Where have all the strong Black Americans that I grew up with and served with gone? I grew up in a unique little town in West Texas called Big Spring, we were the first integrated school in Texas. This was due mainly to our having an Air Force pilot training base here. On the street I grew up on there were Black’s, Whites, Hispanic, Native Americans and Cubans. All of these families had one thing in common and that was fathers either serving or working as civilians at Webb Air force base. Color was something we didn’t notice unless it was Red, White and Blue. Since we were all connected with the military we were all treated the same and treated each other the same. When I say the same I mean looked down on as military trash by those citizens of the city unrelated to the military. We stayed together in what I would call our own little gang. When I graduated High School myself and three others of our gang enlisted in the military, myself and Freddie Martinez went into the Army, Scott Goodblanket went into the Air force and Johnathan Dawson went into the Marine Corp. Within a year we were all serving in Vietnam and by the grace of God all Returned. A Black American, Hispanic American, Native American and this old White American, this was out gang. Freddie was the only one who stayed in the military and retired as a Sargent Major, the rest come back and went about our lives. We get together from time to time and the usual topic of our conversations is what has become of this country we so love. I started this with Black Americans but it’s not just there, it’s throughout all races. We seem to be getting weaker as we progress into the future. Our fear is there’s not allot of us left to hold this country together. We see this weakness in our own grand children. Everybody wants to stand out but nobody wants to stand up! With the exception of the few young men and women who still stand before the flag of the United States of America and swear an oath, this strength is sadly in a downfall. We all believe it due to a lack of strong family foundations, a lack of strong fathers and mothers who have forgotten their true purpose in life. The strength of our country and future relies on us raising our children to love, respect and protect this incredible gift we have been given.
Top ten posts of the month, sir. Very well said.
You were absent the day that they taught about “paragraphs” in the third grade??