Book by
Mr. Ron Grayson KB5DKW (SK)

Please note: I wanted this to be in exactly the same format that Ron sent this to me, thus no additions or substractions have been added or taken away. ENJOY! 73

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: BASIC TRAINING
Date: Monday, June 25, 2001 2:33 AM

C H A P T E R...NO..1
      Some drunks never learn to play guitar no matter how
many camp fires they sit around..It does,however,depend on what you mean
by play and drunk..Some people get drunk on whiskey and some (like me)
on playing music..Some get smashed on just telling lies or shaking their
finger in your face and saying "You goin' to Hell Boy"..Some pretty
girls get an egotistical high out of just making you want what you are
never going to get..Some serial killers enjoy slicing pretty women up
and some Cops enjoy trying to track them down. Some men get off on
taking your last dollar and a very,very few enjoy giving money away but
I have never understood the complicated buzz associated with turning raw
recruits into Soldiers,Sailors,Airmen or Marines..I understand that
things are much easier now (for better or worse) but in the 60s,it was
no sop course if you went to Amarillo,Texas for Air Force Basic
Training..I just wanted to fix airplanes like my Father had in World War
II,so,I joined the Air Force..I did not have the metal to be a Marine
or Army Ranger and wanted to be trained in a job that I could do in
civilian life and I was and did just that before it was over..It was my
last night around the camp fire..We vowed eternal loyalty and said that
we would always return to the spot as long as one of us was alive.We
viewed the Viet Nam War(South East Asia War) with mixed feelings.
.It was a good way to get
 shot but on the other hand ,it was good to write songs about or protest
against and it was a job that paid money..We were mostly unaware of what
stood between this circle of friends around the fire and the Hell in the
East..I had the Hell in the West to contend with,first.I caught a
Braniff Airlines Jet and headed for Texas . The Jet turned into a prop
job as I got closer.I received my first clue as to what I was getting
into when a young man in an army uniform, with no rank insignia,sat down
beside of me..He (like me) was from the South and from a remote region
of it..His eyes were hollow and scared but he accepted the cup of coffee
offered by the stewardess..He was attempting to hide from the three
striped Army Sergeant standing by the door and he did not notice that I
was sitting behind and to the right of a Brigadier General..The airplane
was an old DC-3 (C-47) and the flight was rough..The isle seat that he
now occupied placed him directly behind the little ball headed,nerdy
looking one star General who was looking over some papers from his brief
case..An air turbulent caused the plane to drop about ten feet, the
coffee left the cup and tried to remain where we had all been
before..Being unable to find us,it headed back down directly toward the
General..The young Private sprang to his feet and caught every drop of
it back in the cup...I was amazed at his level of motivation..As I said
before,I took Basic Training in Amarillo Texas which is one of the few
places on Earth where you can stand knee deep in mud and still have dust
blowing in your face..I was picked up at the Amarillo Air Port by a two
striper being supervised by a three striper in a blue bus in the small
hours of a Sunday morning and driven out to the base..Amarillo is pretty
at that time of night and my poetic soul was touched but staying alive
and together was more on my mind than writing poetry at the time..I had
been a Boy Scout and had spent some time with them at Summer Camp..I had
been told that being in the Air Force was a lot like being in the Scouts
but you could not carry a knife and there was no adult supervision..They
were wrong!..The Boy Scouts wanted me to grow up and be a fine young
man..These guys just wanted me to die and rot without stinking up the
place..I was from Mississippi and to make things worse,I had already
finished two years of college..I had a Training Instructor with a facial
injury and a last name that you were bound to pronounce wrong..He
arrived with an attitude problem..Our Senior Training Instructor (Team
Chief) was a Baptist Minister turned alcoholic turned Tech. Sergeant
forever..These guys alternated between not liking you very much to being
drunken sadists or so that is the image that they liked to project..In
the REAL World the Air Force did not waste any talented aircraft
technicians or potential air crew members on that kind of duty..These
were not the best and the brightest that they had to offer..I knew that
and they knew that I knew that..That made life harder for me..To make
things worse,I entered Service with a large lesion in the form of an
abrasion on the outside of my upper leg..We were receiving our clothing
issue and were stripped down to our civilian under wear..I was given a
duffle bag which we were made to carry over the shoulder that was on the
side that caused the lesion to open from contact with the rough canvas
of the bag..Then as part of the FUN were told to sit down naked on the
floor and put on our Military boxer shorts so that some of us could put
them on backwards and be singled out as Queer..This brought the wound
into contact with the floor which had recently been in contact with some
one else's rectum..We were not allowed to sleep but a few hours at
night and had little time for eating or personal hygene..I ran a high
fever because of the "staph infection"(I still have problems with it)
but tried to hang on any way..As
part of the training we were told to remove all the tags and gum
stickers from our clothing and then we were subjected to a T.I.
inspection..Certain of us were singled out to report to the Day Room and
to bring all our clothes stacked neatly back into the duffel bag..The
