I would have given anything to be there, especially at that particular moment.
His hat looked like it might have been fine leather at one time. Now it looked like the bleached skin of a dead cow which had died somewhere out in the desert. It was heavily stained from sweat around the middle and down the brim, and sported a couple of those silver acorns that cavalry officers had on their hats. The hatband was missing .... You can't buy a hat like that, you have to make one with dust and your own sweat.
That says it all, John.
Thank you (more than you know) for starting my day off on an incredibly bright note. Your description of the way in which you came across him, and the interaction between the two of you, is incredible. You shook hands with a genuine American hero yesterday, and, even though you didn’t necessarily know it at the time, you gradually recognized it on your own.
Please consider posting this account as a thread of its own, maybe with a little background information on H.K., and maybe even include a little more about your hindsight reflections since meeting him. More FReepers need to read what you wrote here. The personal, one-on-one accounts, and impressions, of this kind of meeting mean so much more than the cold, second-hand facts that (of necessity) generally comprise the posts here.
Many thanks for sharing this wonderful story.
~ joanie