Sentinel, Danger!

      

      9 days ago our capitol legislators felt the danger of possibly losing their lives. I believe for many of them it was their first time of ever feeling a fear like that.

      I have been thinking about that all these days now and several things have come to mind. Look at the men and women who served in WW-2, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq. Many of them faced that fear every single day in combat. Facing death became a way of life. Those fears have now come home to roost. Those who have never served in the military may perhaps still never considered that.

      I know how that feels, in a somewhat lesser way. I was on Shore patrol one night in the P.I. We used what were cattle trailers to haul 60 plus men back to the ship after liberty ashore. There had been a few incidents where rowdy returning sailors threw shore patrol off the cattle trailers while they were moving at 40 miles an hour. The night in particular I was on shore patrol on a 12 hour shift and came back to Subic Naval Station. The curfew was midnight and the last groups of rowdy drunks had cleared the gates. The chief in charge had been assigning 2 patrolmen with the trailers all evening long. When this group came in the gate it was a powder keg waiting to explode. There were approximately 20 marines, 20 redneck sailors and 20 black sailors, all inebriated and sullen. The chief assessed the situation and put 6 of us shore patrol on the trailer to contain over 60 angry men who were not fond of others in the group. That night I felt fear in a big way. Lucky for me, while the tension was thick enough to cut with a knife, there was no incident though it was the longest 15 or more minutes in my life.

      I once had a U.S. army .45 caliber pistol pointed at me on a night I was in a P.I. grocery store having a beer at the small bar. I had gone into town wanting to avoid any trouble so I stayed out of the regular bars. I was sitting there when a beer bottle came whizzing by my ear. I had enough beer in me that I jumped up and turned to kick someone’s backside. That was when the .45 came out. Lucky for me an old Fillipno man next to me escorted me past my aggressor and out the door.

      Once in Escondido, California Joyce and I walked into a Warehouse video store in the middle of a robbery. The robber was at the checkout register and he reeled around when we walked in the door. He had a high caliber revolver pointed at us and as Joyce tried to back out the door I held her, knowing if we had fled there would have been bullets flying in our direction. It was a rough few moments. The young female manager was pregnant at the time and she was so frightened she wet her pants as she tried to open the register.

      I suppose what the lesson here is, this can happen at any moment whether we are just sitting in a coffee shop or walking down the street. Trust in the supreme being above and if it is your time to go, it will happen. If it is not yet your time, go ahead, wet your pants and feel relieved.