T.I. would "palm" some tags or just drop them into a pocket when you
were not looking..At that time when he pretended to catch you not
obeying orders,he would use a judo throw which would land you on the
floor..I came from a rough neighborhood and was very good at dodging
blows..He was drunk,I was sick and had a blister on my ankle that had
been caused by an ill fitting boot..I stayed on my feet by avoiding most
of the force from the blow but he broke the blister with the "foot
sweep" and the staph infection found yet another home..I made him look
silly and so,I got a lot of C.Q.(charge of quarters) and K.P. (kitchen
police)duty which eliminated most of my time to sleep..I began to see
things that were not there until someone decided that I needed a
medic..The Doctor was very upset with me for letting things go so long
with a temperature of 103 and kept me in the Hospital for eight
days,which caused me to get "set back" to another flight of basic
trainees..As I said before,I am from Mississippi and when I got out of
the hospital, they put me in a three man room with two Afro-American
boys in an attempt to make life hard on me but they had just thrown
"Brer Rabbit" into the briar patch and life was easy after that.
.Ronald "Skillet"
Jones was my friend..He could march,dance and write
poetry..He marched so well that he would screw up on purpse to get his
share of the "ass eatings" and avoid the stigma of being thought of as a
"kiss up" or an
Uncle Tom..They gave us a few minutes to write home every three days but
Ron had other things on his mind..There was a Hotel in down
town Amarillo that provided good little Airmen like us with a 'ho or two
or you could just pick one up on the street if you could ever get a
pass..He wrote this poem called..Hi 'ho...It went...Hi 'ho,hi 'ho--It's
off to work I go..There's 'hos on the corner..There's 'hos on the
square..They's hookin' and trickin' most everywhere..I work all the
time,can't make no money..Still they axe me "wanna party honey"?...They
gives they money to the preacher man and a funky little dude that plays
in a band..On Saturday Night,they out to play..On Sunday they get's they
sins washed away...Come Monday though,they back on the square just
hookin' and trickin' most everywhere..Hi ho,hi ho it's off to work they
go!..Skillet spent $20 at the Hotel but it did him at least a million
dollars worth of good..My other "bunkie" was also Black and from the
South..His name was Walter and Walter was a top notch young man that
liked to shoot craps and throw money away..He would loan me most of his
pay check to keep from spending it or losing it..He would tell his
friends.."That White Boy borrowed all my money,'cause his Mama died." He
knew that letting me have it was like putting it in the bank and he
enjoyed White People owing him money ..Walter and Ron
kept me laughing too much to be home sick and Basic Training became a
breeze for me because of them..I had seen some attempted suicides, one
guy that danced all night with himself in the Laundry Room, a boy who
tried to re-break his arm so that he could go back to the Hospital,two
nervous break downs and a heterosexual who pretended to be otherwise in
order to be sent home but things were well with Walter, Ron and me..My
thanks and appreciation go out to Walter Johnson and Ron Jones where ever
they are today.I was sick and confused and they stood by me..Call it male
bonding or espirit de corps but as white and black were at war in my home
state and around the country,they changed my life and launched a career
for me through their kindness with no hope of reward.I
was still not myself when discharged from the Hospital but my roomies
took up the slack when I needed them to..I have worn glasses that look
like the bottoms of two coke bottles ever since I was six years old and
every one expected me to wash out on the rifle range.The TIs
called me "Seal Beams" because everybody had a nick name.However,if you had
given me a rifle and told me to try and shoot you back in those
days,then you would not have been safe in the next county..My two
friends and my affinity for guns got me through Basic Training and when
my good health returned,I made the Air Force a good junior NCO that did
things and made friends that I am very proud of until this day,Crappy
War or no Crappy War.. After Basic,I was treated very much like a human
being during my Aircraft Mechanic Schooling at Witchita Falls,Texas and
was then sent to Sacremento Ca. for some "on the job training" on EC-121
Air Craft..Some of these Birds were used stateside as AEWAC (Airborne
Early Warning and Control) and some were used in the South East Asia
warzone to monitor the Ho Che Mein Trail with a form of low light TV
from 20,000 feet..After you stayed there a year,you could bet that you
were bound for the War Zone..I was a young,innocent boy that did not
even have a girl friend any more but was in for a shock.. CULTURE SHOCK
and the way that it affected a young man from the South is what this
book is all about..I was in the Day Room one day and I saw what was left
of a young sergeant returning from a two year streatch in Thailand..He
was wearing a Uniform that required some imagination to be recognized as
an Air Force uniform..On the pocket of a faded old Olive Drab shirt was
a picture of an eight ball with a screw ran through it in the form of a
patch ..Buck Sergeant stripes were sewn sloppily on both sleeves..The
shirt was unbuttoned revealing a bare chest and a large brass Buddha
medalion on a gold chain hanging from his neck..His hair was worn in the
"duck tail" style but very greesy. On top of the hair and the greese was
an "Australian Bush Ranger Hat" with the brim snaped to the crown with
patches attesting to his sexual prowess..Everyone just left him alone,even
the A.P.s..I was impressed and just had to go where he had been.. I did
and stayed for 2 years..

