” Mother shrugged. “I can’t remember it now.”“We thought about marking the occasion. Couldn’t come up with an appropriate ritual. You were...always better at those.” I paused. “You haven’t changed. I mean, you look the same.”She did. Her hair was a little longer than I remembered, and pulled back in a ponytail now, but it remained the same deep lustrous brown. And she wore clothes: a high-necked white smock with a deep open vent, piped pockets and charcoal leggings. Aside from those cosmetic. “Let me think about it, okay?” I asked.“Okay,” Jordan replied, “but don’t forget that I asked you.”I looked Jordan right in the eyes and said “I promise.”After much agonizing and a call to Trish, I finally decided that I would go along with her request. The next Saturday, we looked at a bunch of tattoo places and narrowed our list of ‘okay’ places to 3. The following Monday I made a trip to each of them and discussed Jordan’s request with the operator. I finally decided on one and made. And so many wouldn’t even realize what that loss would really mean.“You OK, Sir?” Private Smith interrupted my thoughts, showing some concern that maybe he had upset me.“Sorry, just woolgathering.” If this simple piece was making me so thoughtful, someday it should probably be on display in a Confederacy art museum, if anyone ever bothered to make one of course.“You ever been to a museum?” I asked.“There’s this science and technology museum in Columbus I really liked. They had all sorts of cool. ”Charlie leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table with his hands clasped in front of him.“I’m a graduate of a no name school, with a degree in business. As one of my professors once told me, you can get a first rate education in a third rate school. It isn’t the school that matters, it’s the student. I took that message to heart. I worked my ass off in school, did very well, and then got a job with a Wall Street brokerage firm.“After a couple of years on the job, I became the manager.