The Confessions of Ira Short

Every day, life gives us a little nudge, a peek, a whisper in the ear, "Here it is." And if you aren't paying attention, you'll miss it. I watch for them now, those brief seconds when an infinite variety of things suddenly align and you find yourself immersed in the sublime. If you are lucky, you will enjoy a moment of wonder, or awe, or epiphany before the sunlight changes or the cloud disappears. Personally, I don't believe in fate, or the idea that your life is set or predestined in any way. In 60-plus years, my experience of the world (external to me) is that it consists of seemingly random events that aren't random at all, but rather unpredictable. Their unpredictability lies in the fact that there is not a single bright line between cause and effect. Between cause (A) and effect (Z) lies an alphabet of mitigating factors, often unseen and unknown inputs that can dramatically change the outcome of events. In looking back at events in my life, I can ...

Ahead of me, the freeway is dotted with cars, white and black and shades of gray. In the distance, a single red Mustang maneuvers its way through the monochrome blocks. A bank of clouds hangs ominously over the freeway ahead, black and white and shades of gray. San Gorgonio Pass Runs about 20 miles from the Highway 62 junction (where I get on Interstate 10), to the summit, roughly the junction with Highway 60 in Beaumont. Wikipedia informs me that it is one of the deepest passes in the contiguous 48 states, as it divides two peaks rising 9,000 feet above the valley floor on either side. From the desert floor to the summit of the pass is a rise of about 1800 feet; it's a long and gradual incline for 20 miles. This is one of the reasons the railroad came through this way in the middle 1800s. The steam locomotives still had to work pretty hard to go up it, so they put in a station to re-fill the water tender. Banning grew up around that. The freeway follows the railroad tracks. ...