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: THE HUSTLER
Date: Friday, June 22, 2001 9:22 PM

 C H A P T E R NO. 2
    "The sun was coming up like Thunder" as Kipling might say..In
the tropics and because of the Sun's angle to the Earth, Sunrise and
Sunset are of short duration but right then the timing was perfect and
the sight was beautiful..Mein Cawprotfie aka. "Bob" was looking to the
sky for some fresh "Cherries" that were arriving onboard a big Boeing
707 about to come in for a landing..He had to make a living for his
family and the job market was poor. He was a bright young man and given
a good education and a U.S. Citizenship,he would have been an asset to
any company as a worker and to any Man as a Friend. However, place,time
and circumstances were about to make him my enemy.The 707 was now on
final approach. The flaps and landing gear were down and it was lit up
like a flying saucer..For a few moments,it gave the illusion of standing
still in the red-orange sky as it lined up on and closed the distance to
the runway. The pilot powered down while holding the nose high and the
air speed dropped to the landing speed. The runway gently came up toward
the crew and with a faint puff of white smoke, the eight big wheels of
the main landing gear touched down almost at the same time..Then the
nose gear found the concrete completing a fine landing... He talked to
the tower on ground control frequency and brought the big bird to a stop
near the Bangkok,Thailand terminal..It had been a long but uneventful
flight.. "Bob" waited by the Terminal like a cat waits on a mockingbird,
while I was still onboard getting my "V.D. Lecture"..The young man doing
the talking sounded like he was giving personal testimony as if maybe he
had the "Clap" so many times that like the Old Sailor in "The Rhyme of
the Ancient Mariner" he had to roam the Earth and tell the story to
anyone who would listen over and over again forever..He said " Do what
you want to boys but a Thai Girl will gladly sell you her body for
almost anything from a quarter to a five-dollar bill. However,she will
also sell you V.D warts,gonahrea,syphlis,shankeroids and something we
call brand X that you can't wash off with Ajax." That  was all true but
nobody is perfect and AIDS was still on the drawing board back then,so
no worry there....When the young Sergeant finished his speech and stood
aside, I was one of the first people out the door..I had been flying for
14 hours but when I grabbed my luggage, my legs were still right there
where I had left them..I was Twenty-One..I deplaned and began to walk
toward the Terminal. Just then, Mein (Bob) with all his 105 pounds of
muscle grabbed a suit case and began to help me..Two years later the
same kid was there in the same place on my way back home and I kicked
him three feet in the air and told him that I would kill him if he came
near me..However, right then I was still a "Cherry Boy" (in Thailand)
and I bit the bait..He charged $2 for helping me and was financing a
support group of his peers behind a fence to insure that he got his
money for his work..He asked me.."You want Pooying (Woman)??,hand
job,knob job,blow job,can suck,can fuck can do anything you like,she
number one cherry girl,can marry and take to States..Your Mama Love her
very much..She only cost one hundred baht (five dollars)..Please,forgive
my extensive use of profanity but I must remain truthful to you and
myself or forget the whole thing..This is how it was..This was not
Sunday School and I was not in Kansas any more..I also want to add that
I am a Christian..That makes Marriage and other types of he-ing and
she-ing that might lead to marriage a sacred thing. The relationship of
Christ and Church has a lot to do (whether you subscribe or not) with
our whole Western Culture now falling apart because of marriage evolving
away from being a religious commitment..However,fake it or not, a lot of
it is still in place..These Thai boys were not Christian,did not want to
be and saw it as a blood thirsty and violent religion..They had good
reason to think like that because we "Christians" had traveled 12,000
miles to kill and blow people up in a War that we did not even
understand..A true "Christian Church Lady" had much rather me write
about dead Children's napholm roasted little bodies and old Women with a
face full of steel splinters than all that BAD OLD SEX stuff but these
boys looked at Sex as we would a bowel movement..At home it's free but
you might have to pay for it in the bus station..I gave them $3 to show
them that I was a Christian and an OK guy..They wanted more but I lied
and said that I was broke..For some reason,I had a spare wallet which
was empty and I showed them that..One boy wanted the wallet..He reached
for the wallet,I reached for his strong but tiny hand and smiling from
ear to ear began to crush his fingers while all his friends were
returning my smile..Their numbers were legion and they were about to
catch on and kick my ass when two Marines stepped up making the odds
look just not worth it to them..Me and my "Jar-Head" friends wandered on
through the door and each of us caught a bus or puddle jumper to where
we would live for at least a year or perhaps come back home on ice and
in a plastic bag before the year was over..Of course, I never saw those
Marines again..Just "Bob" on my way back home after I had gotten evil
enough to look after myself..I was no longer a happy camper and decided
that the whole World smelled like shit by then but that was mostly
because of too much work,too much fear and too many drunks..Actually the
World smelled more like shit and garlic being roasted over a charcoal
fire because they cooked outside a lot..That is the Truth but you got
used to the smell after about six months and the food began to taste
just fine after about a year..It is hot as a deacon's daughter but I
still eat it when I can get my Thai friends to cook it for me right here
in Mississippi..I have an eating disability because my saliva glands
were "irradiated" to kill cancer cells..Tears caused by the hot, spicy
food seem to help me "cry " food down my throat more easily..Up
close,the Thai people are warm,angelic,family oriented and (in their
wisdom) value good friends more than material possessions..I love the
mocha colored,doe eyed,raven haired,well built Ladies and the Men are
Smart as a Fox, as kind as Children,Tough as Nails and Loyal Friends and
Soldiers to the bitter end but first you have got to get to KNOW them..I
had a long,long way to go before I did, for the East is the East and the
West is the West and never the Twain shall meet..

