I was surprised by the obvious difference in the way I was received at the gas station from previous visits. I knew it was the uniform, as well as the Saran treatment that kept me from looking like a weakened Hunchback of Notre Dame creature. Mickey’s friends, those who worked on the cars with him, who never spoke to me, or seemed to notice me in any way, smiled and nodded when I looked over at them.
Danny Ongais slouched against the side of the GTO, as I walked out toward him. Mickey had quietly gone back to work under the Mustang. I didn’t know what to make of the thin Hawaiian I moved slowly toward. He seemed like a typical Oahu local, or Kanaka, which I was not. He smoked a cigarette, glancing up at me as I approached. He didn’t smile, so I didn’t either.
“Your car?” he asked, not saying hello or anything else to introduce himself. I nodded. Ongais tossed his cigarette, not bothering to put it out, which seemed odd. It also seemed odd that he was so young; probably no more than a year or two older than I was. It was unlikely he’d been to the Nam or he wouldn’t have had time to distinguish himself to the point where he drove for Thompson, so I didn’t bother to ask. I was about to head back to the garage, and then limp home, when he spoke again.
“Get in,” he said, opening the driver’s door and setting himself behind the wheel.
I walked around the car, noticing that Ongais was belting himself into a three-point seat belt rig, the kind that went up over both shoulders and was used only in racing.I got in, slammed the door, and hunted around with my hands for my own safety harness.
“No belt,” Danny said, “don’t need it for the track.”
I understood, a little uncomfortable with that understanding. At the track, there would only be Danny making the runs, and therefore no need for passenger belts. The GTO had come without belts of any kind, having been sold prior to the Federal Law mandating them. Even if it’d come with belts, I’d purchased it used, so some things that might have been there when it was new might be long gone. Danny hit the ignition and GTO came alive, except not like its old self. It came alive like some wild animal waiting to attack. The car burbled gently but every few seconds bounced up and down, before going back to the deep-throated burble thing. Combine a quiet pervasive thunder with seconds of earthquake thrown in from time to time and the unique effect is describable.
“410 lift on the cam,” Danny said, looking straight ahead, “that’s the rock and roll part.”
I thought about my wife. There was no way she was going to want to have anything to do with the kind of jouncing action the car now exhibited, but there was no sense in saying anything. Mickey Thompson appeared at Danny’s window, so Danny opened his door. The glass windows had been replaced with clear plastic Lexan, except for the windshield, to save many pounds in weight. I wondered if Mickey would put the factory windows back in. The blender-like action of the engine vibrations might be a lot more acceptable to my wife than windows that didn’t go up and down.
“The slicks are already bolted into the rims, so watch it on the corners,” he said.
I didn’t know what he was talking about, but the way he said the words made me feel a bit worried about going out on the highway with Ongais behind the wheel. Mickey backed up,
Danny slammed the door and then eased the GTO forward and out onto the highway. I didn’t ask any questions, bracing myself into the corner where the door and seat came together. I had to do something to protect my healing torso, no matter what might be coming. As far as I knew Ongais considered me Haole slime from the island, and his willingness to give me a demonstration ride might be driven by some of that prejudice.
It was a short run to the 480 Highway heading for the Bay Bridge. The bridge was four lanes each way of the open tollway, with payment due only on the Oakland side. After a few minutes of driving the car seemed to settle down a bit in high gear, still making too much noise for true consideration as a family car, however. The road curved gently until we were under the first overhead truss of the bridge. There was no traffic. Danny brought the car to a complete stop. I craned around, wondering what he was doing stopping in one of the middle lanes of a major tollway. Ongais brought the revolutions of the engine way up until it emitted a screaming roar. He looked quickly over at me, seemingly to make sure I was turned back around and firmly braced in my seat. The rear slicks of the GTO started spinning, adding their noise, and throwing up a great cloud of blackish gray dust that blew past the front of the car and toward Oakland. Ongais hit a small switch on the shift lever with one finger and the car launched itself forward.
