LIFELONG LEARNING? WHEN DOES IT END

Lifelong learning is a goal, or should be a goal.

Do it right and you’ll always have a motherlode of regret:

“If I only knew then what I know now.”

Call it what it is: continuing education. And it’s never over.

I’m a fan of leadership; what makes a leader and who do they lead.

My Dad had a pretty good idea on the topic from serving in the Marine Corps and going to Korea in 1950:

 

The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star to Corporal Wayne B. Gillaspie (MCSN: 1132710), United States Marine Corps, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity while serving as a Fire Team Leader of Company B, First Battalion, Seventh Marines, FIRST Marine Division (Reinforced), in action against enemy aggressor forces in Korea on 11 September 1951.

Participating in the attack against heavily defended enemy hill positions when his squad was subjected to sudden and intense hostile small arms, automatic weapons and mortar fire, inflicting several casualties, including the squad leader who had to be evacuated at once, Corporal Gillespie bravely moved from man to man through the fire-swept area to assume command of the unit.

Reorganizing the squad, he skillfully led an assault to overrun the first objective and, after evacuating several wounded men, directed a final devastating attack to completely rout the enemy.

By his outstanding courage, inspiring leadership and stout-hearted devotion to duty, Corporal Gillaspie greatly aided the company in seizing its objective and upheld the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.

 

I read this and reflect on what the old man must have been thinking.

So I asked one time and he said, “I was young and dumb.”

That was it and no more. It was enough.

 

Learning About Valor

My wife has had the great misfortune of listening to dashing men tell her about their war time experiences.

One of them talked about writing letters to relatives of the men who died on patrols he led in Vietnam.

He showed her his dress uniform with all the extras he kept hanging in his closet.

She met one of the man’s adult sons and told him he should be very proud of his dad’s service.

Son: What service?

Wife: In Vietnam.

Son: He never went to Vietnam.

 

She told me all about it and all I came up with was disappointment.

Why would a guy invent that kind of shit? Because they can.

And they sell it hard. That’s their reality and who’s going to call them on it after an impassioned presentation?

And it never grows too old to repeat.

Recently some jackass has been promoting their own service with the idea or chasing women and sleeping with them was his own personal Vietnam.

In a previously unreported 1998 interview with Howard Stern, Donald Trump compared sex to going to battle in Vietnam and joked he should be getting the Congressional Medal of Honor.

 

I only bring this up since the former president decided to weigh in on the difference between the Medal of Honor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

. . . he went on to opine that the Medal of Freedom was “much better” than the military’s top award, because those awarded the latter are, in his words, “ … either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets or they’re dead.”

He continued by comparing Miriam to MoH recipients saying, “She gets it and she’s a healthy beautiful woman. They are rated equal.”

 

He’s a funny guy with a real sense of humor, but the VFW was not amused.

 

Lifelong Learning Intelligence 

I’ve always been insecure about education and continuing education.

I graduated college at thirty-nine, so there’s that.

No honors, no honors college, no GPA, just a persistent push to finish in 1991 what I’d started in 1973.

Was it fun? Sure, but not in a ‘let’s do it again’ kind of fun.

My classes were full of determined students willing to work for a better future.

One young woman liked to talk after class and walked me to my car once a week.

A lesser man would have made an attempt to do more. And she was worthy, just not for me.

Beautiful, smart, with time on her hands waiting for her real life to start.

She was a fun walk. We talked about lifelong learning.

Her plan was to be a news lady on television.

She had the essentials.

But why was she wasting time on me?

She wanted to learn the ropes, like how long it takes a guy to jump the rails and make a plan to meet her in a different place.

I didn’t tell her, but left many clues.

If a guy does this, he means that; if a guy says this, he means that.

How would I know?

I explained the idea of finding someone you could believe in, someone you could trust, someone like I found.

You don’t find them everyday, and you won’t find them in the dark on the Portland Park Blocks.

She wanted to be found, and soon.

Me: Most guys will be bowled over by your looks, then your smarts, then start wondering why someone like you is with them.

Her: Like you?

Me: The other side is the guy who knows if he starts anything, it won’t end well.

Her: How does it end?

Me: They want more, they deserve more, they need more, but more isn’t part of the deal.

Her: There’s a deal?

Me: If you’re with someone who makes you feel better than you’ve ever felt, you want to keep it up. Right?

Her: I think so.

Me: But the longer you’re with them, the feeling diminishes when they get remote and stop making time together.

Her: This happens?

Me: All the time. Then it turns into bitterness and revenge. You feel rejected, then you see them with someone else.

Her: Has this happened to you?

Me: More than once.

Her: What did you do?

Me: Not like we’re doing here.

Her: And what is that?

Me: If I was not married, didn’t have kids, didn’t have a girlfriend, and you turned up on my radar, things would have been different after our first walk to my car.

Her: Sounds good.

Me: This is the lifelong learning part: we all want something like companionship with the extras. Some guys just want the extras. A lot of women don’t understand how that can be possible when they’re beautiful, smart, and like to walk around at night.

Her: Like getting dumped?

Me: Getting dumped without cause. When you do everything right and it still goes wrong.

Her: Have you done that?

Me: I always had cause.

Her: Like what?

Me: Like leaving town.

Her: You’d move?

Me: I made plans to move whether I moved or not.

Her: Like a rolling stone.

Me: With no direction home.

Her: But not anymore.

Me: Nope, and I’m headed home now. See you next week.

Her: Good. I have a new dress.