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: JEEP
Date: Saturday, May 19, 2001 8:53 PM

C H A P T E R  NO. 3
 "JEEP" meant Just Enough Education to Pass..That is the way you were
when you first arrived in South East Asia..If you were a Full "Eagle
Polishing" Colonel and were new to the War Zone then you were a "JEEP
Colonel" but still a Jeep..It was like being born again into another
World and you would need about as much help as an infant would in this
World that you and I live in now....There were NO Experienced American
Women around to serve as Mamas (like on TV) but we had a good supply of
Father and Big Brother figures.. However,it  seems that there were only
a few personality types around and the good ones were being cloned over
and over for future generations of grunts to come after us..Then,out of
this sea of copy-cat conformity,there arose a young man who just
remained himself..The man's name was "Richie" just plain old Richie..He
had been on base for Ten months and the tour had taken it's toll on
Richie but he was a "short timer" with a short time to go..
.."Short",meant that you were about to fly back to the "World" and stick
your feet under Mama's table..He was pale and  skinny,a nervous wreck
with a drinking problem but he was nice and he was smart and cheerful
through it all..He would laugh and say "Hey,Jeep, I am so Short, my
socks get stuck in the crack of my ass..I am sooo Short,I can crawl
under a snake with a hard on..Ever seen a Snake with a Hard on?"..Then
he would laugh and belt the bottle but you could talk to Richie about
anything..Richie,showed me how to go down town and score but warned me
that it might be habit forming..I soon learned that over there (in the
10 hours of the day that I was not working) I was like a rich playboy in
the U.S.A...So,ten,twenty,thirty,forty,fifty and more,like the bloody
red baron,I was running up the score..Eighty girls lied trying to end
that spree and wanted to come back to America with me..Then I got into
some serious whore hopping..I was always a follower of Mrs. Aynn Rand
and she once said that if Sex is what you want out of life then go for
it and go do it..Aynn,I love you very much and  know that you got a
little bit randy in your old age but you do not know what in Hell you
are talking about..Sex,is just as addictive as Heroine and you might as
well say that if SMACK is your thing,then go for it..You said that
because it was politically correct and hip to say at the time..It served
your own agenda and you said it because you needed to make some more
money to keep your 25 year old boy friend hanging around and your sissy
ass husband form starving to death with you..On the other hand,I could
give a rat's ass if what I say makes a dime or not  because even if it
did,I would still put on a black sock a green sock and go to town like
the poor white trash that I will always be..Now,how is that for
OBJECTIVISM?..Any way,I miss and love you and can only win an argument
with you because you are dead..Sorry,but say "The Sixties" and I flash
and flash hard..The Sixties hit me like Bob Dylan's "Freight Train
Moving with a Simple Twist of Fate"..I played in a Band back then too
but it was a disaster..There is nothing more temperamental than a Thai
Musician but they were about ten times as good as me and if they could
have spoken clear English then we could have made decent money..Over
there,playing an instrument carries some built in prestige but do not
just carry a guitar around and bask in the glow of special attention
because as I said before,you had better  walk what you talk becasue they
will call your hand.  They are a party people that do not like to be let
down when they want to have fun..One night,I did a "no no"...I got drunk
as a monkey and sat on the top of the back seat of a somlar
(transportation tricycle) like Caesar about to ride through Rome in a
Chariot..We were warned against this because it made them think that we
looked upon them as a conquered people with that gesture..In five
minutes,I was surrounded by a crowd of about 20 men..I reacted quickly.
I took the guitar out of the case and hung the Harp rack around my
neck..The sight of the two instruments seemed to take their minds off
killing me for a minute and one man cried out "Rong pein Farong" (Sing
an American Song)..I asked him in Thai which one he wanted and them
seeing that I was trying to learn  their language,weighed heavily in my
favor.."Mule Skinner Blues" came the reply and I invented a
harmonica-guitar version on the spot that I still play today and think
of when I learned it everytime I play it..They laughed,slapped each
other on the back and I sat down in the seat like I should have been
doing to start with..WHISKEY,now that was something that they liked more
than music and if you wanted to get your head busted then go to town
with a bottle that you would not share..Over there a  fight was over
when you or they were dead. They would guzzle just about  anything and
some of the  beer that they drank was sent back to the U.S.  and lab
tested for purity..I drank a lot of it myself and the fact that the lab
found traces of blood and urine in it did not stop any of us from
drinking some more "Singha Beer"..One day,I was telling Richie about it
and as I said before, at the age of 23,Richie was a dedicated
alcoholic..He said,'Ronny,you should take some Tequila with you because
they hate the stuff"...I picked up a bottle of "Pepe Lopez Tequila'"
with the plastic sombreo for a top and went to town to ho around and get
drunk..In the middle of the main street,four of the natives accosted me
and asked me for a sip..A sip was about three fingers down on a fifth
with them..The boldest and bravest of them turned up the bottle,swigged
down a finger's worth and said to me in English "Vely Good,sank you" and
smiled the big smile..He then turned to his friends and said in Thai
something that meant "Don't drink that crap,it's poison,and this crazy
bastard is trying to kill us all"..The Tequila trick worked many times
until one day I met the crazy Woman..The crazy woman was about
60,wearing no top or bra of any kind and sitting by a mud puddle playing
with a toy plastic boat..She had long thin tits that hung down to her
belly button and a mouth full of black teeth and red beetle nut that she
was dipping like snuff..She asked if I needed any loving and I told her
that I would take a rain check (never burn a bridge,any bridge)..Then
she pointed to the bottle of Pepe Lopez..I poured the lady a drink like
a gentleman ought to do and held out the cute little plastic hatfull of
tequila thinking that she would enjoy playing with it when she finished
her drink..However,she grabbed the bottle instead and ran down the street
jumping and yelling and flopping her titties around..I drank the hat
full myself,I needed it badly after what I had just seen..When it came
to fixing the Airplanes (which took up most of my time),I was assigned
to a Staff Sergeant who was assigned to an Airplane..He was the Crew
Chief and I was the assistant CC when he was not around and was off from
work..In other words he worked 12 hours on and I worked the other 12
hours while he was off..We had one flying slot assigned to him and we
split the money when either one of us flew with the plane..I had been a
tire changer and gas pumper in the States but the "sink or swim" method
and advise from the CC turned me into a real mechanic in a short
time..His name was Bill Clontz and he was about 6' 2 " 225 pounds of
Pawnee Indian..He may well be in the top 5 of the finest men that I have
ever known. We stuck together like glue,depended on each other and
nobody but nobody messed with Bill but one time..He was big, strong,very
handsome,altruistic,a good artist,a fine mechanic and a gentleman if you
treated him half as well as he made other people treat me..However,I had
been trained to find things that were wrong or out of place and I knew
that there should at least be one charater flaw,that he had..The flaw
was that he did  not like any funny business when he was drunk..Another
friend and Wingman of ours who shared a bungalo with him said that Ssgt.
Clontz once caused him to pass through a door horizionly and into
another room from a gentle,friendly tap that he gave him on the
jaw..That guy and myself are in contact via email and he wrote that he
still has a lump on his jaw from the mis-understanding that happened 31
years ago...With Bill around,I learned to swagger,act tough and buy
custom made uniforms from down town that did not look like any other Air
Force uniform..I drank like a fish, became a massage parlor lounge
lizzard(which came back to haunt me in the form of a contract on my life)
and one day,I learned to run and check out the four 3350 horse power
engines on our Lockheed Constellation and do a lot of other things to
keep it flying..Then,I found my one good Woman that I cared about,moved
in with her and stopped all the skirt chasing..I settled down to one
Woman and stayed another year..I was not a JEEP
any more..

