Today I heard a song from the past and remembered why. Just why is it as it is today?
It is like it was in the 60's war in the Middle East. Death and trouble in the world is just
as it was. Not much has changed. We have better weapons and can kill from a world away
Our eyes can see more of the world now than ever before. In Nam it was so far away from the
US and home that most did not know what was going on. No in Iraq we can see it as it happens
over and over again. The dead and mangled are back before their families know what has happened. Sure we are protesting but not with the gusto and feelings of the 60's. That was
pounded out of us. No one is called a hippie but now they are active reformers. The corruption
in our government is perhaps more now than ever. Money is being made by legal crooks and they
get away with it more and more. It depends on who their friends are and whos pockets they are
in. Remember my friend the past as it was , look into your history books. But can you trust what
you read?
There were once some who spoke up. Now those may just vanish like the wind. We can now make a person never exist. With the electronic age came new ways. All records of your life can
be changed or even deleted with a key stroke. You can make up a entire past and make your life
fit your desires to be some one else.
The 60's that only happened on a drug induced trip. You became some one else and it
was good. Ha Ha. Bad trip man. We have introduced new drugs to escape and run from
our problems. In the 60's it was not to run but to enjoy what we had be it good or bad.
A bad day could be lost with one puff from the devil weed. But now as then you are wrong
to do that. It still better to get drunk and stupid. Sure millions and millions are spent on
the drug war but not a cent to figure out why we take the drugs.
Ask a Viet what he saw and did. Look at Eastwoods new movie. "Whats it like to kill a man?
Son you don't want to know?" Stand up for what you feel is right. Stand up for your land and your country. Yes be the first to take up arms to defend but not to take what others have
in the name of freedom. Do not forget what freedom is.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Sgn up and ship out
So the time came to sign up which I did with no regret. Fear yes but no regret. We all left on a train and hit the Great Lakes training Center for the Navy. It was winter and damn cold. We were all young and all full of teenage foolishness.
First off they cut your hair off. Some of the guys needed to be scrubbed first. I never knew you could have such things growing on you scalp and not know it. We all were just still kids. Training went fast , they had to tear your moral down and build you back up. You were no longer one person you were many. You learn to depend on the guy next to you. If you could not trust him you could be killed. Some guys were not cut out for it and cried like babies others jumped in and to charge.
My self knew to listen and learn. Watch and learn. I got sick at camp and did not qualify as a swimmer. Now that was a problem to be in the Navy and could not swim.
Camp was over and we waited for orders. I got the West Coast and a Destroyer. First I tried a school to learn something besides deck hand. I became a Radioman. Communications as they say.
They ask you what you want to do and I said electronics. So I got to be in communications. In boot camp they teach you to shoot a gun which I knew already. I was classified as a sharpshooter elite. Or simply a good shot. This came in handy later.
After 6 months in San Diego to train for Radioman I transfered to the Destroyer. Those six months were a learning experience for me. A midwest boy let loose in Calif. The land of dreams.
Tijuania was just across the border and full of a new world of drinking and all kinds of vices.
Never heard of some of the things I saw. It was a maturing experience for me.
The school also was near the Navy Seal site which also did some training with us. I became great friends with some of them both on base and off. What I lacked in training of survival and fighting I learned from them. This too came in later to save my life. All the time we heard of the war in Nam and wondered how it was going to be. After our schooling we all were assigned to different ports and ships. My Destroyer waited for me in Long Beach a mere 90 miles up the coast from where I was.
So I got leave and went home for two weeks. Greeted by my High School sweetheart and got engaged as soon as I got home. Two weeks of hot and heavy teenage sex. Knowing I was shipping out to War made it all the more special. With tearful goodbyes I caught a plane and was off to War. My mother hugged me and my father shook my had as a man and said to take care of my self. Aim straight and keep my head low. War and Nam here I come.......
First off they cut your hair off. Some of the guys needed to be scrubbed first. I never knew you could have such things growing on you scalp and not know it. We all were just still kids. Training went fast , they had to tear your moral down and build you back up. You were no longer one person you were many. You learn to depend on the guy next to you. If you could not trust him you could be killed. Some guys were not cut out for it and cried like babies others jumped in and to charge.
My self knew to listen and learn. Watch and learn. I got sick at camp and did not qualify as a swimmer. Now that was a problem to be in the Navy and could not swim.
Camp was over and we waited for orders. I got the West Coast and a Destroyer. First I tried a school to learn something besides deck hand. I became a Radioman. Communications as they say.
They ask you what you want to do and I said electronics. So I got to be in communications. In boot camp they teach you to shoot a gun which I knew already. I was classified as a sharpshooter elite. Or simply a good shot. This came in handy later.
After 6 months in San Diego to train for Radioman I transfered to the Destroyer. Those six months were a learning experience for me. A midwest boy let loose in Calif. The land of dreams.
Tijuania was just across the border and full of a new world of drinking and all kinds of vices.
Never heard of some of the things I saw. It was a maturing experience for me.
The school also was near the Navy Seal site which also did some training with us. I became great friends with some of them both on base and off. What I lacked in training of survival and fighting I learned from them. This too came in later to save my life. All the time we heard of the war in Nam and wondered how it was going to be. After our schooling we all were assigned to different ports and ships. My Destroyer waited for me in Long Beach a mere 90 miles up the coast from where I was.
So I got leave and went home for two weeks. Greeted by my High School sweetheart and got engaged as soon as I got home. Two weeks of hot and heavy teenage sex. Knowing I was shipping out to War made it all the more special. With tearful goodbyes I caught a plane and was off to War. My mother hugged me and my father shook my had as a man and said to take care of my self. Aim straight and keep my head low. War and Nam here I come.......
