Wayne

Waynn and Cabin Boy Mitchell

The Consummate First Mate

I first met Wayne Milhorn about five years ago on the occasion of my moving from Placerville, California to Kingsport, Tennessee.  Our friendship grew as a result of our time together at our local VFW 4933.  Commonly referred to as the Little Club, as it was the littler of the two VFW clubs in town, it is now the only survivor, the other having fallen on tough economics and finally failing altogether. In the course of having some beers and some jolly good conversations, I came to know Wayne more and more.  I would often phone him for a recommendation for anything from a hardware store to a contractor, all small little things that made my transition to a new place to live much easier.

Wayne was born in a small, wood frame house that sits near but not on his farm boundaries as they exist today.  With the exception of a tour in the U.S. Air Force and some temporary duty stints with the TVA, he has spent his life in North Eastern Tennessee. 

As time went on, I found that he had done a myriad of things in his working life and he never seemed to move slowly.  Waking before dawn on most days, he is one of those people that we all know who seem to get more done before breakfast than a majority of folks get done in a day.  He is without a doubt a doer.   He worked at Eastman Chemical when it was still affiliated with Kodak.  He is a journeymen electrician, as is his son after him. He has worked for the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) extensively.  Worked into all this, he has opened and run at least a two small businesses that I know of and maybe more.  I think the reason he is so good at fixing things is that it was his job at Eastman.  He would trouble shoot problems all over the facility on the night shift.  The result was a working knowledge of a great number of things that most of us never have to deal with.  He builds and fixes.  He stands in awe of people like Edison and Ford because he undoubtedly sees the similarities in the puttering they did with his own style of self indulged working on things. He has a graceful skill with young people and an ability to hold their attention and teach them. To people like my grandson, Mitchell, he is an inspiration. 

He has been a pilot, both privately and commercially, all his adult life and even has a small airstrip on his farm where he lives.  I asked him once,  "Wayne, when you take off from here, do you fly under those big transmission lines or over 'em?"  He answered; "Over 'em,  when that plane takes off, it climbs like a home-sick angel!"   I made a mental note that I wouldn't be flying out of his home base anytime soon.  This knowledge of navigation was a God send to us on our recent boat trip.  He actually knew what all those little numbers on the charts meant.  I gained an enormous amount of those skills by watching and learning from him.  And together we learned more about the nautical side of it.    

He hangs out with the love of his life, Connie.  They have a simple enough relationship, except to say that it isn't.  I won't try to delve into that aspect of their lives except to say they are a happy couple.  They have two adult children, a boy and a girl, and grand-kids after that.  You may remember that the reason for parking the boat this last time in Demopolis was so Wayne could be in attendance at one of the grandson's college graduations.  So before you know it, my old friend is probably going to be a great grandpa.

Wayne has a thick southern accent and his use of local colloquialisms makes his speech fun most of the time and hard to understand some of the time. He delights in a good story and loves to tell 'em as much as hear a new one.

To sum it up, he is a regular Hermes Trismegistus, who has made himself an invaluable sailing mate and to whom I shall be forever indebted for his eight week investment in the adventures of the Sea Me Smile.