Thank you!
Dan Dwelley
GM2 USCG 88-92 (active)
92-99 (IRR)
On Wed, 10 Nov 1999 10:22:29 PST, rsexson@excite.com wrote:
> On Tue, 9 Nov 1999 15:29:12 -0700 , Grossnicklaus Jeff SMSgt 27OSS/OSO
> wrote:
>
> >
> > WHAT IS A VET?
> >
> > Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing limb, a
> > jagged scar, a certain look in the eye.
> >
> > Others may carry the evidence inside them: a pin holding a bone
> > together, A piece of shrapnel in the leg - or perhaps another sort of
> > inner steel:
> >
> > The soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity.
> >
> > Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept America
> > safe wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking.
> >
> > What is a vet?
> >
> > He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia
sweating
> > two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carriers didn't
run
> > out
> > of fuel.
> >
> > He is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose
> > overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the
cosmic
> > scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th parallel.
> >
> > She - or he - is the nurse who fought against futility and went to
> > sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang.
> >
> > He is the POW who went away one person and came back another - or
> > didn't come back AT ALL.
> >
> > He is the Quantico drill instructor who has never seen combat - but
has
> > saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and
gang
> > members into Marines, and teaching them to watch each other's backs.
> >
> > He is the parade - riding Legionnaire who pins on his ribbons and
> > medals with a prosthetic hand.
> >
> > He is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and medals
pass
> > him by.
> >
> > He is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns, whose
> > presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever preserve the
> > memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor dies unrecognized with
> them
> > on
> > the battlefield or in the ocean's sunless deep.
> >
> > He is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket - palsied now
> > and aggravatingly slow - who helped liberate a Nazi death camp and
who
> > wishes all day long that his wife were still alive to hold him when
the
> > nightmares come.
> >
> > He is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being - a person who
> > offered some of his life's most vital years in the service of his
> > country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so others would not have to
> > sacrifice
> > theirs.
> >
> > He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and he
> > is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the
> > finest, greatest nation ever known.
> >
> > So remember, each time you see someone who has served our country,
just
> > lean over and say Thank You. That's all most people need, and in most
> > cases it will mean more than any medals they could have been awarded
or
> > were
> > awarded.
> >
> > Two little words that mean a lot, "THANK YOU".
> >
> > Remember November 11th is Veterans Day.
> >
> >
> > JEFFREY L. GROSSNICKLAUS, SMSGT, USAF
> > Superintendent, Operations Support Squadron
> > Cannon AFB, New Mexico
> >
>
> Thank you SARGE, for myself and thoes who can't.
>
> Robert B. Sexson, MSGT, USAF [ret]
>
>
>
>
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Dan Dwelley
77 Midget
Alexandria, Va.
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