My CV According to My Younger Brother

Hello fellow SRS colleagues, I thought you would enjoy reading my email exchange with my younger brother, Jobie, in which he describes me to some of his friends.

Some of you may have wondered what became of my colorful older brother, Bobby Dixon. He is now Captain Midnight!

Remember the guy who dyed his hair green in the 10th grade, got suspended for a day for sassing back to his teacher Mrs. Osteen and became radio ham operator W4GLH in the 8th grade?

Yes, the same guy who built an antenna 30-feet high on our house to broadcast to the world and accidentally blew up his handmade space rocket over Sumter when launching it from the city park, spreading shrapnel everywhere (shh, they still don’t know who did it!).

You might recall in high school, Bobby had an ‘A’ average and joined the Counts Social Club. Well, he later graduated magna cum laude from the University of South Carolina (how did he ever do that?), joined the Navy and became head of nuclear physics at a nuclear submarine school at age 25.

Believe it or not, he also earned a PhD in nuclear physics, built atomic bombs, became a medical nuclear physicist and invented a medical nuclear machine. He now teaches radiological physics to doctors.

At age 50, he bought a 30-year old Russian jet fighter, learned to fly it and started flying in air shows (scary huh?). Captain Midnight, which is displayed on his plane, is the name he uses based on the 1950s movie serial hero. He has been interviewed on TV and is well-known as Captain Midnight. In this clip, you’ll see him flying his jet and dog fighting with another jet at a Wilmington, NC airshow. And you thought I was colorful!?

My reply:

Dear Jobie,

Thanks for your (mostly true) depiction of my life. I am thinking of using this in place of my regular curriculum vitae — it makes me seem much more interesting. However, you left out the prediction of my high school English teacher, Mr. Wiggins: "Someone will kill you before you reach age 25.’"

— Bobby