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: MY RUSTY OLD RIDE
Date: Sunday, July 22, 2001 8:47 AM

C H A P T E R  NO. 4
Mother of Iron,tonight we are one..Nestled inside like a life unborn and
streaking out beneath the stars,two hours from the sun,away from nothing
and into nothing more.Spin again old
wheels of fortune.Morning brings a newborn
baby son...How can I wax poetic over a damn pickup
truck?..Well,you just don't know but you will..At one time,It was the
only security that I had..Life is such a temporary "paper thing" and
wrought from sorrow..Give me grease on my hands rather than blood..The
wind about my ears and  not cries and curses..The rhythm of a ride and
the song of the road..The American Way..The hamburger of the soul.. It
was a 1970 Ford F-100 that had made me a living and brought me home
drunk and crazy at least a hundred times..It even took a load of shot
across the radiator and fender that would have cut me in half..I had the
radiator fixed and it remained in service until the very same day that
the "gentleman" who shot at me,shot himself..That was twelve years later
when his wife caught him screwing his fourteen year old
step-daughter..The engine ran hot,I installed a head gasket and my
ex-brother-in-law took the easy way out..All in the same day..It was a
good day for my ex-wife's family and I fixed the truck..I had rebuilt
the engine at 100,000 miles when I was twenty-seven with the help of a
friend ..I drove it until I was forty-eight...A friend of mine who was an
old man with one lung was one fine mechanic, did most of the brain work
while I did the hard work and he sucked on a Camel down on his knees
just trying to breathe..It ran at least another 200,000 miles after that
and out lived the mechanic by ten years..It had a 302 engine and a low
speed rear end that was fine with a load but would get stuck in the
middle of the hi-way when empty..The gas mileage was terrible no matter
what you did..The brakes were drums all around and were never that
great..It was leaking out the rear main seal and a young man that I knew
wanted it because it had a stick in the floor and twin pipes that made
it go varrooom..My wife told me that if I did not buy her a new sewing
machine that she wanted then I needed to see a lawyer,the young man
offered the same price that the sewing machine was selling for and I was
weak and made the deal..Two weeks later,it was parked in a junk yard and
forever more gone where the good Fords go..I paid the poor thing a visit
and thought about how it had saved the life of a man who had
picked a terrible night to get drunk and sleep by the side of the road
when it was ten degrees,snowing and getting colder..I thought of how it
had carried most of the lumber in my house and a lot of other people's
houses too..I thought again of the shot gun blast that it took for me..I
thought of how some girls just thought that it was plain sexy when I was
lonely and had nothing else going for me..Most of all, I thought of the
quality time that I had spent changing the oil,airing the tires and
hunting through the junk yards to replace parts that had fallen off or
had just given up and all the mid-night rides when I just could not
sleep..I thought of how it seemed to only break down when I had the time
and money to fix it but on the road with nothing but gas money it would
come home on a wing and a prayer like an old B-17 all shot to hell and
gone by an ME-109..The truck had a name too and it was OLD YELLER..Good bye
old Friend..I'm just like you now..God Bless you Henry Ford..May you
Rest In Peace..