I was pinned to my seat very sharply, and then there was a series of hard jerks until the engine quickly began spooling out toward its maximum revolutions. And then it was over. Danny braked the car down hard. When the acceleration had been at its highest I’d noted that the rear end of the car was actually raised up in the air, but that all changed as the front of the car dived when we nearly came to a complete halt. Danny eased the GTO off the tollway and onto Yerba Buena’s main drive. He tightly turned the car around in the single lane circles that allowed for free travel without stopping and then headed the GTO back toward San Francisco. Danny said nothing, his full attention on driving. I waited, but there was no ‘blast off,’ like we’d experienced on the way to the island.
“What was that?” I finally asked, a bit exasperated, still recovering from the noise and harrowing high speed the GTO had reached in such a short period of time.
“Quarter mile,” Ongais replied. “Quarter from the strut over the bridge to the turnoff. About twelve seconds, I’d estimate, and a hundred and twenty.”
I got it. He’d demonstrated the work everyone had done in getting the vehicle ready and also his own capability for driving the car at the strip. We pulled into the gas station. Danny parked the car exactly where it’d been before we left, only moments earlier. He got out and walked away. I could tell by his comportment that we might have had the last conversation we were ever likely to have.
Mickey walked toward the car.
“What’d you think?” he said, a great smile on his face.
“Wow,” was all I could think to reply.
I needed Mickey’s goodwill, and possibly that of Ongais too, as I had little money and no car. My wife, at the very least, needed a car even more because of what might happen to me following the actions I’d taken at the office. Any questions I had for Mickey would just have to wait until after the race, which was only a week away.
“I think it’ll run fine against Manfred,” he replied.
Mickey hadn’t mentioned his former partner or competitor at the event before. We walked toward the office. I knew I had to set out for home soon as my torso was beginning to ache all over and my hip was forcing a sharper limp than it had earlier. All of a sudden, the walk home seemed farther away than I’d calculated.
“Can you work a bit?” Mikey asked, “the guys helping me can’t deal with customers at all. Tell you what, you work for a couple of hours until I get this Mustang out of here and you can have the 442 for the night.”
I didn’t want to work, but the Oldsmobile would be a great help, particularly if I had to use it to rush to the observatory early in the morning. The sergeant’s advice was sound about my staying away until things settled down but I wasn’t yet ready to disobey the direct order of my commander to show up when demanded. The country was at war, and you didn’t have to be in the actual area of combat to get charged with some pretty onerous crimes.
I worked until I was simply too tired to go on. Just as I was about to go into the shop part of the garage a yellow Ford Convertible pulled in, filled with young men. I went to greet them. They piled out of the car and all stared over to where the GTO sat. All five young men appeared to be my age or a bit younger. The tallest of them, the guy who’d been driving, ordered me to fill his tank with ethyl.
I looked at the car, I knew the guy was toying with me because there was no evidence of a gas cap on either fender. I walked around before I registered the car in my memory. It was a 1966 Ford Galaxy ‘Seven Liter’ convertible. I walked to the back of the car, reached down to the license plate, and levered the plate toward me on its hinges. The gas cap was right under the plate. The guys looked at one another while I pumped their gas, and the looks didn’t seem to be friendly.
“My Ford can take that GTO hands down,” the kid said, nodding over at my car.
I sighed, finishing my chore, putting the pump back on its base, and then screwing the guy’s gas cap back on. I moved to go back inside but the other boys, seemingly inadvertently, blocked my way. I stopped and waited, wondering what they could possibly have in mind.
“The GTO’s purpose-built to run the quarter-mile,” I said. “It’s not likely your Ford, even with the 428 engine installed, would beat it, but it doesn’t matter. The car’s ready for the track and not to be raced on the street.”
I moved through the boys, gently brushing against them as I walked until I was finally through the door and inside the office. The boys crowded in after me, all of them.
As if by design, a song played out from the transistor radio just down from the cash register. “Just call me angel of the morning, angel, then slowly turn away from me…”
I was back. Warmth flooded through me, replacing my initial fear. I was home and the boys had come into my living room. I would not be blinded by the light, just like the song played out.
