It is the closing of April 24th. A date that may not be significant to you but it is one that tells me that I am now 62 and 1/2…on the down-hill slide toward 63. Often, I ponder…how did I become this old? I recall the beginning of 2020. It was only 4 months ago. MJ and I were blessed to enjoy a week with, Ron and Ira Kaye, in Destin, during the first days of January. We relished breakfast at a local restaurant, The Donut Hole, and the room was packed with people…with many congregating around the front door, waiting for a seat. I wiled away the hours sitting on the balcony and watching, and photographing the ocean. We visited the Waterford store, and found some good deals…that were exciting. I was able to secure a new Tilley Hat…as was MJ. The weather was balmy…with a good dose of fog the last few days that we were there. We visited a little bookstore, in Seaside, and I brought home three, very, interesting books. The businesses, and Bed and Breakfast, and hotels…are in pastel colors…as are the native Floridians. We watched the second season of the Netflix drama, Ozark…and throughly enjoyed it. When we arrived back home…it was bitter cold! We proceeded to plan on MJ’s birthday, and then Jonathon’s birthday, and our trip to Maine at the end of May. Oh…there was a news story regarding a strange named virus…that was killing people…in Wuhan, China….
So, life has dramatically changed. The plans that we thought we had…we don’t. The life that we thought that we had…has changed. The excitement of the beginning of a new decade…has started badly. We all react in different ways to a overwhelming tragedy. As a youngster I lived the Vietnam War on a nightly basis. The renown newsman, Walter Cronkite, gave the American people a nighty update regarding the deaths of our soldiers and the deaths of the Vietnamese. I lived in the time of the draft. Upon your graduation from high school, unless you were enrolled in college, you were drafted. My cousin was drafted less than a month from his commencement. Everyone that I knew talked about the war in Vietnam. It had gone on for several years…with no resolve of the conflict. It was a war where our soldiers fought and retuned home physically and emotionally and mentally scared. Rather than be welcomed home with cheers and the thanks of a grateful nation…there were greeted with chant’s of hate and derision. It was a divided time in our country. I believed that I would not see another time, in my lifetime, that there would be such divided understanding of a battle that we are engaged in…
The second wave of combat helicopters of the 1st Air Cavalry Division fly over an RTO and his commander on an isolated landing zone during Operation Pershing, a search and destroy mission on the Bong Son Plain and An Lao Valley of South Vietnam, during the Vietnam War. The two American soldiers are waiting for the second wave to come in. (Photo by Patrick Christain/Getty Images)
After receiving a fresh supply of ammunition and water flown in by helicopter, men of the US 173rd Airborne Brigade continue on a jungle ‘Search and Destroy’ patrol in Phuc Tuy Province, Vietnam, June 1966. An armored personnel carrier provides security on the landing zone in the background. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
1st March 1968: American soldiers and Vietnamese refugees returning to the town of Hue, in Vietnam. (Photo by Terry Fincher/Express/Getty Images)
American army combat platoon leader Second Lieutenant John Libs (center) of 2nd platoon, C Company, 2d Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment, 1st Division, surveys the situation with his men from the relative safety of a watery rice paddy as they prepare to advance on a Viet Cong sniper position, Vietnam, mid 1960s. Libs and the rest of 2nd Platoon participated in the battle of Xa Cam My/Operation Abilene in April 1966 during which Charlie Company suffered 82% casualties. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
1st March 1968: American soldiers and Vietnamese refugees returning to the town of Hue, in Vietnam. (Photo by Terry Fincher/Express/Getty Images)
American folk singer Joan Baez performs at an anti-Vietnam War demonstration in London’s Trafalgar Square, 29th May 1965. Amongst her audience are actress Vanessa Redgrave and singer Donovan. (Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Students march with anti-war placards on the campus of the University of California at Berkeley, California, 1969. (Photo by Archive Photos/Getty Images)
View of American soldiers of 7th Marine Regiment as they march along a dirt road, Cape Batangan, Vietnam, 1965. A pair of tanks drive beside them. (Photo by Paul Schutzer/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images)
South Vietnamese soldier walks among bodies of dead Viet Cong guerrillas killed during street fighting in suburbs of Saigon during mini Tea Offensive of Vietnam War in 1968
Now we are engaged in the fight of our lives. Messages from, some, of our leaders…are confusing, and insulting to our intelligence, and dangerous…and scary! We need a Marshall Plan for our recovery from our 2020 pandemic.
‘The Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program, was a U.S. program providing aid to Western Europe following the devastation of World War II. It was enacted in 1948 and provided more than 15 billion to help finance rebuilding efforts on the continent. The brainchild of U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall.’ History Channel
On Saturday, the 22nd of February we had dinner at Bella Milano in Bellville, Illinois and then travelled to St. Louis to Powell Hall to enjoy the sweet dulcet sounds of Mr. Aaron Neville. The seating, in the old theatre was very close. We had to get up close and personal with our fellow theatre attendees.
Monday, the 24th of February, which is MJ’s birthday…we drove to Cape Girardeau, where we enjoyed lunch at Katy O’Ferrell’s Public House…courtesy of Jonathon. Then…we brought home a large bronze statue of Fredrick Remington’s…Bronco Buster. We still did not fully appreciate what was coming like a freight train in a dark tunnel!
The Happy Traveler 
Loving your stories, yes the was very decisive as all wars are, I was campaigning against the war and an end to the escalation of nuclear weapons here in the UK, maybe we all died a little in that war.
Thank you, my friend. Yes, it was a terrible war, as all wars are. Most had no say as to whether they fought, due to the draft, and yet felt the lack of appreciation for their sacrifice. The political rationale that caused America’s envolvment was a tragedy that caused the loss of many lives.