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: SAVED BY GOD AND THE GUARD
Date: Sunday, July 22, 2001 6:06 PM

C H A P T E R  NO.5
    I sobered up and came back to the World in 1971..I had been
having a fifth a day and my hands shook when I signed the papers that
made me a free man again..My Dad is a WWII veteran and he tried hard to
understand me as I sat at the supper table and tried to remember the
English word for Salt..My flight from Bangkok had been greeted in San
Francisco by some low-lifes who were getting all the pretty girls and
calling us baby killers.. The APs were no help because they would not
let me beat the crap out of them...I left Frisco and landed in
Jackson,Ms but was not greeted by any more "hippies" there..I had to
drive the last leg of my journey home in a Hertz Rent-A-Car even though
I had not driven a car on the
highway for two years..An old friend and fellow vet who
had not been gone as long as me, rode with me along with a very nice
young woman who stoicly sat in the back seat and even though I scared
her badly,never asked me to just let her drive. I soon found out that I
had more problems than just driving a car..I am not real sure what
caused my problems ..It could have been culture shock but I know that I
was a candidate for the nut house..I only know that drinking had nothing
to do with it..Hell,Jesus drank wine and even made some..I was just
crazy so,,I went out and married a woman who was even crazier than I
was..With the help of my Father and Brother who were both Union
Carpenters,I finished my apprenticeship and between fights, all night
drunks and divorce lawyers,I made a decent living and bought a house
which I got to keep through two failed marriages..I know some very good
lawyers who can not pull that one off..I was crazy but not
stupid..However,the next career field that I would choose would make it
seem that I was all of the above..I decided that at night,when I was not
sawing wood and driving nails and in between drunks and bar fights,that
I would enjoy teaching young children in elementary school.. I was not
far from having the college credits so, I majored in Elementary
Education and was going to be THE CATCHER IN THE RYE and keep little
children from ever being as screwed up as I was..I was encouraged a lot
by one of my teachers who held a Ph.D and was also a Baptist
Minister..They needed more "male" teachers and fine upstanding young men
like me to serve as role models for little boys who did not have very
many good men to look up to..My hat goes off to all the ladies who can
handle 30 kids in a class room but I found that I did NOT have the right
stuff for that. Then one day,my own mentor, role model and favorite
teacher decided to blow his brains out..He did a poor job of it because
he did not even own a shotgun..He used a .25 automatic and it took the
whole clip to kill him..He even stopped after he had shot himself
several times in the head and made a phone call..He hung up the phone
and finished the job..That upset me and ended my desire for more formal
education..I quit college in the middle of a semester and never went
back..I continued to build things made of wood and concrete and joined
the Mississippi Air National Guard in 1975 as an aircraft mechanic
(43171A) for the extra money..As a carpenter I made more per hour and
often more per year than many of those who worked full time for the
guard ..I worked all the time during the months when the weather allowed
it and then "guard bumed" when I was off from work..My line chief saw me
as a "flake" because I did not work all the time like a normal human but
he reluctantly put me in for E-6..With that he informed me that "I was a
big boy now and should take on more responsibility".. Sweeping the floor
was one of my newest jobs..I did a lot of that..The big cheif had a good
understanding of what a "flake' was..He was the only man that I ever
knew who taxied an F-84 through the wall of the flight shack ..A circuit
breaker is such a small thing but it still must not be forgotten..I have
no idea what he thought that I did in the "real air force" but I needed
the money and accepted his attentions as the "tough love" that he
intended it to be. .. I worked Transit Alert and soon found out that I
was not the in the Air Force any more..I serviced a Guard General's
C-118 who along with his entourage of bird dogs,snitches,slaves,whores
and suck ups was on his way to kill some quail and do some other things
while the tax payers picked up the tab..I knew that I had found a happy
home and I never stopped until I got hired full time under U.S. Civil
Service..It took nine years but I did it..I was sitting in an
establishment that was known as the "Ape Yard" when I was offered a full
time job..I went to work for a young man who as a Master Sergeant had
once had a stripe for every year that he had been in the ANG..He had six
years and six stripes..He was a fine person and a good
NCO all the way around but he drank too much..daaamn did he drink too
much..He stayed semi-smashed for 8 years but still did a fine job of
fixing airplanes..He got drunk and I got cancer but I beat cancer and he
beat the booze..God is Great and the beat goes on..

