I don't believe any of us had any notions of what this reunion would be like. It was intentionally kept unstructured to allow each individual to do what
he wanted when he wanted to do it. This format worked very well for us. Had it been tightly formatted, I really think we would have all been in jail or dead at the end of the first week.
For the
better part of a year I had been planning this reunion trip and had hoped that the contacts I made last year would be able to help me get this group on base one time. It seemed that it was not to be.
Just as we were about resigned to taking our pictures at the main gate of the base, fortune smiled upon us. The admiral's chief of staff happened along just as we were getting ready to leave. We were
granted the base visit we had hoped for. This trip actually happened with no guarantee of getting on base at all.
After our brief three-hour run of the base, including lunch at the beach, we left
feeling happy, satisfied and surprised we had actually done this. My gratitude goes to the captain, the admiral's chief of staff whose name I do not recall. I also thank the sergeant of the guard who was
assigned to escort us around the base. He was told where we could and could not go and what we could and could not take photographs. In the end, he realized we had all been here in a previous life and
took us a few places we were not supposed to go…like along the flightline.
The rest of the trip seemed almost anti-climatic now that we had done this unbelievable feat. I do feel sad that two of our
members who were trying to catch up to us were not able to share our excitement of getting back on base. This was not due to a lack of trying on their part. I still wish they had been able to join us.
Most of the next week was spent going our own ways quite a bit. It seems like the attitude was OK, we got on base, the pressure is off. I can honestly say that I know of no one who is going home less
than satisfied. I can't believe that I have actually been able to pull this off. I was not able to do this alone and I thank all the folks who gave me the encouragement to keep this trip alive.
Especially since there were times when I considered calling it off.
I can honestly say this was a Herculean effort that I never thought I would occur. I am thankful this went off as I hoped it
would. I met a lot of great folks in person for the first time and renewed some others that I had not seen in awhile. There are some others, no, a lot of others I hoped would have made this trip but
were unable to attend for one reason or another. These friendships are ones that will remain with me for the rest of my days and I will cherish them always. There was the initial bond of having served
on the same base, while not necessarily at the same time. Now there is the bond of having returned here and for most of us meeting face to face for the first time…hopefully not the last!
Now it is
time to return to work, reluctantly, and get back to talking to these folks on line. I also have another trip to plan for the spring of 2004. I also need to publish this journal and post some pictures
to get the hounds off my back. Boy are they going to be surprised that I didn't photograph every beautiful woman in LOS for them. I got a lot of good pictures and some not so good ones too. I'll let
you readers be the judge of how good the pictures are. You can see them at
