Flashbacks, Study and Understanding

Over the past couple of months, I've noticed a large change in a couple of sites I follow. One of the owners has been sick and completely off the day to day posting. He's been fighting cancer and I completely understand how he was unable to post anything.

Oddly enough, the owner of the second site published an editorial that indicated a concern that things weren't correct and he didn't like the direction his site was moving toward even though it depended on member participation for input. In all fairness to the owner, let me qualify his statement as one that came during the election and he didn't want to see the site "politicized".

His concerns that the input from the membership was moving his military site in the wrong direction, apparently didn't sit well with the group as it stopped the participation and it's been dead as a hammer since September 21st when he posted his concerns about "Site Correctness". Since both sites are hosted by military men, I began to wonder what in the hell happened to the second one.

As I considered everything, I concluded that the total input from all the members would only cover a short period of time spent in combat during the war in Vietnam. A year doesn't seem to be a short period of time when you are in combat but 43 years later, it seems to be only a flashback of some real intense experiences as we weren't in combat every, single day.

After we had submitted photos, movies and stories of combat missions, we seemed to progress from who we were then toward a more current explanation of who we were now or who we had become.

There were great stories from some of our wounded who went on to obtain Doctorates and MD's from the GI Bill. Other stories of success in careers followed with one that included a 37 year long career as a professional photographer and another one that surrounded a career in construction.

After that, things seemed to slow down a bit and I suggested that we input information that might be considered as "who we would become". Some of the guys stood up to the plate and began work to get the lost pay checks and awards and decorations squared away. It may be hard to believe but some of the troops missed paychecks completely and others who earned a number of medals, received none.

Since I was one of the members who never received a single award or decoration during the last 7 months of my tour, I really appreciated the thoughts and efforts to push the paper work through. When I came to this particular unit, I had already been awarded a Bronze Star and a load of air medals so I wasn't very interested in awards and decorations.

Unit Citations were earned by everybody in the troop but many never received them. I'm also one of the many from that group. Air medals, an award that came with the number of combat assault hours we spent flying in combat were more or less automatic. Despite that, many never received a single one. I spent hundreds of hours flying combat assault missions but so did my co pilots, gunners and crew chiefs. They didn't get them either.

Somewhere between the story of who we would become and the editorial called "the direction of the site", it crashed.

I began to read everything I could about the history of our Country. The Revolutionary War was one that brought about a specific bit of information and in a sense, opened the door to understanding how political statements can be troublesome to a certain number of people in our society. I'm glad to say that despite that, we had enough real patriots in our midst to overcome that and we went on to establish the land of the free.........as in freedom of speech.

Having said that, and knowing well what my short comings are, I've decided to completely disengage from the site. I check it several times every day but only find myself being dissappointed with the never ending nothingness that exists there.

I'm not certain that I will disengage from my efforts to get "EveryVeteran.com" formed but in view of a couple of comments that I received from the Veterans I've invited to join in with the efforts to help the VA hospital out, I think it's time for me to simply pass the baton on to others.

You may have noticed that I've deleted the "get started" post I made a couple of weeks ago but if you haven't, the negative comments have produced in me a level of understanding that I'm not the guy to lead the way.

I've admitted that since day one and hoped to find some leadership with my postings about it, but at this point, I've only found nay sayers instead of real leaders.

That's just the way some people are and the way I am, doesn't allow nay sayers to even have a say. I concluded that they weren't going to offer anything positive anyway and would rather focus on finger pointing instead of leading the way.

In view of that, let me wish whoever may step up to the plate, the best of luck and my support of any efforts they pursue to help the wounded warriors with their plight. I will finish by sharing the advice to watch out for the assholes who will try to block your efforts to help. Believe it or not, they are out there and would rather take from than add to your efforts to help.





 














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