Old Friends

Well, I think I'm on the blog wagon again. We will see how it goes. I'm a little rusty, but I hope you enjoy the latest installment, just the same.

Today, I was thinking about all of the different people that I met and befriended during my 17 years in the Air Force. Unfortunately, I haven’t stayed in touch with many of them, but that doesn’t change the many fond memories that I have for them. We pretty much were all subject to the circumstances that caused our paths to cross, whether it was a deployment, remote assignment or whatever. I wonder what happened to the countless names and faces that helped make my career so enjoyable and those that helped me through some of the rough stretches. There was my first dormitory roommate, Eric, from Bean town. I remember how we used to go cruising in his old orange Ford truck and our night fishing expeditions. If , for some reason, you are reading this, Eric; I apologize to you for the times I had…um…overnight guests and you had to sleep in the dayroom and I did utilize your bed once while you were deployed to England, but hey…you were deployed to England, you lucky dog! Then there was my friend “Shaq”. He was a total clown. The funny thing about our friendship is the first few times we met, I thought he disliked me and he thought that I felt the same about him. We later ended up on a deployment together and after drinking a few beers together, we were best buds. We had a blast in Germany and St, Johns, Newfoundland I don’t think I had ever seen three months go by so fast. I will never forget being doubled over in pain, from laughter, as Shaq described the circumstances behind his hotel room bed getting broken and stating that sometimes a ménage et trois isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. I had many good friends while stationed in Korea, but Shannon is the first person that comes to mind. He was a hard worker and always made sure everyone’s beer glass was full when we were at the bar (I’m sensing a common theme here). He introduced me the owner of the Stereo Club in “A” town, thus ensuring preferential treatment on our many excursions there. I will never forget when Shannon’s motor functions were slightly degraded and he asked me to pour his beer in his mouth for him. I hope your liver has recovered from that long year, my friend. Then there’s Jake. Jake and I spent hundreds of hours working on aircraft together and were often the go to guys when an aircraft had to be repaired quickly or attempts by other crews fell short. My daughter ended up being a flower girl in his wedding. Every other week we would go to a Chinese buffet restaurant that served crab legs. We would eat so many crab legs that our wives (at the time) refused to go back there with us (a sure sign that things weren’t meant to be in our marriages). D.J. was my roommate on my last deployment to Saudi Arabia in 2002. He had a unique way of counting down the days in country by prominently displaying a different card from his Hooters playing card deck. We’re both hockey fans and played roller hockey four times a week while deployed. D.J and I had an ongoing argument on who was hotter…Brittany Spears or Shakira. I always said that it was Shakira hands down, but I could never sway his opinion…I wonder what he thinks now? D.J and I would host a friendly game of cards once a week. One night while playing cards, someone made the comment “every time you masturbate, God kills a kitten.” You can imagine the response the comment got, but it sparked a legend of sorts. D.J. and his coworkers were bored at work and created a “Killing Kittens” score board…complete with a bell, so you could ring it each time you added a strike against another kitten (this is what happens when boredom sets in….scary isn’t it?) D.J. also took it upon himself to design a patch, featuring Bill the Cat (like the blog picture) depicting our deployment as the “Killin’ Kittens Tour”, which I still have to this very day. Another brain child of D.J. was the mustache contest. We had two weeks to grow facial hair and then we had a vote. I forget all of the different categories but, one was “most pre-pubescent” and another was “most porn star like” (which I won, btw).

That was just scratching the surface of all the different characters that I’ve met. I know that I’m missing so many others, but space and time is limited. Hopefully, you can look back at your acquaintances with a smile. Here’s to friends…past and present.