“You got that uniform on like you’re some sort of warrior prince,” the leader said.
“I’m not a prince, merely a lieutenant,” I replied, breathing in and out slowly like I’d used to do in the valley, to get control of myself and reduce the terror I once had but no longer really felt.
The boys were trouble. I was in no shape to handle physical trouble, but there was nothing inside me to signal that. I was ready.
“What do you weigh, about a hundred pounds?” the leader said, laughing and pointing at my chest. “You got that bent over twig look going for you too. I thought hot shot Marines like you, with that crap all over your chest, would be a whole lot more man than you are.”
The boy’s friends laughed.
“The crap is called ribbons,” I replied, my voice carefully modulated to be low and soft. “Most of the ribbons represent medals I got doing stuff like most people won’t do, or can’t do, or don’t live through doing,” I finished saying the words, knowing that I should simply keep my mouth shut. It didn’t seem a good time or place to admit that I didn’t feel like I deserved most of the ribbons.
Suddenly, the medals were my medals, and they were my Marine’s medals, and those guys had paid with their lives so I could wear them.
Mickey Thomson suddenly walked through the door, as if an apparition from nowhere.
“How you doing, lieutenant?” he asked, his words quiet but firm, like the brushing of water going over a low set of rocks in a stream, “Need to take a break?”
“I could use a visit to the restroom,” I said, before coming around the counter and walking through the gathered boys.
I walked out the door, and then went around the building, so I wouldn’t be able to hear anything of what might be going on between Micky and the boys. I didn’t move around the corner of the building until I heard the very distinctive sound of the Seven Liter’s dual exhausts roaring off.
I walked back around the corner of the building. Mickey stood inside the office. I moved toward him. He leaned down behind the cash register. He pulled out the oversized crowbar I’d put under the counter days before, just in case of some bad encounter.
Mickey slapped the big bar heavily into the meaty palm of his left hand.
“You were expecting to beat the shit out of them with this?” he asked with a cold smile.
I stared at the man and then told him the truth.
“No, I had no intention of beating the shit out of them.” We continued to look at one another for a few seconds longer.
Mickey put the bar down and walked out the door.
“I need a cigarette,” he said, stopping to light one just outside the door.
I joined him outside, not wanting to take a puff of his cigarette because my hands were shaking, which they had not done since I’d gotten home.
“You know,” Mikey said, “down in L.A. and in my other businesses, I run with a pretty tough crowd. When you get healed up I think I could really use somebody like you. For right now though, lose the uniform before you come here. That was their real gripe. They wouldn’t go to the war or missed the war, or whatever, and they feel less of men about that. There’s probably going to be a good bit more of that in your life as time goes by unless you don’t let people like them know.” He stopped, looked over at the GTO that Ongais was still polishing, and took another drag from his cigarette.
He blew it out into the sun-warmed afternoon wind. “Instead, let them know who you are, I meant,” he continued softly, before finishing, “what you are.
”The man was amazing”, I thought to myself. I had no return for anything he’d said, so I didn’t say anything.
He knew. Somehow, he’d gleaned from the situation, and my single laconic comment, that I had had no intention of hurting the boys. I had been intending to kill them. I left through the office opening and Mickey went back to working on the Mustang. The keys were in the 442. I pulled the Cutlass onto the highway and then turned the corner to head the half-mile, or less, down my street toward home. There was nobody on street at all, pedestrians or vehicles. I pushed the accelerator to the floorboard of the 442, and the smooth wonderfully handling convertible became a brute. I hit about seventy in no time at all, before I quickly brought the speed back down. I smiled to myself as I idled the rest of the way down the street. The boys would very likely have been beaten by the stock 442, much less the specially prepared GTO, as it was lighter and more powerful than the big Galaxy, not that it mattered. I got out of the car. I didn’t have Mickey’s kind of ‘leave the keys in the car’ kind of trust so I took them in with me. I put the top up because the dew of San Francisco mornings was nearly as heavy in moisture as a light rainfall.
