Kudo’s to all our Veterans and their wives and husbands for protecting and serving the greatest nation on Earth. God  Bless!!! Please say a prayer today for a Veteran!!

Reflections: As a Veteran of the Vietnam Era in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s I served in the US Naval Nuclear Submarine service aboard the USS James K. Polk SSBN 645 . First as a Seaman, later as a Sonar Technician with Ocean listening and electronics skills. Though I had no rifle per se, I was aboard a submarine that could place a  bullet pointed missile in the enemies left or right pocket from very very far away.

I was at the age of 20 years old, qualified to load Nuclear Torpedo’s on the Polk. I turned 21 under the Atlantic Ocean on submerged patrols that lasted 2 months or more. My Sub was 425 feet long, a football field and a half long.  Yes we experienced and done things that would turn most folks hair white as a matter of course.

We were part of the concept of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) and carried 16 missiles with 10 nuclear warheads on each one. Do the math! Periodically we had drills to fire missiles, I was stationed in the Missile Compartment as a phone talker near an officer with one of the keys. We were still in a Cold War mode against the Soviet Union at the time and before the Ronald Reagan/ Mikhail Gorbachev Star Wars era and before the Berlin Wall came down.

My wife was an equal part of my team that kept me going at home. We had just had our first son, Christopher.

To occupy my mind after I Qualified Submarines and received my Dolphins, in my off watch time, I would often read books and visualize hunting places and the game I  might encounter. I was unwittingly creating future adventures as a reality. I also imagined flight in gliders such as the Libelle and to use cloud updrafts on cumulus clouds to fly cross country in my mind using Cloud Streets and later made flying a reality achieving my Private Pilots License. And here I am today having achieved some of those adventures like my African Safari with one of my sons. Being a part of our Military was an honor and am proud to have served our nation. Run Silent Run Deep has a special place for me.

God Bless our Veterans who keep us safe!!!