More from Roger Harris

After a while, I think most us treated the program as a game you must play to get through the system and graduate. I can still hear some of my platoon members yelling "OK, a little false enthusiasm for Hamma" when told to fall out for inspection in the morning. I also remember hearing "If Hamma can graduate, so can we".

After graduation I spent a stent at Fort Carson and ran into Trigg just before leaving for Nam. Had long talk with him and told him I really admired the way he hung in there after breaking his leg. They had him as a buck SGT until he could pass the physical and get his commission. I always thought Trigg was one of the best in our platoon.

After Fort Carson, I had the luck to be assigned to the 61st Transportation Company (POL) in Nam. The Co of the 61st was a 50 something years old Capt. who was an Armor officer from the reserves in California. His claim to fame was that he was Chesty Puller's aide and driver during some of the invasions in the Pacific during WWII. (For those of you who haven't heard of Chesty, he was the most decorated Marine ever). I just cannot describe how much I learned serving under this man. One my first day in the company, he asked me if I knew what was wrong with the Army. Told him I didn't have a clue. He responded that too many officers think they run the Army. He told me Sergeants run the Army and our job to run the Sergeants. He relieved a couple of E-7's and the rest of the Sergeants got the message.

After two weeks in the 61st, the other Lt. DERO's back to the states and I was the lone Lt. in the Company as the Army was going to deactivate the 61st as part of Nixon's withdrawal plans for Nam. I literally lived on the road running convoys seven days a week to Da Lat , Bao Loc, Phan Rang, and worst of all; Bam Me Thuot. And as dumb as I was, I loved it. No lifer field grades except for the clowns who flew over us at 5,000 feet and offered suggestions on how we could improve our march unit.

In November, the unit was deactivated and I moved up the 262 QM Battalion as the S1. It took me two weeks to figure out I couldn't sit in an office and sign my name for 12 hours a day and a shrink would probably say I missed the "pucker factor" of being on the road. I asked the Battalion Commander to let me go back on the road and after a couple of months, he relented and sent me to the 360 Trans (POL). Everything was just great until the 1970 Spring Offensive into Cambodia. I was involved in setting up Chopper refueling/rearming points in the Boonies. Be glad to discuss it at the reunion but it was the biggest "Cluster F**k" ever.

When I got back to the States, I got a sales job selling Yellow Pages and spent my entire career in sales and sales management until I retired from Verizon in 2003.

I have been blessed with a good woman (The Big Huff) who has always been there for me and two great kids who received their brains from their mother. Two granddaughters, who I suspect; they just think I'm just weird.

I just love retirement as I have spent hundreds of hours on the Chesapeake Bay fishing or just drifting for miles up or down the Bay with my friend Paul (another Nam Vet) discussing how screwed up the Army and VA are.

For the past three years, I have become addicted to contract bridge and spend 3-4 days a week letting little old ladies with walkers and oxygen tubes teach me the finer points of bridge.

For those of you who are unsure if you will attend the reunion, I have learned over the past 68 years, you mostly regret the things you didn't do rather than the things you did. Most of us are approaching 70 and this may be the last chance to see some of your former "Beanheads"

"Get your gross chins in--See you next May"