Dear Evelyn, Thanks for forwarding that to us. I can well appreciate everything that was said about veterans. I haven't fired a weapon since my Navy boot training and I guess that all that you can say about my thirty years in the Navy was that I sat at the controls of a flight simulator keeping the pilots up to date on flying by instruments After that, I sat behind a desk making certain that personnel records were being kept up properly. As a chief personnelman I guided the junior personnel in proper military behavior and taught them what they needed to know to be advanced to the next higher rate. I was never sent overseas, I never served aboard a ship and I never carried a weapon into combat. But that doesn't mean I didn't serve my country and it doesn't mean that I'm not a veteran. Given the opportunity at the time, I would have been the first to volunteer to put my life on the line. That's what I had been trained to do. vee > WHO IS A VETERAN? > (Attributed to a Marine Corps chaplain, Father Denis Edward O'Brian) > > Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing limb, a > jagged scar, a certain look in the eye. Others may carry the evidence > inside them, a pin holding a bone together, a piece of shrapnel in the > leg - or perhaps another sort of inner steel: the soul's alloy forged in > the refinery of adversity. > > Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept America safe > wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking. What is a > vet? > > A vet is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia > sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carriers > didn't run out of fuel. > > A vet is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose > overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the cosmic > scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th Parallel. > > A vet is the nurse who fought against futility and went to sleep sobbing > every night for two solid years in Da Nang. > > A vet is the POW who went away one person and came back another - or > didn't come back at all. > > A vet is the drill instructor who has never seen combat - but has saved > countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account punks and gang members > into marines, airmen, sailors, soldiers and coast guardsmen, and > teaching them to watch each other's backs. > > A vet is the parade-riding Legionnaire who pins on his ribbons and > medals with a prosthetic hand. > > A vet is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and medals > pass him by. > > A vet is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns, whose > presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever preserve the > memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor dies unrecognized with > them on the battlefield or in the ocean's sunless deep. > > A vet is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket > - palsied now and aggravatingly slow - who helped liberate a Nazi death > camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still alive to hold > him when the nightmares come. > > A vet is an ordinary and yet extraordinary human being, a person who > offered some of his life's most vital years in the service of his > country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so others would not have to > sacrifice theirs. > > A vet is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and he > is nothing more that the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the > finest, greatest nation ever known. > > So remember, each time you see someone who has served our country, just > lean over and say, "Thank You." That's all most people need, and in most > cases it will mean more than any medals they could have been awarded or > were awarded. > > Two little words that mean a lot, "THANK YOU." > "In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a > world > founded upon four essential human freedoms. > > The first is freedom of speech > and expression--everywhere in the world. > > The second is freedom of every > person to worship God in his own way--everywhere in the world. > > The third is freedom from want--which, translated into world terms, > means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a > healthy peacetime life for > its inhabitants--everywhere in the world. > > The fourth is freedom from fear--which, translated into world terms, > means a world-wide reduction of > armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation > will > be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any > neighbor--anywhere in the world." > -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) > --------------------------------- > > > >