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    DX A Gift Like No Other
    DX A Gift Like No Other
    DX A Gift Like No Other
    Ebook80 pages47 minutes

    DX A Gift Like No Other

    By Wayne C. Long

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Amateur Radio operators the world over know that DX means long-distance communications. These state-of-the-art operators will do anything to work that next New One for the bragging rights and personal
    satisfaction. But what of their interpersonal relationships, especially around the Christmas holidays? Honor Roll DXer and award-winning short
    story writer Wayne C. Long has crafted seven delightful holiday stories that explore why DX is A Gift Like No Other.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWayne C. Long
    Release dateNov 25, 2012
    ISBN9781301048670
    DX A Gift Like No Other
    Author

    Wayne C. Long

    Wayne C. Long is an unusually gifted electronic short story teller. His love for and mastery of this delicious and powerful art form puts him right up there with the best! Having written all his life, whether as a copy writer in the business world or as a writer of edgy short fiction in the digital world, he does one thing particularly well: he mines the edges of human experience for those powerful ideas that no one is tapping into. He visualizes onto the page what other writers overlook, using his cinematically-trained mind’s eye. He distills down the creative essence of the short story, to where less is more. Wayne’s work has appeared in QST magazine where its international readership voted to honor him with the coveted QST Cover Plaque Award two years in a row. He has also written for the Wisconsin Writers’ Journal and is known throughout the blogosphere. For over six years now, his website LongShortStories has been his writing home. There, he offers two free sample stories. On the pages of his blog at www.LongShortStories.com/wayne/, he teaches and engages readers in the art of short story writing. Wayne C. Long is a graduate of Northern Illinois University and his wife, Diane is also an N.I.U. graduate. They recently built a home on a hill overlooking the headwaters of the Milwaukee River as it meanders into a charming century-old millpond occupied by hundreds of Canada geese. Wayne and Diane are proud of their two married children (a daughter and a son), one very special granddaughter and a brand-new grandson.

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      Book preview

      DX A Gift Like No Other - Wayne C. Long

      DX

      A GIFT LIKE NO OTHER

      Wayne C. Long, K9YNF

      Copyright 2012 by Wayne C. Long

      Smashwords edition

      Cover image (c) puckillustrations - Fotolia.com

      Dedicated to my very good friend

      Carl Smith, N4AA

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      THE LAST ONE

      A CC&R CHRISTMAS

      THE LOST AND FOUND

      THE REGIFT

      A SMALL TOWN LEGEND

      BOAT ANCHORS

      A GIFT LIKE NO OTHER

      THE LAST ONE

      I was so very proud of Dad. There he stood, the last one in a field of like-minded men and women in this call area, whose greatest goal in life was to work them all. And to be honored by one’s peers for a lifetime of achievement in DXing. Chet Ewert, ruggedly handsome with his full head of silvery hair, alone remained standing at the end, as the MC at this year’s DX convention presented the DX countdown. I held his hand as he rocked slightly on his heels, not able to see the audience. His eyesight had been taken by the ravages of time. Murphy he called it, like many of the unpredictably bad things that had occurred in his 92 years on this planet.

      My mother and father had married sixty years ago in Chicago, where Dad had landed a job at a defense contractor during the run-up to World War II. Deferred from active military service, Dad fulfilled his obligation by serving as an accountant for his employer who made machined parts for the war effort. Then I came along.

      Doris Ewert (that’s me) was the apple of her daddy’s eye and the only child of this happy union with my mom. Never once did he express to anyone that he wished he had had a son. And never once did Mom have a clue that he was going to become a ham radio operator after the war. It just happened.

      And now, in his 92nd year, it all came into clear focus. He had worked them all, except one. That elusive entity had arisen onto the world DXing scene as if it were a mirage. Would it count … or not? Would he QSL? Or was it a pirate, as Dad had said some of these rare ones turned out to be? Work ‘em first and worry later was Dad’s mantra throughout his life. And here, in the twilight of his days, he couldn’t help going on and on about working the last one.

      As we sat at his kitchen table that day, drinking steaming cups of Earl Grey tea, I glanced out the window at snowdrifts piled high by the base of Dad’s main tower. Rust had claimed its galvanized skin. Constant buffeting from upper Midwestern windstorms, coupled with the added structural burden of early spring ice storms, had taken their toll on his stacked beams that presided over the 120-foot level. Dad and Mom had agreed that he should buy the tower and antennas with a big Christmas bonus he received from the company. Of course, Dad first took Mom to her favorite jewelry store to browse. Then, we drove downtown to see Santa and all the Christmas decorations at Marshall Fields.

      To see his darling wife overjoyed at the prospect of owning a diamond-studded watch was all the motivation he needed. A red-velvet-lined gift box was wrapped with the gold and green of the season. She will love it Daddy! I said to myself as we paid for this very special gift. He loved her so, this life-partner and true champion of his other love, ham radio! She loved what DXing did for this man in her life. It gave him purpose each day and it gave him a feeling of camaraderie that he could find nowhere else. Hardly jealous, Mom derived great pleasure from being seen with him at the annual DX conventions. His friends and their wives, from the small DX club they had formed at work, were a circle of friends that heaven and earth could not separate!

      But ol’ Murphy took them anyway, one by one over the years, until, at this millennial convention, he was the only one still drawing breath. And Mom? She had passed from our view when she was seventy, leaving both of us bereft and unable to fill the huge hole left in our lives by her sudden absence. My own marriage had imploded, leaving me childless, friendless and without purpose. But I needed to be strong for him, I told myself, as I tried to contemplate a life so altered by forces beyond my control. Murphy, indeed!

      I plunged into my work, knowing every day that Dad too had been there before me and that somehow things would all work out. Being supervisor at the call center of a major credit card firm, I found a lot of fulfillment in giving our clients the absolute best in customer service. But finding a replacement for the man whom I once called my soul mate proved far more difficult. The few dates I did have over the ensuing years never materialized into long-term relationships, especially when those guys found out that I was my father’s only care-giver and sole emotional support.

      But Murphy came calling again, at a particularly bad time and in a particularly

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