While at Dover AFB, Delaware, I volunteered for every assignment that would take me off base. I volunteered for parasail training knowing that I could not swim, and was afraid of water. To no avail. The Army needed tail gunners for the Huey helicopter in Viet Nam. I didn’t get chosen. I volunteered to go to Viet Nam. This last one got me an appointment with the base commander.

I ironed my fatigues, with extra starch for the appointment. His office was across the base near the flight line. Too far to walk but not far enough to wait for the bus. Airman George reporting as ordered sir! “Are you some sort of mercenary? No sir, I just want to get off this base. There seems to be a suicide every month, and my barracks is next to the morgue. He said, “I got news for you airman, you are not going anywhere.”

I spent the next three years proving to him that I could get off the base. Not permanently, but a few months at a time. I went to Lajes Field, Azores for four months. I had about four hours notice and had to take a dose of about 10 shots. No one else wanted to go. The next assignment was three months to Rhein Mein AFB, Germany.

I grew up relying on others instead of the traditional family. This is just the opposite of what nature has put in place to create a healthy individual. I learned at an early age, by the grace of God to learn how to read, read good books and do it yourself books in order to navigate through life. Throughout life I searched for those people whom I could place in the position of mother, father, sister, and brother.

Everything I have done in my adult life has been done in a systematic fashion. When I graduated from high school, I knew I had to leave my birthplace. I did not see anything positive to stay. I knew I needed an education, but I did not have any money. This was in 1965, during the Vietnam Conflict. I had turned 18 and I knew I would be drafted in the Marines or the Army, so I volunteered for the United States Air Force. I did not want my life plans to be interrupted by the draft. Nor did I want to avoid my obligation.

Now it reminds me of the book of Genesis 12:1, Old Testament, Hebrew Bible, where the Lord said to Abram, “Leave your country, your kindred, and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.” I can’t claim any religious epitome although it seems like I was being guided. After basic training in Texas, technical school in Illinois, and a brief time in Georgia, I ended up in Delaware. In addition to the men I worked with each day, my roommate’s family became my family. He was from Emporia, Virginia. I used to go to his house without him. His family was well liked, and his friends adopted me as their own.