I waited downstairs for a full fifteen minutes until my hands were no longer shaking. I thought long and hard about my near encounter with the boys. I would have likely caused terminal damage if things had gone further. That could never happen again. If I killed another man in my culture then I was going to go to prison for a time so long that family and friends would not matter anymore. I could not do that to my wife and daughter. And the boys were just nasty young men with their own issues. They would probably work through them, given time. I went up the stairs slowly, thinking about the buck sergeant and his advice.
I did indeed need to avoid the direct confrontation with Lightning Bolt. He was no match for my mindset but I was no match for carefully gauging, and then measuring my response, so I could survive in a culture that mythically encouraged killing and maiming in almost all of its movie and television shows while in real life charging draconian prices from anyone who actually did those things.
Mary answered the door as if she’d been waiting intently for me to knock. I got inside. It took only moments to get my clothes off and have her cut the Saran Wrap away. It’d felt so good to have its support all day but the cloying material was such a relief to get off I wasn’t sure I’d be able to wear it the next day. But I knew that the next day was coming and I also knew I could finally take a shower. Two days passed. During that time, I ventured forth on the first day, wrapped in my plastic, over to the station in the morning for a few minutes, just to let Mickey know I’d be in the following day and to see if I could keep the 442 for another day. I’d rummaged through my rucksack to find sweat clothes, tennis shoes, and a light jacket that was from my college days, so I could avoid wearing my uniform when it wasn’t called for. The back of the sweatshirt was adorned with a green knight riding an equally green horse while carrying a green jousting lance. Nobody ever said anything about it but I considered it my strangest piece of clothing. The Green Knights had been the name of my college sporting teams.
Mickey grunted from under the Mustang, but that was it. I took off to Rockaway beach, down the coast a bit, with my wife, to play in the shallows of the cold ocean, and then try to race her across the sand. She won all our short races. I had no endurance. I was good for about fifteen yards, and then my ‘running’ was reduced to something that more closely resembled a walk. My wife gloried beating me. Julie stayed with Pat back at the apartment because the second day was a Saturday and Pat was off for the day. We couldn’t take Julie to the beach and be more than a few feet away from her at any time. There had been no calls at all on Friday, that first day, not that we took or Pat reported. The big race was to be on the following Thursday.
Ongais showed up at the gas station not long after I did the next morning, Saturday. He carried some old wash towels and a flat blue can. I watched him move directly to the GTO. He opened the can, set it near a back tire, and then went to work. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I quickly figured out what he was doing. He was waxing my car. I went into the garage to ask Mickey about it, Mickey who never seemed to take much of a break, even for lunch, and then went at it for seven days a week.
“He’s a quiet guy and keeps to himself,” Micky said. “He’s all about racing and that’s about it. I know nothing about his personal life, or even if he has one. That’s Blue Coral he’s putting on your goat. That stuff’s impossible to work with. Hasn’t ever waxed one of my cars.”
Ongais worked away, bringing the paint of the GTO to a shine it hadn’t known since its first day off the assembly line. I decided to say nothing. Obviously, the man, whether he approved of Haoles or not, had to approve of me or he seemingly wouldn’t have bothered to do the back-breaking work of applying the wax and then rubbing it off.
I knew none of us had much time left at the station, however, because a For Sale sign had gone up on the corner part of where the pumps were located, and also the number of cars to be worked on had dwindled down to almost none.
I went home for a break, a change of bandages, and my plastic wrap. I arrived at the same time as a blue Navy car from the base on Treasure Island. I parked in the apartment driveway and walked over to the double-parked official vehicle.
“You looking for me?” I asked, not bothering to identify myself.
“You the officer on this envelope?” the driver asked back.
I looked at the string-tied eight-and-a-half-by-eleven envelope. It wasn’t difficult to read my name and rank scrawled across the front of it. I took the envelope in my right hand, wondering what it could have in it, but knowing whatever it was I probably wasn’t going to like it.
“Orders,” the driver said, rolling his window up and starting the car. I stepped back and the car pulled away.
I sat on the stairs leading up to the door to our apartment. I worked to calm myself. In some ways, I would rather have had the direct confrontation with the Colonel rather than be the subject of his silent response, which was very probably what was inside the envelope.
