MSGID: 1:153/757.0 44770553   
   REPLY: 1:135/392 1127cf16   
   TZUTC: -0700   
   CHRS: LATIN-1 2   
   > CP wrote --   
   >> Just nice to know it's there, eh? A reminder of times, & cohorts, past?   
   > Cohorts are getting fewer and fewer every day.   
      
   Damn, eh? :(    
      
   I'm having that problem -- but my cohorts were't collegaues -- just friends,   
   as most of my life, my best friends were 20+ years older than me (so I'd have    
   intelligence & wisdom to learn from; my peers were & are, shallow & dumb    
   *sigh*)   
      
   >> You were dating a North Viet girl?   
   > Shh, no one was supposed to know about that.  :)   
      
   How's that happen? Sounds like an interesting story  -- most guys hooked up,   
   if they did, with a South Viet gal?   
      
   >> > gunboat was seen on the Mississippi.  And just so happened to be during   
   > Mardi Gras.  What are the odds of that as well?  :)   
   >>    
   >> Jeeze, no wonder the army & marine boys resent yas! *G*   
   >> They're crawling around in sub-zero mud, & you're enjoying sunshine &   
   > bikinis!   
   > We all had our jobs to do...   
      
   *LOL*  Not your fault for choosing a branch whose training was more amenable to   
   comfort, eh?   
      
   >> Did you tell your shipmates about the scam? That's scammy as heck -- not   
   > unsurprising, though. . .   
   > Nope, they found out on their own.   
   > I didn't smoke pot and figured if they wanted to do that they would find   
   > out.   
      
   & by then you were already tired of people staring at you vacantly as they were   
   whacked out on drug(s) of choice, hmm?   
      
   Sucks to think youre chatting with someone only to realize you're actually    
   chatting with a pipe dream.   
      
   You've had an interesting life there, Joe.   
      
   I jusrt found out one of my favourite "Canadian bands" was acvtually formed   
   by  adraft dodging American & his fellow-American wife,. his brother & his   
   sister- in-law.   
      
   Turns out the draft was illegal so he was exonerrated of the draft evasion    
   charges, & it was safe to return to the US to tour.   
      
   He was just one of many who were posted to Canada for the duration of that war.   
      
   I got no beef with concientious objectors, but I have no respect at all for    
   mere cowards.   
      
   Itend to think, "If I don't get in the way of danger, then who is that job   
   left to?"; I'm clearly ineligible for military service (paralyzed on one side   
   since  I was 22)   
      
   I'm against war(agessive/corporate-initiated, not defensive, or    
   ighteous(like  the one that ended slavery for youse)), but understand that   
   once it's begun, no matert how or why, non-combatants need to be protected,   
   and real men step  forward three steps.   
      
   I had a fri8end/bneighbour who enlisted in the Canadian Navy AFTER hearing    
   onthe radio that Pearl Habor was bombed -- wa was not a distant European    
   mystery -- it was HERE on the coast he so loved fishing near. He was given a    
   special Vet status, as someone who joined during wartime & never wanted for    
   anything if the veterans' affairs could help (all the tech needed to overcome    
   his service-gained disabilities, daily meals deliveries; no need for income   
   top up, as he had multiple pensions, including disabled veteran's, & lived in    
   subsiudized housing.  Helluva mnam -- left the prairies by train in 1929 to    
   seek fortune on a fishing boat in Vancouver (got hired same day, even though   
   he had only first seen ocean & stepped aboard a boat that day, at age 17)   
      
   Ended up building himself into an accomplished owner/operator commercial    
   fisherman; those he left behind when he enlisted became multimillionaires    
   during the war(WW2) -- he didn't resent this or regret his choice.  A real   
   man, IMO.   
      
   He was on escort boats crossing the Atlantic, ensuring supplies made it to   
   the  front.  He most hated when the Germans bombed a supply boat & he had to   
   help  fish the men overboard out & up into the Navy vessel. (the bodies'   
   thunking  into the side of the boat, while being hauled up from the icy sea,   
   was a sound  that forever haunted him)   
      
   I met many like him -- lived through the Dirty Thirties, but never worried    
   about unemployment, as you worked, you didn't lament the difficulty of   
   finding  work.   
      
   Greatest Generation, indeed.   
      
   & I'm surrounded by the "Me Generation." *sigh*   
      
   Oh well; I just keep trying to instill the values I've learned, as being on   
   the cusp of Boomers to GenX, to those who have no interest in considering   
   anything  I have to say.   
      
   Oh well, worst case scenario, I have natural mortality to look forward to! heh   
      
   My mom's in that spot now -- she's ready to move & avoid the tradh that the    
   world seems to be headed for (she was always into preservation of resources   
   for the future generations -- recycling years before it was in vogue, but now    
   watching, in pain, as the inheritors are squandering it away wholesale.)   
      
   I try to keep her ideals going; Thankfully my family is careful to not waste   
   &  to recycle all that can have any further life.  My son is sem   
   -enthusiastic  (waning as he leaves childhood behind)   
      
   I don't recall if you've said -- are you married? Have kids? Grandkids?   
      
      
      
      
   --- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-6   
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