Glad to reflect on that. Days of innocen...

Glad to reflect on that. Days of innocence, when life seemed to have infinite horizons; that is, before the things we don’t have much control over impact our lives. No cynicism learned at the hard edge of necessity, where international relations usually occur. No torment brought on by thoughts of the dedicated young people who died under my command. One of my earliest memories is of my father back home on leave, putting his arm around me and telling me one day I was going to be a great military man, too. Probably had something to do with how much I liked playin’ with the toy soldiers he bought me. Still have some photos of my childhood I’ll share with you. One doozy is when I walked out the back door of our house into the yard and my diaper fell down. You may not want to see that one. Used to have a lot more. But after my sister was killed in a car accident, my mother spent so much time looking at the family album and crying that one day my Aunt Gretta threw it out. Thought she was doing the right thing, improbable as that seems. Hard to forgive a person for doing something as reckless as that. Broke my mother’s heart even more. I still can’t get over all that was lost.