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: WOMEN AND RELIGION IN RED-NECK LAND
Date: Tuesday, July 24, 2001 5:55 PM

C H A P T E R..NO 6
    The two just seem to go together..I once knew a lady named
"Memaw' that was like everybody's Grandma that they wished was already
dead..She was retired from the cotton mill and "kept" children while
their Mothers worked..She had three hobbies,dipping snuff, killing
flies and preaching..She liked the Levi Garret with four dots on the
bottom of the glass bottle and the large Texas Model Fly Swatter that
would kill flies to the size of a mocking bird or send a kid to the
emergency room if he stepped out of line..If the fly swatter did not
work then she would try and scare the hell out of you by sending your
soul there..If you can not read then you can't read the Bible but that
never stopped her from telling you all about what it said..She was after
all, a Saintly Mother,slaughtered on the alter of a male dominated world
and as a sub-diety herself was entitled to make up her own version ..She
raised two fine sons that worked in the drug dealing industry and a
daughter that alternated between being a night club stripper and a $20
dope whore according to what the traffic would bear..She did it all for
her children and maintained custody..Memaw kept them while she
worked..You can not argue with success or with the facts unless you are
a Woman in the year 2002..If you are, then,you can bend the World around
to where it looks the best for you and tell everyone that you can do all
things..Those who disagree will be sorry..So,being no fool..I go
along..From the Flappers of the 20s,to Rosey the Riveter and Tokyo Rose
to "I am Woman,hear me Roar", "The Eighties Ladies" and the Wife of
today who gets her ass beat every 13 seconds by a cruel sadistic
husband..A husband that is becoming extinct in our own time..OK
ladies,so now,you want to die in combat under a hail of
steel,sweat,blood and flying shit so,that you will be as GOOD as I
am..Well,OK.,suits me..Who needs America anyway but Ladies,MEN love you
but you love out-laws,preachers and dogs which are all about the same
animal.. They love'em 'cause they need'em and they will always need them
and never make it without them..Ladies love children that last FOREVER
all of the above are Children that last forever....God Loves all his
children and his children all love Money..Religion is about saying how
much you love God and paying money for it..You get what you pay for..For
myself, I would only like a small cabin in heaven far off the golden
street and away from most of the people that say they are going there..I
do not like them here..I will not like them there either..My treasure in
heaven will be small and just enough to get by on..Why invite
disaster?..Greed and fear should be all left behind..The two of them
will ruin you in this life and they make people build fancy places of
worship while children starve and go without medicine,so,let's just
leave the two of them right here or let them go to HELL..Oh well,off on
another zinger but it does not take much to set me off on one any
more...Anyway,I play music and among musicians there is a bond if they
are real musicians..I found a pretty little girl who weighed 105 pounds
but could burn a house down with her voice and I married her in
1984..Between us we had been through seven divorces but we are still
doing great together and that is not likely to change..I am one of those
boring happily married men that nobody writes songs about..As for
Religion,tell me what it is and I will give you an estimate..I only hope
that mine is not music or ham radio..

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: THE LIGHTENING MEN
Date: Tuesday, July 24, 2001 6:55 PM
 
C H A P T E R NO..7
   Sometimes they talk late at night..Men, no more but energy
eternal..With no shapes but that of light and storm clouds..Still they
are,they exist and they call me with the flash and the cricket
code..Asleep in England no more or France or Moscow..Far away and in my
head..Old friends of gold and those never met of tube and key,skipping
over the ocean and bouncing from the sky..Riding the tail of a
comet,playing among aurora,then back to the deep blue water,the mighty
mirror of the Sea..From the flickering screen or the magic of a sky
wave, in my earphones for no apparent reason with their "Donald Duck
voices or with the happy whistling song of a telegraph key..May they
always be...KB5DKW....I became KB5DKW in 1986 and  I am glad that I
did..I was building my house and working as an airplane mechanic when
the Radio Bug bit me and it got infected..I went from Novice Class to
Extra Class in about a year and it was a lot of fun..Before the days
when everyone had a cell phone and an internet connection,I had a free
phone in my car and talked around the world on a daily basis and it was
nothing new even back in 1986 for the Hams that came before me..Some of
the Golden Agers were still around and all were about 85% gentlemen that
you did not mind having a chat with..As for chatting in morse code (CW)
I would say that about 99% of those were among America's finest
people..Of course, "political correctness" and  God Dollar had to enter
the picture and cause a lot of "dumbing down" and "wussing up" much in
the same way that it touched every thing else today..However,Ham Radio is
still a fun hobby and one could do worse than try it. I was
back in the saddle again..Then one day,none of it mattered one bit...I
got big Charley which is a radio word for CANCER...They gave me 5800 Rads of Radiation,
which is about a gigawatts worth, which is about the strength of a
lightening bolt. They burned up the Cancer..Some days are good days but
sometimes I feel like Mr. Poe when he said that the Iron Gate of the
cemetery was left half a ajar..That was seven years ago and it still
hurts sometimes but a guitar picker knows a lot about whistling past the
grave yard..So,I do that a lot but don't we all.?

