Just thinking as I watch "Band of Brothers"

This no doubt will seem too dramatic, but this series evokes that in me. Quiet and pensiveness evokes that in me. A few years ago I made the mistake of leaving some of my writing on my desk at work. Some of my friends found it and asked me why I kept it to myself. I elected to write a small book. Doing so led me to Maria Edwards and she pushed me toward MWSA. The journey evolved to place where I find myself today. My thoughts are not about what I have written nor how I have grown. They are about the gifts I have received along the way. It has been my honor to meet people who have flown, sailed, and marched all around the world in the wars our country has joined since WWII. I have dined with those who fought on Iwo Jima, in Europe, in SE Asia, the Gulf Wars, the War on Terror, in the Pursuit of Noriega, and Grenada. I have shared time and space with people who have been involved in intelligence gathering, special operations, and special forces of all kinds. Survivors of Nazi atrocities have shared stories with me, I have met the decendents of those who liberated and treated the Jewish torture camps, the children of those who served on Iwo, the decedents of those who perished on the Bataan Death March. I have shaken hands with those who survived the worst of masacres in Korea. It was my honor to shake hands with men who flew with the Tuskeegee Airmen. I may not spell everything right here; I am stumbling for words as my emotions are welling up in my eyes. I don't really care at this moment. My writing has taken me to POWs from WWII, incuding a survivor of Berga. I sat with a survivor of the USS Indianapolis. I am friends with a man whose family escaped the Halocaust and know a lady who came as a child from East Germany. I know writers who do research on a major scale at the national level, and read on a daily basis about our members who are internationally renowned. I know people who were on the scene at Fallujah and have studied that horrendous battle in depth. I am part of something that is huge and good, salvaging the kind of history that would disappear if were not for the kind of people that make this organization what it is. These people have shared their gifts and knowledge with me...me, a small time writer from a small town in a cornfield in Indiana. I am blessed and honored and awed. I cannot list all the people who have touched me, but all have given me something. All have taught me something. I hope I can put it good use as I continue to grow and write. I cannot say thank you well enough or often enough.