Friday, November 9, 2007
Return home
Now like all wars it took its way with most of us. We left boys and came home men.
Some left part of us in those jungles of Nam. We all met another world of people we had only read about. For me it was all new. My high school love was at home and with the old morals and honor I respected her in my mind. For some what happens here stays here. The taste of drinking like a fool to forget the blood we saw came easy. The bar girls in port did not remind us of our sisters by a long shot. The nights were always slept lightly never knowing when the next attack may come. Jungle patrols were to keep alert and alive. But that was war. For most we only want to forget. Others could not. Our streets now are full of Vets who lost more than most in that war.
Comming home was the ultimate shock. I left a world that can only be remembered.
I left Kansas with Rock n Roll and Country Western music and returned to Jimi Hendrix
Jefferson Airplane. I left with modesty and returned to a new world of free love and topless dancers. The country had killed 4 in Ohio in protest against the war I came from. My high school love sent me the Dear John and I was now let loose on a new quest of life. Hippies and free Love was the word. Sex Drugs and Rock n Roll was the word of the day. No one noticed the pain we felt from what we had seen and done.
So I too put aside the blood and pain for the feeling of haze of the parties. Home in Kansas too had changed. Drugs were just starting to become the thing to do. Pot was the drug of choice then and it was easy to find. Introduced in the war it was easy to accept too. Women now and not girls gave love freely and life seemed good again. But like they said the going up was not worth the comming down. Be a Easy Rider and be free. The movies were wilder and more sex every where. All that mattered was to forget what you had done and where you had been. Parents were proud of you comming home but afraid of what you may of become. Some of us kept it inside and could not face the new world, many ended it on their own or slid deeper into drugs and booze. The VA hospitals began to fill with a new kind of paitients. Women were filling the wards too by numbers never heard of. The streets were full of men doing the thorizine shuffle. Druged up to keep them calm. As in the past we sought to find a purpose in life to hold on to. For me it was party on....I did so with abandoned lust for life and quest of love. No matter who or when I was ready to go.
And at home my parents worried again for me. Not from the war but from now the peace I sought to find....Home had changed or was it me.
Some left part of us in those jungles of Nam. We all met another world of people we had only read about. For me it was all new. My high school love was at home and with the old morals and honor I respected her in my mind. For some what happens here stays here. The taste of drinking like a fool to forget the blood we saw came easy. The bar girls in port did not remind us of our sisters by a long shot. The nights were always slept lightly never knowing when the next attack may come. Jungle patrols were to keep alert and alive. But that was war. For most we only want to forget. Others could not. Our streets now are full of Vets who lost more than most in that war.
Comming home was the ultimate shock. I left a world that can only be remembered.
I left Kansas with Rock n Roll and Country Western music and returned to Jimi Hendrix
Jefferson Airplane. I left with modesty and returned to a new world of free love and topless dancers. The country had killed 4 in Ohio in protest against the war I came from. My high school love sent me the Dear John and I was now let loose on a new quest of life. Hippies and free Love was the word. Sex Drugs and Rock n Roll was the word of the day. No one noticed the pain we felt from what we had seen and done.
So I too put aside the blood and pain for the feeling of haze of the parties. Home in Kansas too had changed. Drugs were just starting to become the thing to do. Pot was the drug of choice then and it was easy to find. Introduced in the war it was easy to accept too. Women now and not girls gave love freely and life seemed good again. But like they said the going up was not worth the comming down. Be a Easy Rider and be free. The movies were wilder and more sex every where. All that mattered was to forget what you had done and where you had been. Parents were proud of you comming home but afraid of what you may of become. Some of us kept it inside and could not face the new world, many ended it on their own or slid deeper into drugs and booze. The VA hospitals began to fill with a new kind of paitients. Women were filling the wards too by numbers never heard of. The streets were full of men doing the thorizine shuffle. Druged up to keep them calm. As in the past we sought to find a purpose in life to hold on to. For me it was party on....I did so with abandoned lust for life and quest of love. No matter who or when I was ready to go.
And at home my parents worried again for me. Not from the war but from now the peace I sought to find....Home had changed or was it me.
lost in the 60's and 70's
If you grew up in this time you know what is was like. Maybe in the East or the West or from here in Kansas. Land of OZ, and all that. We grew up on our fathers and grand fathers wars and their heros. The Lone Ranger , Gunsmoke, and all the Westerns were what we grew up on. The comics gave us our Heros. Life was good ,life was the American dream for a lot of us. Some still had the ole out house and no ac. Growing up then was good.
Then came the time when we became teenagers and the world was starting to change. The
heros we knew started to change and as always we looked for love. But that was not what went through everyones mind. We had a new war to think of. For the boys being drafted or joining up was not a thing to think about it was the way it was to be. Most of us joined what service we felt was the best. Now Viet Nam brought a lot of changes for all of us. We lived through a Presidental assination. And our old movie heros began to die off. For me I knew of war from my family members who served. WWI,WWII, Korea , were always discussed by them over a few drinks in the back yard at night. The more they drank the more the stories flowed and the more of war I knew. So I had no second thoughts when my time came. And that was my entry into the 60's.
Then came the time when we became teenagers and the world was starting to change. The
heros we knew started to change and as always we looked for love. But that was not what went through everyones mind. We had a new war to think of. For the boys being drafted or joining up was not a thing to think about it was the way it was to be. Most of us joined what service we felt was the best. Now Viet Nam brought a lot of changes for all of us. We lived through a Presidental assination. And our old movie heros began to die off. For me I knew of war from my family members who served. WWI,WWII, Korea , were always discussed by them over a few drinks in the back yard at night. The more they drank the more the stories flowed and the more of war I knew. So I had no second thoughts when my time came. And that was my entry into the 60's.
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