My best prayers to the people of Mumbai!

A thought of those who aren't here to speak to anymore!

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In the photo, I'm the guy with the dark black moustache. Don is right behind me, carrying a suit bag over his shoulder. It was April 1969, we had just landed at Buckley Field, Colorado, having come back from one year in Viet Nam.....we were the lucky ones. For most of us, there were lots of people waiting to cheer us off the plane. We were the Colorado Air National Guard; coming home from the war.....



Here's to you!

Don L. Winters - We met in 1967 as we both went into the Colorado Air National Guard at Buckley Field, Colorado. We went to bootcamp from August 13th for six weeks at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas.

Don was the youngest guy in the entire unit, and I was second youngest as we were sent to Viet Nam the following spring.... April of 1968. We had been roommates just prior to getting the word we're going to get shipped out.

We lived in downtown Denver, Colorado. We shared a two bedroom apartment with another young Guardsman; Jay Applegate. "hey Jay", I hope you read this someday.

That was a wild place to live in the fall and early spring of 1968.....

They were putting out these lists of who would; and who would not, go to Viet Nam. There were 900 total guys in the Guard unit. Only 300 were going to be sent there.

In the end Don was on the list; and I was not. I decided to go in and volunteer to be put on it. That was way too easy.....now I was on the list. The next day we found out that Don was taken back off the list....then we left.

Thought I'd not see him again, at least for the year we would be in Viet Nam. Nope....son of a gun....there he was walking up the street one day about 10 days or two weeks after the rest of us got there. Never did find out how that worked out.

The year in the war was an amazing time. We were very young (both of us; just 18). We were so naive, and so optomistic...we never thought about anything bad happening to us....and luckily nothing did over there.

We met a bunch of other young guys from our unit and we became bonded for life as we spent that year....always wondering.....what was happening back home with our girl friends; our wives, our families.....Many got the infamous; "Dear John" letter. I did....so did Don....although he really got it before we left as well.....

So there we were, young, naive, broken hearted, becoming a close group of friends that would last forever......

And then we got introduced to Mary......Mary Jane....you know.....

As we spent the rest of the year learning about life, war, and ...Mary....we all began to develop the personalities that would stay with us for the rest of our lives.

OK.....back to Don...(although this free form rambling is really taking me back there, so please forgive my wandering)......

Don was the Super Hippest guy of all of us....(my opinion). Tall, great looking, and just ooozing cool....

There was Don....Jay....Scott T.,Bob Reposa (Rip - Rip was his nicknamne), Jim Murray (I hope you're alive buddy, I've tried a long time to find you), Doyle M. (who called me from his farm in Colorado to wish me Happy Veteran's Day last week while I was in NYC)...thanks Doyle.....Larry Christiansen (we spoke last year), and a couple of others as well.....

We came back from VN in April of 1969...hard to believe it....home again. The longest year of my life.

As I assume happens in all war-buddy stories; we hung together for a few years after we came back....always close in a special way. But then, one by one, we got married, or 'kinda' got married, and moved off with our spouse; had kids, and pretty much - disappeared....

I hadn't seen Don between March of 1972 and August or September of 1975....I couldn't get my act together after coming back, and finally...out of desperation; I joined the U.S. Coast Guard, simply in order to get away from the influences of my friends and begin to make my own life. I was poor, and had no daddy to ask for a loan....so it seemed like my only way to get back on my feet on my own. When I was around my friends, it was easier to party or 'go to the park', then it was to work, so I didn't work much then!

Coast Guard - August 13, 1971 - August 12, 1975.....it actually worked out very well for me. I got my 'act' together nicely. I married Joyce, and we had our only child; Gretchen.

When I got out; it was August 1975. I saw Don a few times then, although I never got a really good chance to talk to him. There was always something that would get in the way of a nice chat....wife's needed something; other guests wanted to talk...whatever.....but I never got a good chance to talk again with Don.

Sometime a few years later; I got a phone call to say Don was in the hospital after a motorcycle wreck between Glenwood Springs and Aspen, Colorado. He had been rushed by ambulance down to a Denver hospital with more services available. I tracked down the hospital; called it; got to the floor he was on and spoke to the nurse on call.

She said; very slowly and sadly.....I'm afraid Donald has passed!.....WOW! It hit me incredibly hard........

We saw his wife a few times after that; but she soon left town, ended up marrying someone else, and I only saw her one time after that.......Hello Dana! I hope you're doing well....up there in Georgetown.

So......"Here's to Donald Lewis Winters", A2c, Colorado Air Nat'l Guard...My friend, and a hell of a cool guy.

And Jim....If I don't hear something soon......I'm really going to wonder if you're still with us.

Finally; Bob Reposa; Doyle Miller; Scott Terhark, Larry C, here's to us all - brothers in arms!

God bless us all!!!!!

Proud to be an American tonight!

Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States of America!!!!!

We have finally come back from the dark path we have been on for the last 8 years and are once again the Great Nation that I grew up believing in!