Today was Mary's first day at her new job. This brought me to go shopping for ingredients to make some homemade Potato Soup for dinner when she gets home. So off we go (Gunny & I) to the local market. After walking about the store getting what I need and then some, we went to the check out lanes. As we approached them, a fellow about my age stopped us to comment on Gunny's dress blues. He stated that he had been a Marine during the Vietnam war, to which I stated that so had I, and so began the ritual so familiar to brother Marines.
We proceeded to recount our lineage and lo and behold, he named himself a member of D 1/4, 3rd Mar Div. during his tour of duty. Now for those of you unfamiliar with my lineage, I was a member of D 1/4 during my tour of duty. This brought us to commence talking about when we had been with the unit. And once again, our stories coincided, we had indeed served at the same time. I did not recognize the fellow and he did not recognize me, so we proceeded to question who we knew in the unit and where we had been in country. We came up short for the most part, with but a few names in common. We agreed to exchange phone numbers so that we might talk at further length about our experiences. He wrote his name & number on a scrap of paper and handed it to me. Upon looking at the unique name he had written down, 'Phillip Morris', I was stunned, for he was none other than 'Cigarette', as we had called him because of his surname, one of my closest buddies in The Nam!!!
I immediately hugged him as I would a lost brother, for that was what he was, a long lost brother. The last time I had seen him was when I was rotating home from 'The Rock' (Okinawa) as my tour of duty had ended in mid January 1970. We spoke for some 10-15 minutes, agreeing that we had a lot of lost time to make up. I advised him that I would be looking him up upon my return from California. I advised him of The Few Good Men and invited him to look us up and check out our extensive collection of Vietnam pics, including mine, which he has never seen. Hopefully we will get to see some of his as well. When Mary gets home I will be uploading a few pics in this thread, which will feature a young buck we called 'Cigarette'.
We proceeded to recount our lineage and lo and behold, he named himself a member of D 1/4, 3rd Mar Div. during his tour of duty. Now for those of you unfamiliar with my lineage, I was a member of D 1/4 during my tour of duty. This brought us to commence talking about when we had been with the unit. And once again, our stories coincided, we had indeed served at the same time. I did not recognize the fellow and he did not recognize me, so we proceeded to question who we knew in the unit and where we had been in country. We came up short for the most part, with but a few names in common. We agreed to exchange phone numbers so that we might talk at further length about our experiences. He wrote his name & number on a scrap of paper and handed it to me. Upon looking at the unique name he had written down, 'Phillip Morris', I was stunned, for he was none other than 'Cigarette', as we had called him because of his surname, one of my closest buddies in The Nam!!!
I immediately hugged him as I would a lost brother, for that was what he was, a long lost brother. The last time I had seen him was when I was rotating home from 'The Rock' (Okinawa) as my tour of duty had ended in mid January 1970. We spoke for some 10-15 minutes, agreeing that we had a lot of lost time to make up. I advised him that I would be looking him up upon my return from California. I advised him of The Few Good Men and invited him to look us up and check out our extensive collection of Vietnam pics, including mine, which he has never seen. Hopefully we will get to see some of his as well. When Mary gets home I will be uploading a few pics in this thread, which will feature a young buck we called 'Cigarette'.
Last edited:
