In early 1967, I got orders to report to Fort Carson, Colorado from Fort Jackson, South Carolina.

From Fort Carson, I would ship over with my unit to Vietnam.

Those orders designated air travel.

Terrified of flying, I went to a military psychiatrist and got my orders switched to train travel. It turned out to be six days of my life I would never get back.

It did cure me of my fear of flying, though.

That year, there was a terrible snow storm raging all through the mid west. Train speeds only averaged 15 mph in the deep snow.

I had to sleep sitting up for three days.

The worst part of the trip was being surrounded by college students who opposed the war.

When they saw my rumpled, green, Army Class A’s they thought they hit pay dirt.

They wore granny glasses and madras shirts and thought they could enlighten me about war, politics and life.

I was surrounded.

These draft dodging elitists were the most condescending group of windbags I have ever had to endure.

They expounded and expanded, correcting me at every turn as they tried to get me to reach their conclusions.

They lectured and cajoled for hours. Loving the sounds of their own voices as they repeated their trickled down information.

The pain of that experience is still with me today.

So when some hysterical know-it-all tries to enlighten me about politics and life in general, as someone did recently, you are bound to see the results of that tortuous trip.

You are entitled to your opinions, but don’t preach to me. You don’t have the time in grade and I don’t have the patience.

If you’ve never been to a war torn country and seen first hand what some people are forced to live through, you probably don’t realize how great we have it here.

Covid, or no Covid.

In the mean time, enjoy the country, you ungrateful, unhappy and very lucky bastards. 🙂