Fate - To believe or not to believe

In the first chapter of my book, my Oma referred to my Fate to be something other than what my birth dictated I should be as "Schicksal". All my life I have taken this single word and believed in it. It drove me to be what I am today. It gave me characters I should not have been and it gave me characters I did not want to be. A single word spoken by my maternal grandmother made me believe I was invincible. I have stared death in the face more often than a cat with nine lives and I am still here. So I believe in Fate. What has me perplexed is that fate has no time restraints attached to it. I have finished writing my book after twenty years of living it, after waiting forty more years to write it and then finally taking two more years of putting it on paper. Now that it is finished, I am paying the waiting game once more. One of the good, yet bad in my mind, traits fate has given me is the " to be organized" at all times. I am not superficially organized, so you can cannot see my organization within the mess that surrounds me, but I am organized in my mind has to how events must occur in a certain order to be successful. So now the book sits and waits for certain things to fall in place and I have no control over those events. Bummer.... I sit here every day and I am going nuts. Well, at least I feel that I'm heading in that direction. Some people will tell you I'm already there. I truly hope by the time I make my next entry into my Blog things will be moving forward again and I can get out of this funky mood I'm in.

50 Years and counting, the WB-57F are stilling flying high. The way it looks they may around for another 20 years. Usually planes are replaced because they are obsolete or new models are developed that can do the job better, faster and sometimes a little cheaper. This plane was so far ahead in its field that no design have been necessary and even when there were new designs, they came and went while this "Blackbird" is still flying. The SR-71 was one example of that. A great airplane but very expensive to run.
So to all my friends who are anxiously awaiting the book, please be patient. We are getting there.

To publish or not to publish?

"No Easy Day" competition or writing on the wall?

 

With the release of "No Easy Day" questions have been raised and answered by many. As long as mankind has a mind, opinions will vary like the shades of flowers in a field. As a member of the American Legion I received my monthly email and lo-and-behold even the Legion chimed in on the subject. They conducted a survey as to how their members felt about the book. The survey gave 5 or 6 options and the last option was "Other" which allowed you an opportunity to write a short opinion. I never have been known for keeping my opinions to myself I wrote a reply as follows:

 

As with all my fellow Legionnaires, there are many opinions on this matter. Mine is just as confused. I have been carrying secrets in my mind for the past 40 years. I could have gone for the gold and published a book, but then I would have labeled myself a traitor. Over the years more and more of our achievements have been released and I hope that before I die they all will have become part of the Freedom of Information Act. Then I can put my words on paper and have my family, my children and my grandchildren read about where and why we spend so much time apart from our families. As to the argument that so much was already released before the book, may I remind you who released it. POLITICIANS... what they released was nothing but political fodder. If their words were the same as Mr. Owens, he would sell very few copies. They are in no way alike and his book will sell through the roof. Remember this little information my dad left for me: POLITICS comes from them Greek words POLI = Many , TICS = Bloodsuckers. How true that is.

 

 

To my surprise as of today I have had 9 "Likes" attached to my rambling. Moving on from this, it made me rethink what I was doing. Yes, I to had pledged secrecy and being a man of honor I held that secrecy within my head to the point that at times it would nearly drove me crazy. What I did different than Mr. Owens was that I got in touch with my comrades in arms and asked their opinion about me writing a book. They gave me sound advice and to a man told me to write, write, write. My story is aged, I realize, but some things are still secret (for now) The names of my team are never displayed or given in any way. Personal descriptions of the men have been altered in order to not give any information to anyone. What I did give away is the mission, but by now many people know about this just like we all knew about the mission Seal Team 6 was on. The details are what must be kept from our enemies so that they cannot prepare themselves should we ever have to do it again.

Bottom line is . . The book will go on. Hopefully within a couple of weeks we will be on Kickstarter.com to raise the funds to publish and with the help of others the book can be published by end of October. I still count on the help of many people and I hope they will step up and lend us a hand.

If you happen upon these pages and find them interesting, please pass them on to your friends. I need the word out there if I am to succeed with this project. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

 

 

 

 

To my knowledge there are no pictures available of the aircraft we flew. Someone was kind enough to change an existing photo of a WB-57F with the black paint applied.