There was nowhere to go or to hide, and opening the envelope in front of Mary and Pat upstairs would accomplish nothing. At least I might have a chance to prepare myself, I realized. After opening the envelope there wasn’t going to be much of the hiding of anything because all of us were deeply involved together.
I unwound the string from its small spool and then tore open the envelope There had been no return address on the outside of the big envelope but the thin sheaf of papers was flagrantly stamped “Headquarters Marine Corps” in red. No papers could have come all the way from Washington in the short time between when I signed all the approvals at the office and now. Permission had to have been given and approvals reached in D.C. to allow that origination designation.
After my name, rank, serial number, and date information, my new duty station was typed in bold-face letters: “Headquarters Company, 2/7, 1stMarDiv, “I” Corps, Republic of South Vietnam.”
I was staggered. I was ordered back into the combat zone of Vietnam, only weeks following major surgery. How could that be? The ‘Second of the Seventh’ was a renowned great unit but I wasn’t in any condition to serve at all inside a war-torn environment. My departure date out of Travis Air Force Base, the base I’d flown into only months before, nearly torn to shreds, would be my exit back into the war.
I walked upstairs in shock, beginning to understand that I was nothing more or less, outside of the A Shau Valley and real combat than an FNG. The Marine Corps back home was a place of mystery and politics slathered all over with lubrication of deception and injustice.
I didn’t use my key to the locked door at the top of the stairs. I knocked softly, instead. There was no point in rushing the kind of news I was carrying in my right hand.
Anything coming out soon LT? It’s been a while….Hope things are good with you.
What were they thinking ,Damage wasn’t enough.
Jimminy Crickets, James! Back in the doo-doo you go. I am wondering how your wife handled it.
I am always so glad that I get to read it both before and after Dan C does his magic. Your writing of your experiences seems to manage to climb higher through each chapter, though I enjoy each of them.
Yep, back in the late ’60’s, early ’70’s, wearing the uniform out in public could be hazardous. My CO told the whole squadron to wear civvies off base.
Waiting eagerly for your next chapter.
FUBAR
I also had a 1966 Galaxy convertible red/white top. It had the 428 but it was a two barrel. Good car.
Wow! Like many readers I didn’t see that coming at all. Great work, your writing gets better and better with each chapter. Thanks!
Life itself slowly but surely improved, if you want to consider that that word is interpretable…
I had asked God for the favor of not letting me live a normal life once I knew I was going to make it in Japan.
I believe he complied, with enthusiasm for the job.
Semper fi,
Jim
Some people could never understand just why I volunteered to extend my tour there for six months, but as you just pointed out is what I had based my decision on back then. I knew “they” were taking anyone returning conus with more than six months left of enlistment and sending them back, often to different units in I Corp. as replacements, and using the old Convenience of the Govt. (COG) rules to keep them there past their end of enlistment date. Having realized I would have been caught in that trap, I beat their game, stayed safe and got out a month early. I truly hated the thought of what they just did to you happening to me too.
Hope your goat laid down some quick times… 🙂
Great chapter Lt., keep ’em coming.
SEMPER Fi
By God, Bob, but you were the ultimate player. How did you know? Of course I never got to the rear long enough to learn anything.
Nice work and glad you are here with us.
Semper fi,
Jim
A buddy of mine went Stateside with 10 months left on his enlistment, then he suddenly returned after 3 months. Otherwise I believe it would have also happened to me as well. Changed squadrons and made out 😁👍
Time for chapte xx?
Chapter XX and XXI are posted
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
After reading the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Ten days, I didn’t think that anything else you had to say would hold much attention. I was wrong. I wait impatiently for the next chapter of the Cowardly Lion. It is hard to believe you had such bad luck with people of higher rank. Lucky that you had an understanding wife and a daughter to distract you from everything ugly that was going on. I am envious that you met and had work done on your GTO by THE Mickey Thompson who was the first person to break the 400 mile per hour speed record in 1960.
I am honored by your support, Danile.
I hope you are sharing these chapters with friends.
