Greetings: One of the most lasting impressions left on my mind as I grow older, is the faces of men who lived through combat.
My fist encounter with these men was when I was a young boy in our family owned bar in Texas.
I sometimes would help clean the bar and as a side benefit I came to know many of these men who served in WWII and Viet Nam.
It said heroes rarely talk to friends and family members about there time in combat but I was privy to many such exploits generated from copious amounts of beer.
I heard the lamentations of ordinary men over the loss of many friends and comrades and saw the sadness in their eyes.
I saw something else in their faces that were most haunting of all.
It was a look of guilt and remorse; perhaps because they had made it home and so many others hadn't.
I was beguiled by story after story form old men in young bodies on bar-stools day in and day out, and the look never changed.
I never really grasp what I was witnessing until I spent my own time in the military.
I never saw real combat but in the early 70's I served with many who were in combat in Viet Nam.
Once more the same faces were being worn, not by strangers but by fellow soldiers and leaders over my future.
Once more in the quiet evening hours over a few beers I was again beguiled by the horrors of war.
It was different this time, it was more personnel, more explicit, and a more present daily reminder of where I might find myself one day.
It was a time when this nation didn't care too much for the men who fought in their regards, and it was obvious on my return home.
My return flight to the shores of this nation was accompanied by two men about my age at the time who had been wounded in Viet Nam.
We talked most of the way home with the constant badges as reminders of their sacrifice, and when the plane landed in Oakland we parted; I remember their faces to this day.
I took another flight back home to Texas where I would spend my leave time at home.
Arriving on a rainy night at the Austin airport I was all alone with no one to greet my triumphant return, punctuating the time we lived in.
Over the years I've worked with many men, some who served others who didn't.
I'm amazed how quick men are ready to talk endlessly about their time in the military, especially when combat wasn't involved.
Most men and women are proud they were able to contribute and they should be proud of their accomplishments.
The men I met, when I was young and when I was in service, were quietly trying to move ahead, but were haunted by images they tried desperately to contain.
The past couldn't be contained forever and would upon occasion find its way back through the doorway of a bottle.
It was the only time heroes cried and I found myself in their shadow.
I heard a young man say the other day, the men in Viet Nam were coddled.
The sacrifice in Viet Nam was over 58,000 troops, when many returned they were insulted by the very ones they were trying to protect.
They were called baby killers, murders and spit upon.
If we were coddled, why have so many found their way to the old bar-stools beguiling anyone who will listen to a story of a long forgotten time and place in a jungle far away? Doomed to live the rest of their lives in a dark place where the souls of men never truly come home.
We live in the shadows of heroes, and this nation is blessed because they choose to sacrifice, it's not one generation but the combination of them all.
Pray Christ return is soon, and war will be no more and it will finally end for those that still suffer.