Many times when I drive into our valley, I get that same feeling I used to have when we surfaced the submarine I was on and opened the hatch for the first time in maybe two months.

Yep, it can take my breath away.

On the submarines, we might stay submerged for 100 days. When we finally got ready to surface the boat, we first raised the snorkel mast and started taking in the outside air. (The snorkel mast is a rather large pipe that a submarine has, to bring in air and still be underwater.)

That first rush of fresh air would nearly knock us over. The interior of a submarine has its own smell. That fresh, salty air was so much better.

Soon the boat would surface and the officer of the deck and a couple of lookouts would go up to the top of the sail (called the bridge) and conn the boat from there. Orders for steering were given from the bridge, and the poor guy steering (the helmsman) could only follow the compass in front of him. He doesn’t have a window.

As we got into the port, other hatches could be opened and our mooring lines would be brought out and made ready on deck.

Now the whole fresh-air thing changed. You see, lots of stuff can grow on a boat when it is underwater for a long time. And when the hot sun hits the black submarine paint, all of those little creatures die – and then smell. Rotten fish smell.

One of the first jobs after arriving in port was to take a fire hose and wash down the outer hull and maybe in those places under the outer hull and in the sail. Wash the barnacles and other sea life off and right back into the sea.

Now one of the most effective ways to ensure that the little critters washed off was to use fresh water, not salt water. The whole job only took an hour that way. With salt water it could take days.

I remember that coming into our valley in the ’60s was usually to escape the smog of that lesser valley to the south. We used to get a lot of smog the and even here in the SCV, but now it is much better.

It was my life in the Los Angeles County smog that adapted me to live on a diesel-electric submarine and even a nuclear submarine when we ran the diesel engine. You see, on some boats, the designers put an exhaust pipe on the back of the snorkel mast induction pipe, and you could suck your own exhaust into the boat.

One time, I was on watch at the launcher control panel in the missile compartment and the diesel smoke was so thick that I could see only about 20 feet. I called the control room and requested they turn the boat so we weren’t sucking our own exhaust. Made me feel right at home back then.

So I was well adapted, and as the years passed, with improvements to motor vehicle exhaust systems and emissions controls, the air is mostly clear today. Thus my reference to coming over the hill and into our valley.

But sometimes I wonder when the sun is going to come out and things start to stink a little. Often when we learn what our various local, county, state and federal government agencies are or aren’t doing, it starts to smell when the light of reason is allowed to reveal all of the stuff that grows in a place not often illuminated.

So much of what government does for us is done so the elected officials can get reelected. They can bring home some “pork” and we think they are so wonderful, we vote for them again.

But is that the way it should work? I don’t think so. You know, I might want to vote for the person who promises NOT to bring us any pork. Someone who says, “I’m only going to promise that if elected, I’ll stop spending on stuff we don’t need and don’t want.” That is the person I’ll vote for, come election time.

I understand that the pork that is brought to us is just like those little critters that attached themselves to places on my submarine. Once we see it in the light of day, it starts to smell.

I want to come over the hill and look at our valley knowing that when the “hatch” is opened, we won’t have to go wash out the dead critters and the smell of rotten pork.

Is that too much to ask?

Darryl Manzer grew up in the Pico Canyon oil town of Mentryville in the 1960s and attended Hart High School. After a career in the U.S. Navy he returned to live in the Santa Clarita Valley. He can be reached at dmanzer@scvhistory.com and his commentaries are archived at DManzer.com. Watch his walking tour of Mentryville [here].