Semper fi,
Jim
OMG, the interaction with Mickey after the car load of boys left. I remember having conversations with other vets about this very same realization. That a confrontation of any sort would result in someone’s death. It hit me right between the eyes, recognizing myself as being in that frame of mind at one point in my life. Experiencing anger that I didn’t recognize and actually scared me.
As I predicted after Chapter Eighteen a gut and sucker punch was coming but I could never imagine something like this . However like in the previous situations with the collection of some very well connected friends you have made I am sure they will figure out a way to get you out of this mess and turn it around on whoever initiated it .Keep the chapters coming and I am looking forward to seeing you in Pittsburgh in September
The ego of a minority turns them into an arrogant and vengful bastard. They can do a lot of damage to satisfy their ego with power they do not deserve. Time for a chat with the Sgt Major? He may know a way to circumvent even a full bird. Never underestimate the wiley ways of a pissed off senior NCO.
You will find Chapter 20 to be most interesting!
Thanks for the advice and speculation.
Semper fi,
Jim
If I ever needed anything when I was in the Army, I always went to the top enlisted guy. I knew many of them from my job and they were always willing to help me out….for a favor or 2. I never minded doing that!
Smart move, Joe
This came entirely unexpected , and heart stopping , to say the least ! My grandfather always said , life is a surprise , and some of them suck !! This proves him correct !!
Thanks Don, for that down home advice and observation.
Yes, it was a surprising time in so many ways…almost all unexpected.
Semper fi,
Jim
Wow, didn’t see that coming.
Neither did I, at the time. A Colonel with twenty some odd years of working in the rear had some considerably powerful allies and
resources. I was lucky to survive his reaction.
Semper fi,
Jim
Here’s hoping “Lighting Bolt” gets nailed by a real lightning bolt.
You remain the class act you started out to be, and your cheering from the far bleachers is most appreciated.
Semper fi,
Jim
Wow that was a surprise
Yes, Jim, to me too!!!
Semper fi,
Jim
what happened to the inquire about the col who pretty much did little for you and your men in the valley?
The resolution, with respect to that man, I never followed up on. I had no tools or access to anything and all I wanted
was for all those memories to go away. The answer is, to this day, I have no idea.
Semper fi,
Jim
LT as I have read this I have become more and more appalled at your medical care! Belay that appalled isn’t a strong enough word! I’m outraged at your medical care. You are at best ready for limited desk duty. No way in hell you are ready line company duty even here in the states and you are sure as hell not ready for any duty in a war zone!! I don’t know who you pissed off but they must have had a great deal of pull!! The fact that you could write this story says you survived. SMH in wonder!
Yes, I have survived and no I did not really expect to. Life’s twisting and turning back in those days
seems a whole lot more wild and wooly than it did when I was going through it.
Semper fi, and thanks so much for your concern.
Jim
Caught a lump in my throat. Still shaking
I was, back in the day, too. I had some Blessed by God help aboard, however,
and I would not have survived without that. Like I have Blessed by God men and women writing on here.
I always feel this group in my corner.
Semper fi, and thanks for caring so much.
Jim
Surprise, Surprise, as a fictional Marine we all know would say. Were these orders cut long before you collided with the Colonel ?. In your email you mentioned you posted the latest chapter, but I misread it for the last chapter , kind of took my breath . Looking forward to the remaining chapters , Good luck to you .
I met that movie star later in Hawaii. He was on a run around Diamond Head after getting out of the hospital for a liver transplant. He stopped to rest for a moment. “Yes, it’s me,” he said, with his big smile. I thanked him for
talking to me at all and then went my way. I remember well his voice and accent. Thanks for the care and for wanting to read more, which there’s plenty more coming.
Semper fi,
Jim
Wow. Plot change! I thought of the delusional helicopter pilot in the hospital in Japan. I was preparing for WW3 between you and lightening bolt. Keep the good work.
I too was preparing for a confrontation of staggering proportions with the Colonel. I was so new
to stateside ‘combat’ however that I had no idea of the moves and games that might be played by
hateful masters of the game.
