guys are like that. Everyone's alive - bitch about the walk. I understood it completely. Funny aside - I had a newly procured M1905 bayonet which, somehow, Kevin ended up with - stuck in his pants. Which caused a bit of a stir at the Emergency Room of the university hospital. This is how you tell it was the mid-70's... the Doc comes out with the bayonet and says, "This belong to one of you guys?" And I say "Hey! That's mine! What's Kevin doing with it?" And the Doc just gave it to me and went back in the ER. Today, there would have been a SWAT Team and beanbags, at a minimum. Life was simpler then. No one though it was weird or dangerous that an accident victim would come into the ER with a bayonet stuck in his belt. Well, at least not in Columbia.
Preston was a profoundly dedicated worker and fiercely loyal friend, husband, and father, who was reduced to tears as the end neared, fearing that he had let his family down - a wife stricken with MS, a mother suffering the ravages of Alzheimers - Preston gave over his life to care for them both, raise his daughter, and sacrificing much of his own desires to meet obligations he had freely undertaken, and didn't resent having to meet. Once Preston made a decision, or gave his word... well, we should all be so righteous.
I miss you buddy. A lot. Even if a good chunk of you is sitting on the mantle right now, and a bit of you is cast into three Coke cans full of cement. Of course, you get to look over SWWBO's shoulder as she surfs the net on her laptop. And - ever since you arrived here a little over a week ago, Suellen, who spends a lot of time on the deck, has been constantly checking on the fountain out there. What an odd place to set up a haunt, dude! At least that what I and SWWBO assume it is.
I'd give almost anything to have you back.
More to follow.
I awoke this morning to mists in the valleys, unusual in July here in Kansas - presaging the smoky vistas we'll create this afternoon as we fire the Howitzer of Argghhh! and through the smoke and flame send Preston on his way across the Bifrost Bridge to Valhalla. He really did want a viking funeral, but that not being possible in the grander scheme of things was happy to ask one last favor - he who granted so many more than he asked for. What follows is a pastiche of remembrances by myself and Preston's sibs...
The Third.
First-Born.
Warren Preston Sights III was born of a Canadian mother and a Kentuckian father on a chilly spring day in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on April 24, 1957. It’s difficult to say if his Canadian half or his American half had more influence on his persona. At any rate, it’s safe to say that he was “all boy” with a soft heart for all the ladies in his life.
Unlike his father, “Presty” as he was called in his boyhood, was not dubbed “Little Doc” from the moment he was born. His father and grandfather, after whom he was named, as well as his great-grandfather, were well-known physicians in western Kentucky. But his father would have preferred to be a naturalist rather than a successful neurosurgeon. Therefore, Warren Preston Jr. decided that his namesake would be able to choose his own path in life. At the same time, he shared all his favorite pursuits with his son. Preston always shared his father’s canoe on float trips, and his father’s blind on duck hunting trips. His relationship with his father left an indelible mark on his intellect and personality. Plus, Warren Jr was an "Armorer" kind of guy - he owned a 20mm Lahti anti-tank gun. Sweeet.
Preston was destined to not to be an only child, and soon learned to share everything with a younger brother, Ian Keith, born less than one year after him, followed by two sisters in 1959 (Galen) and 1960 (Ann). Being the oldest of four closely-spaced siblings was another important factor in his childhood. His siblings felt as if they were lower in seniority (they were!) and they got beat up on the most (it’s true), but from his vantage point it was much different. We always knew that being the oldest and named after our daddy was a pressure position – but only Preston knew really how much. He dealt with that pressure with a trademark stoicism that became uniquely his most prominent and frankly – handy – personality trait. Although the downside to it was in the end, it was his stoic, enduring nature, that caused him to ignore the fire in his belly until it was too late. In this, as in all things, Preston was classicly male.
Perhaps being born on a chilly spring day had something to do with his love of cold weather. He and his brother played in 4-foot snowdrifts in Montreal at their Nana’s house, ice-skated and snow-skied until everyone else’s fingers and toes were blue. It was this affection for brisk temperatures that created one of his early nicknames: “Prestone Antifreeze”. He decided in his childhood that a spring temperature or 32 degrees felt much warmer than the same temperature in the fall. He theorized that we develop a resistance to the cold during the winter, and that therefore we really didn’t need winter attire at all because we could develop a resistance to all winter weather if we just gave it a go. This is a theory the Armorer subscribes to, as well. We both drew startled looks in winter as we walked together sans jacket and hat. The neighbors on Tracy Drive probably thought his family neglected or abused him by making him walk to school without an overcoat in every sort of Missouri weather. He retained that crazy love of freezing temperatures as an adult by becoming famous for jumping into Stephens Lake during the Polar Bear Plunge to benefit the Special Olympics Missouri. He threw off the stoicism and just had fun.
