Today, August 25th, 2025, I visited G’s (my late wife Genevieve if you don’t know already) Memorial Bench and Palm Tree at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, FL. It’s a special day as it would have been G’s 51st Birthday – she passed in November 2020. Happy Birthday G, I miss and love you endlessly.
G’s Bench is part of the Scholarship I established in her name in 2021, which supports Women in Aviation, College of Aviation Fund for Excellence at the Daytona Campus and Protecting Animal Welfare Society (PAWS). Her scholarship has helped many students and many feral cats that share (own) the campus with the students of ERAU.
Apart from spending some time with G at her Bench, I was delighted to be given a tour of the updated ATC Training Facility, which places at the top of all training facilities in the USA. Normally, Bill Thompson would have been there to guide things, but he is on short term disability, returning soon. In his stead Keith Deaton was MC accompanied by Romey Gallegos, Jenny Tourville, Andrew Folsom and Kaleb, one of the current ATC students.
I got to sit at the “boards” and play Air Traffic Controller for a few minutes, although I should state that at no time were the flying public at risk, all simulated stuff, but it was fascinating, and I also got to speak “ATC-Speak” again! (“Pat, I’d like to buy a vowel”)
I must admit, the experience quickly transported me back to when G was alive, and she would tell me about work and the challenges she faced and overcame daily. As an example, G was a “D-side” trainee on 9-11 and assisted in landing 1000’s of planes in a very short space of time.
I will be forever grateful to the wonderful folks of ERAU (Eagles all) for all they do to help me keep “G’s-Force” alive and helping others.