Semper fi,
Jim
This is surely a BIG mistake!
No mistake. It was real. I wish I still had the copy of orders, but when you are living history at an early age
you cannot see it as history at all.
Thanks for the comment and the support.
Semper fi,
Jim
Sir, You mentioned your departure date but you don’t tell us what it was, are you trying to keep us even more in suspense? If that is your objective it’s working, can’t wait to see the next chapter and I already feel so bad for your wife. Semper Fi, Sir
I was given two days to report to Travis for transport in the orders. I thought I mentioned that in the story segment. I must reread. I might have replayed that part in my
mind and not written it!
Semper fi, and thanks,
Jim
Is he the driver they called the Flyin’
Hawaiian ?
Yes, he was. Retired now. I only knew him for that rather small slice of time
and he wasn’t socialable enough to get hold of anything inside him.
Thanks for the usual interest and introspection.
Semper fi,
Jim
I find the Cowardly Lion more interesting than 30 Days- because I kind of knew the ending at 30 days and while well written and unique it is a story of war – but the Cowardly Lion gives a real look at what one experienced after being seriously wounded, the time in the states and some real human behavior- good and bad towards a decorated veteran and man. It is a story of recovery and despair – how badly the Corps can treat “people” and how kind some people were towards Jim it is truly compelling and I cant wait for the next chapter. While war is unique to the author there are universal elements to war but the Vietnam vet in 1968, 69, etc is a very different post war experience making the Cowardly Lion is brilliant
Thanks so much for the great compliment Rich, and also for your comments on my Facebook page.
This little comment isn’t so little and goes right to the heart of the novel, me, the time and
a recitation of experiences I never thought of as special in any way. Only you guys and gals on here
give me much in the way of understanding it.
Semper fi,
Jim
That last part…. my heart dropped.
Didn’t see that coming!
I still remember getting my orders for my second tour in Vietnam, the first time was an adventure to be had, I was single the second time married with one child and another on the way. A bad enough experience but I was healthy and been away from that war for a couple of years. I could not even begin to understand how you and yours felt at that moment. FUBAR
I didn’t really feel at all. I was dead to feeling, the shock was so great. Without my wife
I would have been, once again, lost in space, time and soon to be over life.
Semper fi,
Jim
Another great chapter. I look forward so much to reading each chapter of your book.
You always keep us hungry for more.
Much appreciate that attention and the compliment it pays me.
Thanks for that and writing about it on here.
Semper fi,
Jim
Great read Definitely have are attention Keep it coming On a different note Did you ever fight the war in your dreams at night I don’t recall you mentioning that Your recent return might have block that out at this juncture of you recovery that subject might’ve a good one
We all fight war in our dreams, one way or another. I have had few in the last year or so, but then this writing of the whole thing
has been much more curative and cathartic than I would ever have imagined before I started.
Early on, I just could not sleep normally, at all, Down and up, into a dream and then bailing out to the real night
instead of back in the valley. The guys mostly appeared in many of those early dreams but disappeared as time went by.
I have a hard time picturing any of them in my mind now but back then, it was startling how detailed they all were.
Semper fi,
Jim
I am enjoying the story very much. As a non-combat draftee, i had got into Athens on the bus after a seven hour delay from Ft. Benning. I was walking down the street headed to my trailer and wife,about two miles in my class A’s, at about 2:30 in the morning when a car full of frat kids go by with the catcalls.
Could a car load of frat boys or any single one of the whip my ass? No doubt they could have, but like your story, I would not have been fighting to hurt them.
I got chills reading you experience.
You got the nature of that sequence H.Kemp. Probably not many do or will.
There is something special and terrible having Junior live on at the bottom of
our human abyss…
Semper fi,
Jim
James, I felt my heart rate increasing as I read this chapter. The incident with the wiseguys seems to have birthed the Cowardly Lion. We’ll have to wait to see how everything works out. At least your readers know you survived the events you recount from so many years ago.
Some minor editing suggestions follow:
Ongais behind the wheel.Mickey backed up,
Maybe add space before “Mickey” and period instead of comma after “up”
Ongais behind the wheel. Mickey backed up.