Another way that Preston was influenced by his parents and in turn influenced his siblings was through music. His dad played trombone, baritone and tuba with a Dixieland Jazz Band of off-duty medical professionals called the “Boone Docs”. We grew up listening to their practices as our bedtime lullabies. Preston picked up the trombone and was extremely successful at it. If he had not been in the band, it’s hard to say whether Ian (baritone), Galen (clarinet) or Ann (flute and piccolo) would have joined. Ann even made music education her career. While the parents definitely had an influence, one cannot deny that having a big brother pave the way was a huge thing. Preston and Ann even went to a band camp in Kirksville together when Ann was a rising 9th grader and Preston was a rising high school senior. Ann lied about her age and made it into the top high school band, conducted by Colonel Arnold Gabriel. While Preston did not influence Ann’s decision to lie about her age, he certainly inspired her to aim high.
He taught the Armorer how to work hard, but have fun working. Working the shipping department of the MIssouri Book Store in Columbia, Preston and the Armorer would make a game of always being ahead of the textbook department when it came time to do returns.
Then there was Prestonius Maximus, a doughty warrior of a very strong lawful neutral cast, who made a point of hunting down and killing a certain thief named Kevin who was wont to pick Prestonius' pocket, pack, horse, and home.
He had his quirks. And he indulged his friend's quirks. There's the time Ian, Preston, and the Armorer set up a .22 caliber bullet trap in the basement, while Ian, the photographer, set up a unique method to try to capture a bullet in flight. A piece of cardboard, cut to a frame, with tin foil taped to both sides, wires running from the foil to the strobe. The bullet, on passing through, would complete the circuit, firing the strobe. The camera would have the shutter "pre-fired" so that it was open. An object, such as an apple, an orange, a glass of water, were put in the path. The Armorer manned the .22 rifle, committing the crime of discharging a firearm inside the city limits (hey, statute of limlitations has passed...) By now the perceptive among you have figured out that for this to work... it had to be dark before we tripped the shutter and fired the rifle. It was. Pitch black. Preston's job was to... worry. We got some great pictures, and I never missed the target or the bullet trap.
Then there was the famous roll-over. Coming home late at night from some still-too-embarassing-to-mention revelry, we're taking the big curve back east down to West Broadway when a car coming uphill cut the curve too tight - Preston swerved to avoid the car and in doing so caused us to go off the road and roll. In a Volkswagen Thing. With no top. I'm in back, and pull Kevin down into the car and toss him on the floor (where he got a good noggin-knock, I got to be the high point of the car after the windshield collapsed and bunged a rib, Ian, in the front passenger seat managed to leave his arm outside the car and had a really nice compound fracture. Preston got a strawberry mark under his left arm. After making sure we were all alive, he was seen kicking the tires and bitching loudly about having to walk to work the next day.... Guys are like that. Everyone's alive - bitch about the walk. I understood it completely. Funny aside - I had a newly procured M1905 bayonet which, somehow, Kevin ended up with - stuck in his pants. Which caused a bit of a stir at the Emergency Room of the university hospital. This is how you tell it was the mid-70's... the Doc comes out with the bayonet and says, "This belong to one of you guys?" And I say "Hey! That's mine! What's Kevin doing with it?" And the Doc just gave it to me and went back in the ER. Today, there would have been a SWAT Team and beanbags, at a minimum. Life was simpler then. No one though it was weird or dangerous that an accident victim would come into the ER with a bayonet stuck in his belt. Well, at least not in Columbia.
Preston was a profoundly dedicated worker and fiercely loyal friend, husband, and father, who was reduced to tears as the end neared, fearing that he had let his family down - a wife stricken with MS, a mother suffering the ravages of Alzheimers - Preston gave over his life to care for them both, raise his daughter, and sacrificing much of his own desires to meet obligations he had freely undertaken, and didn't resent having to meet. Once Preston made a decision, or gave his word... well, we should all be so righteous.
I miss you buddy. A lot. Even if a good chunk of you is sitting on the mantle right now, and a bit of you is cast into three Coke cans full of cement. Of course, you get to look over SWWBO's shoulder as she surfs the net on her laptop. And - ever since you arrived here a little over a week ago, Suellen, who spends a lot of time on the deck, has been constantly checking on the fountain out there. What an odd place to set up a haunt, dude! At least that what I and SWWBO assume it is.
I'd give almost anything to have you back.
More to follow.
Sorry I am you lost another friend; as you know, you'll see him again...
It was a rather interesting as you wrote about life in the 70s. If we look at the changes that have happened in those 40 years, yet with all the changes in place, Preston did not have HIS answers.
John, allow yourself to write about Preston, you don't have to post it. But if you do, you'll be adding to his life. Thank you, for writing it.
Those times weren't simpler. LEOs just had brains back then.
And about 20 minutes ago, Preston's warrior spirit went winging across the Bifrost Bridge on smoke and flame and a Coke can carriage.
The rest of him is hangin' out with us, watching fireworks in the front yard.
It was a good day.
"Well I won't back down, no I won't back down. You could stand me up at the gates of hell. But I won't back down."
Not because he was afraid to changing his mind or worried about being proven wrong like most of us. It was because once he committed himself to a cause, idea, or pledge. He would not back down from that commitment no matter what the cost to him personally. I thank the "Good Lord" for being able to call him a friend for these last 30 years. He was a good sounding board, confidant, teacher and friend.
You, Preston, will be sorely missed but not forgotten!
Slainte. Here's tae ye,
-- Jim