Chula Vista Readers
Dec 4th, 2007 by Don Ray
I was glancing at the Chiriquí Chatter reader map this morning and saw that there were a couple of readers that live in Chula Vista, California. A long time ago (around 1966), I lived in San Diego and worked at Rohr Aircraft Corporation in Chula Vista. Rohr was my second job working with computers. At Rohr I got to work on the Univac 1107 and then got trained in the IBM 360.
Rohr was a company that built sections of airplanes for other larger companies. If I remember right it also built the rail cars for BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) in San Francisco. Working in Chula Vista gave me my first understanding of the panic that comes from living in an earthquake area.
One day, while I was working on a 3D milling model, a plane flew over the Rohr plant and broke the sound barrier. There was a loud boom and the building shook, but I thought nothing of it. The fellow, working next to me, jumped out of his seat and said, “follow me”. I did and soon we were standing outside. He was certain it was an earthquake and wanted to be away from any building. I was lucky and never got to witness one of the California earthquakes.
While I lived in San Diego for only a short time, seeing Chula Vista pop up on the reader’s map brought back some happy memories. I remember going to Balboa Park on Sunday afternoons and watching my toddling daughter play.
One time I was in the park and Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass were filming a TV special. Other times I enjoyed watching the lawn bowling that was going on.
My daughter was blessed with my tonsils and it seemed like once a month we were running to the doctor’s office with her running a fever. Many a time I saw them pack her in ice to bring her fever down.
On one of these times, one of the thick San Diego fogs had rolled in. We called the doctor’s office and they said to rush her in. When I got in the car and turned on the lights, I could only see about three feet in front of the car. The doctor’s office was only about 4 miles away, but it seemed like hours passed before I found his office. Two months later we had my daughter’s tonsil taken out. She was about two. I was six or seven when I had mine out.
I thought that San Diego was like heaven on earth and might never have left were it not for my mom’s health. Because of my mom’s health, I decided to move back to Texas. Of course I was delusional, when I was in California, because any tried and true Texan will tell you that heaven is the Lone Star state. That is any Texan that hasn’t made the move to Chiriquí Panama.
It is funny seeing the thoughts that flashed through my mind by seeing Chula Vista on the Chiriquí Chatter Reader map. If you want to add yourself to the map, look for the Chiriquí Chatter Amigos area in the right sidebar. You may cause me to reflect on other memories.