From: Ron Grayson
Subject: REFLECTIONS
Date: Monday, May 28, 2001 5:25 AM

C H A P T E R NO..8
 In the 1960s, in Thailand about 85% of Young Women were licensed Female
Entertainers..A few were Bar Singers or Actresses but most were legal
and taxed Prostitutes..The three professions were considered all the
same in the eyes of the Thai Government.Their careers were short and
they were past their prime at about 35 just when they were starting to
enjoy their work ..Some would marry American G.I.s (for better or
worse), a few were smart enough or ruthless enough to raise the money to
buy their own bar..I have also seen a few bright eyed ambitious girls
working their way through college like that and moving on to bigger and
better things but I suspect that most of them just went back to their
village and waded in the rice paddies until too much VD,cheap dope,too
many abortions and a hard life took them away from their loving
relatives in about 15 years.. If they lived to be fifty years old, then
they were lucky old Women.
I liked older Women because they were street smarter..She was 29,I was
22 and she saved me from danger more than once..I was living with a
Woman fresh from the farm but before that she was fresh from the bar and
had not been fresh since she was about 11 years old but she was still
pretty and well endowed for a Thai Lady in the "Dolly Parton"
department.. She  was a fine person in her heart and she was well liked
by other Women and by Men who liked Women and did not just tolerate
them..She had long black hair down to her waste and a smile like a pearl
 bracelet..She talked constantly with a sweet little voice
that sounded like singing and I enjoyed learning the language from
her..We spoke very little English in our little house and were the very
best of friends..Kipling wrote.."She was funny,yellow and faithful..A
Doll in a tea cup she were. We lived on the square like a true married
pair and I learned about Women from her".We were in her Country and I
let her call the shots and make the deals when I could..I have been
accused of  abuse by ex-wives but this girl had almost no protection
under the law but I never even had to consider any thing such as that..
Who but a fool would destroy an oasis of love in a Desert of hate and
pain.?.However, she had a temper and was good with a knife..She would
have killed me over another Woman in a minute..A lot of Thai women are
like that..Thai men are just as "slutty" as American men but have
learned to take advantage of the obvious social stratifications that
Thai Women live under. They are smart enough to cheat with Women of
several different social classes who will never meet each other..Men
have the run of the play ground (society) but the Ladies stay with their
peer groups most of the time..My Lady friend's name was Sungwein but
most Thais have a nick name...She wore "pig tails" some times and I
think that the "nick name" "Beea' meant braided hair..She was talking
about how American "flying machines" had nearly killed her when she was
5 years old and living in Kong-Thep-Apomaha-Nakon-Amon-Rotinigosen
(Bangkok)..The Thais are so proud of their Capitol city that it takes a
while for them to say the name but "Bangkok" works OK for me..I did not
believe every thing that she said because her vision of reality was
different from mine..She lived in a World of Spirits and took
precautions to be nice to them..She had red paper nailed up in three
corners of the bed room and various and sundry sacred objects laying
around..She had ran out of cigarettes and was smoking some of my "Prince
Albert" tobacco  in my "Sherlock Holmes" Pipe.. She said "me mock Kohn
Hippun'' (There were lots of Japanese)..Aoplane go boom,boom..I run
scared to Mama..No could drink water...Chan dek,dek Pooying ayu ha
pee.She said."I was a young child of five years"..The years have gone by
and I now know the event that she was trying to tell me about but it
took me 30 years to find it out..There was only one day in History when
Uncle Sam bombed Bangkok Thailand..On November 27,1944 the Japs were in
the city and B-29s of the Army Air Corps tried to bomb them out on just
that one day..My girl friend had been caught in the raid..On November
27,1944 on the other side of the Ocean and in the Watkins Memorial
Hospital in Quitman,Mississippi..Mrs. Milo Barrett Crisby Crane Senior
aka..Lucelle, was giving birth, as the bombs were falling, to twin girls
with no middle names just the names of Theola and Leola but GOD saw it
all and saw his face reflected in the Sea. He marvelled that he had
created us in his own image and sent some more angels to watch over
me..Theola,my wife and Leola my friend and the old man looking out of
the mirror..I still wonder who he is and do not completely understand
what he has become,where he has been or where he will go..However, I can
tell you for sure that this World is for REAL and a Mighty Big old Place
where people do bad things to each other and play crazy,
dangerous,little games but in the end they are mostly only Human..END