Dannie braked the car down hard
“Danny” instead of “Dannie”
Danny braked the car down hard
He tightly turned the car around in the single lance circles
Maybe “lane” instead of “lance”
He tightly turned the car around in the single lane circles
He blew it out into the sun-warmed afternoon wind. “Let them know who you are, I meant,” he continued softly, before finishing, “what you are.
Maybe add “Instead of” before “Let”
He blew it out into the sun-warmed afternoon wind. “Instead of ‘Let them know who you are’, I meant,” he continued softly, before finishing, “what you are.”
Move quote mark from before “The man was amazing” to end of “what you are.”
convertible became a brut.
Maybe “brute” instead of “brut”
convertible became a brute.
“You looking for me?” I asked, not bothering to identify myself
Add period at end of sentence.
“You looking for me?” I asked, not bothering to identify myself.
May everything work out in the best interests of you and your family.
Blessings & Be Well
Well, what can I say?
Thank you again, Dan for the fabulous edits.
They are corrected.
Another favor?
You might want to share our Combat Wind tour info with friends who might be interested.
Combat Wind Itinerary
Semper fi,
Jim
Holy sh*t! That’s crazy, but par for the course.
Ah good on ya Junior
Ya was just ‘spinnin’ ya whéels stateside anyways
Yes, I was, and man oh man did I want to continue doing that!!!
Semper fi,
Jim
And the hits just keep on coming. The green machine strikes again. Curious to how you beat this one😎
It wasn’t the Corps. It was some bad actors in the Corps. The overall Marine Corps, from philosophy to implimentation is pretty damned great, back then
too.
Semper fi,
Jim
WOW, absolutely unbelievable.
Holy Shamolie! That was a sucker punch. I mightve gone UA for awhile. I felt my stomach tighten when I read it. Very good chapter.
PS: I used Blue Coral on my Goat too. Never let it dry completely or it’s a biotch to get off.
Blue Coral is good stuff. Thanks the input, Laddie
GEEEEZ LT his part is way more depressing than the valley stuff. So difficult to fight the fog of bureaucracy. Semper fi
Thanks so much Bob, but the depressing part is overwhelmed with the greatness of living and being back.
Maybe I do not do such a good job at illustrating that.
Thanks for the heads up.
Semper fi,
Jim
Shit , never saw that coming, how much shit can a man take
Man can handle a lot, and the more you’ve been through the more you want to live on…
At least I did.
Semper fi, and thanks for the great comment.
Jim
Unimaginable they wouldn’t even allow you to heal. Beyond belief.
You have to be kidding me. Told ya I was waiting for the other shoe to drop
The Military im action, some make sense most do not!!
I wonder what I would have done, if I received orders back to DaNang rather than MAG 14 Building & Grds Officer, MCAS Cherry Point NC? I suppose a certain amount of relief going back to a place I understood. But then responsibility of June and kids, plus anger at being screwed with would take over….options…write your congressman, request mast or return for more advice from the SgtMaj or kill the bastard and dispose of the body!
S/F
You would have done the ‘right thing,’ which you have an amazing talent for doing. Me, not so often…although we both have arrived here
at this age and time. Amazing.
Semper fi, my friend,
Jim
Damn, didn’t see that coming.
Neither did I, obviously, Robert…and thanks for being and staying along for the ride.
Semper fi,
Jim
WTF kind of a deal is this?
The kind of deal that so many were handed back in those days, when vets were at an all time low in the public’s opinion.
Semper fi,
Jim
Ahhh no…
Ahhh no…what?
Semper fi,
Jim
Holy shit batman!! Can’t believe they did that to you. Were you a little bitter with the Marine Corps at this time?
No Peter, I love the Corps, like I did back then, I wasn’t screwed over the the Corps. It was some men. So many others were quite wonderful.
I loved the uniform the music and the innate patriotism of the whole thing, then and now. By and large, the Corps is always trying to help people
and almost always caring about the residents, citizens and more in this country.
Semper fi,
Thanks for caring so much,
Jim