6/11/1979:

Shooting pool, drinking beer, as 18 year old midshipman on a 4 week summer assignment to USS Tripoli, moored at the 32nd Street Pier, Naval Base (San Diego). Willie Nelson's "Georgia on my Mind" was playing on jukebox, when we learned that John Wayne had died.

10/23/1979:

Aboard the USS Tarawa in the Red Sea, playing backgammon on a Sunday morning with fellow lieutenants, when reports came re the bombing of the Marine Barracks in Beirut. I had been inside that building just days earlier. We immediately knew the # of casualties would be huge. Incredibly tragic day. Life got real ... in a hurry that day.