Compare and Contrast

The photos are of me and my new hat and my personal movie theater.

It’s funny, many years ago, when I was in the peace time Army, that’s during the end of the Cold War, when our enemy was the Bear and before these current conflicts in the Middle East. Coincidentally (and I wasn’t aware of it then) the Russians were attempting to conquer this Country. Silly Commies. Anyway, I digress…. For the young people in the group, that’s the late 70’s early 80’s (no Kids, not the "black and white" days... Past that). Well, I was in the Mojave Desert on a training mission. It was actually the biggest peace time jump in history, (at the time),and it didn’t go well, high winds and parachutes don’t go together very well. But that’s a story for another time.

We were playing war games, as boys do, and one night I was on top of a dune on guard. I had one of the big Starlight scopes on my weapon,(night vision device, using ambient light, stars or whatever). Just walking... and looking... and anyone who’s ever pulled guard duty knows how long and boring it can be. That’s when the imagination kicks in. Imagination is supposed to be a training tool. Mentally running drills to how you might react to certain things. I imagined what it might be like to be in a combat - desert type - environment . It was spooky and exhilarating...then.

I happened to be out a couple nights ago. We heard in the distance and over the radio that there was a TIC going on between some locals. No US involved. One minute we’re all standing around the vehicles watching the flares and tracers from afar and I’m thinking, wow, it’s @#$%^&* dark. So I put on my NGV 7’s. Newer than the Starlight scope, but not as new as what the military uses. I notice that I should be sitting in my armored up HMMV, so that’s where I went. It ended and we went home and that was that.

Another interesting comparison ; back in that PTA, we were MP’s. The "we" would be Dave and I and at times we had to work Garrison duty. Basically, Police work on Ft Bragg and occasionally liaison in Fayetteville with the F.P.D. We had roll call and Dave and I usually rode together. It was the standing order of the day that we could have a magazine in our sidearm, (.45’s, 1911, that’s right, steel pots and jeeps and we jumped out of Huey’s not Blackhawks... things have changed), sorry, anyway, magazine with real bullets but we were not supposed to chamber a round. I guess they thought it was safer that way. Didn’t make much sense, which is why we always put one in the chamber after roll call. There are a bunch of quotes I could use, suffice it to say, "an empty gun is a paperweight". Right now, while I’m writing this, my pistol is next to me, loaded, my rifle is hanging next to my bed, loaded. They always are.

If I think of more, I’ll let you know…