My Great x 5 Grandfather
Major George Lowery, Jr.
Vienna, Virginia (2013)
My first teaching experience.
Show & Tell at my daughter’s Elementary School.
Memphis, Tennessee (2012)
This is the giant Elvis statue at the Memphis Visitors Center near the Mud River where Jeff Buckley drowned.
Fort Bragg, North Carolina (1994)
This was the photograph that accompanied my packet to try and get into Officer Candidate School (OCS).
I’d been in the 82nd for about three months.
We were so busy training in the field or getting deployed to Panama and absolutely nobody was helping me that it took over a year to get all of the necessary paperwork together.
I submitted it to Division HQ and it got approved. Then I walked it over to XVIII Airborne Corps HQ and turned it in to some skinny E-3 clerk.
Several months passed and I hadn’t heard anything when I saw an announcement in the post newspaper congratulating individuals on being selected to attend OCS. My name was not listed.
I went and complained to my Platoon Leader who accompanied me up to XVIII Airborne Corps HQ once again where we talked to a crusty E-7 who didn’t give a shit.
“What happened to this paratrooper’s OCS packet? It was approved at Division HQ.”
“How should I know? Maybe it got lost.”
“Where is the E-3 clerk who took his packet? Can’t we talk to him and find out what happened?”
“He’s in the Virgin Islands doing hurricane relief.”
“When will he be back?”
“No idea.”
By that time I was about halfway through my enlistment and pretty much decided to give up on the military and concentrate on going to grad school after I got out.
Richmond, Virginia (1989)
Senior Prom.
Before the carnage.
Song Of Ajax 