My Sister's bed

When you are little your big sister is super cool.  When you are three and your sister is nearly 10 years older than you, she is the coolest thing on the planet.  I adored (still do actually) my big sister.  Many of my earliest memories are of her playing with me.  Anyway, when we lived in Germany she had a canopy bed, with a baby pink bed spread with raised white pin stripes.  I used to love to sit on her bed, while she did my hair or my nails or whatever and run my fingers along the ridges of the white stripes.  Her bed really was the coolest thing in the house.  One night, she invited me to spend the night in her bed.  I felt so grown up, and so pleased with not only getting to spend the time with my sister but getting to sleep in her amazing dream bed.  Unfortunately the dream did not last very long.  I don't know what time it was or exactly how it happened but I remember waking up, on the floor, under the window nest to the radiator.  I laid there for a second trying to figure out why I was on the floor while looking at the stripes on the dust ruffle.  At this point I reached up and touched my head because it itched ever so slightly.  When my hand touched my hair, my hair did not feel like hair should.  It felt wet and sticky. I immediately brought my hand down out of my hair and saw the red  blood and did what every self respecting four year old does when she sees her own blood, I screamed at the top of my lungs.  I am pretty sure that this is when my sister woke up.

I don't remember much from that point on.  I remember parents rushing into the room.  I remember my father prodding at my head, which now that I was aware that it was severely injured hurt instead of itched.  I remember being bundle into the car.  I don't remember the hospital, I only remember the bright light on the ceiling.  I remember two stitches and a butterfly.  And I remember that I was never allowed to sleep in my sister's bed again.

A Walk On The Moon and I Forgot To Duck

On July 20, 1969 many thousands of miles from earth, man first set foot on the moon. A small step for man, a giant step for mankind.

Far below, back on earth, in a little spot, called Quan Loi, one of many US base camps located in Vietnam. I was just a one year out of high school, I found myself wearing jungle fatigues and carrying a M16 rifle. I was a Fire Direction & Intelligence Specialist. Just 20 years old and I was the Section Chief with responsibility for four other soldiers my age. Our job was to coordinate artillery and naval gun fire in support of the 11th Armored Cavalry troopers. The day had been pretty much the same as many days before with one small exception. Usually, around noon when it was time to eat, the Viet Cong would launch a mortar and rocket attack on us. Funny what you can get used to. Well, lunch came and went, with no attack. Around 2pm, I decided to take a shower. You might wonder, "A shower?. What kind of base camp was this?"  One of the talents common to most soldiers, is the ability to create something out of almost nothing. While out riding around the base, just kinda looking into this and that, I had obtained a 50-gal drum, a shower head, and some discarded lumber. We screwed the head into the bottom of the drum, built a frame to hold it up about 8 feet in the air, and used some "found" ponchos as sides. When the water truck passed by, the driver would just happen to spill 50-gal of water into the drum. After sitting all day in the hot Vietnam sun, the water was pretty warm. Instant shower when needed!
So there I was having just completed my shower, had gotten a coke out of our buried mermite can (insulated can used to keep food cold or hot). A mermite can, buried in the ground, cools a coke somewhat. Don't ask how we came into possession of the can. My ears were suddenly assaulted by a loud explosion and felt a hot blast of air on my right leg. My hand had gone instinctively to my leg and as I looked at my hand, I saw blood running out between my fingers.
I grabbed my M-16 looking for something to shoot. I quickly discovered that there was nothing to shot at. We were under a mortar and rocket attack. A 122mm rocket had landed outside my tent. A piece of the rotating band about the size of quarter had taken up residence in my leg.
A medic soon arrived and began working on my leg. I noted that he was drunk and he said, "Yes, but I can still do my job"; and he could. They moved me from there by stretcher, then by truck, followed by a helicopter ride. Fortunately, the shrapnel had missed the bones and had stopped just before exiting the back of my leg. For not ducking, I was awarded the Purple Heart. I spent the next couple months in various hospitals recovering. During my recovery I was awarded a second Purple Heart, but that is another story. You know even to this day, I do not remember what I did with my coke. Did I throw it, did I crush it, or......did someone drink my coke......ok who drank my coke!

The Day the House Burned Down

The way I heard it was that my Father’s mother was with some others working with some of the older children the field over on the other side of the hill.  Working fields in the hills and hollers of the Kentucky mountains was mean work.  The Sun was hot and she pause, and looked up from her work to wipe the sweat from her brow, to see where the sun lay in the sky to gauge time, to take a deep breath and gather strength so she could go on working, but instead of accomplishing any of these things she saw smoke, dark thick smoke rising up from the other side of the hill, rising up from . . HER HOUSE.  Her heart caught in her throat and she grabbed the mule, Old Hamp, as she cried, "Lord, have mercy, it's the house."  She jumped on the mule and took off toward the house

On the other side of the hill a two year old boy was in that house with his older sister, Millie, and his elder brother Cecil.  The smoke was getting thick and the two year old just cried, what else is a two year old to do, so the brother grabbed him up under his arm and grabbed Millie by the arm attempting to lead her out of the house.  Millie pulled away and ran back to the bed to get her doll out from underneath it, as she scrambled under to grab the doll Cecil grabbed her by the foot. Cecil emerged from the burning house with his baby brother under his arm like a foot ball and dragging little Millie out by her foot, saving both of their lives.

The fire burned that house to the ground leaving nothing but ash and cinder, but not one of her children died  that day.   But now she had a house full of children but no house.  My father was two when the house burned down and grandma gathered the family up and took them to the city.