 I want to tell you about a couple of guys who made DAV, a particularly special community to me. Just over a half a century ago, three young soldiers were called to war. I was one of them. The other two were Chad Collie and Jim Sersley. Jim was an athlete and, to be honest, a bit of a hellion from Rochester, Minnesota. He saw a billboard in his hometown that said, Uncle Sam needs you. Three months later, he was in the Army. Bootcamp hadn't challenged him physically and track vehicle training was a breeze. His biggest problem in the Army was that he wasn't what you would call a good garrison soldier. So he volunteered to go to Vietnam. He arrived in March 1968, a month after the Ted offensive as casualties were peaking. When he arrived in country, he found out his job in the military had changed. Son, his first sergeant told him, we don't actually have a motor pool, but we're going to get you a toolbox. You'll be a machine gunner in the third platoon. Chad took a different route. He joined the Army after running track and playing football in college. He was a very special leader. As a young officer with 101st Airborne Division, he arrived in Vietnam in 1967 and found himself promoted from platoon to company commander in just six months. He was a rising star who would, many would have guessed, become a general one day. And my route from Vietnam was completely different. I had tried college, but I took a break just before I graduated. I got married and at just 19 years old had a son. But just as my new family had started, I received a very nice letter from the local draft board. They must have thought very highly of me because they placed me in a very special category. They called 1A. It was then that I found out that a student deferment was something you only get one time. I'd already played that card. Goodbye, Herr, hello, Army. I started basic training in December of 1968, finished infantry training and was shipped off to Vietnam by the end of May. You might guess from looking at me that didn't turn out so great. On patrol in the Mekong Delta, I lost three limbs as a result of a landmine explosion. A part of my war was over, but as many of you know, a new fight had begun. Going back to Jim, Army life and away from the barracks suited him. After seeing fierce combat against the Viet Cong and the NVA, he was promoted twice in just 10 months. With just weeks left before the end of his tour, he was setting up a claymore mine for a night operation when he triggered a landmine. The blast dramatically amputated three of his limbs. The force and flame of the explosion were so intense that they cauterized his wounds. He didn't even need a tourniquet. His proximity to the blast probably saved his life. It took 30 days for Jim to regain enough consciousness to even realize what he lost. When his mother was able to make it to Fitzsimmons Hospital in Colorado, she walked right past him. She couldn't even recognize him after all he had endured. Meanwhile, Chad was leading his company in July of that same year when he stepped on a landmine in a Vietnamese village. As was the case for Jim and I, the blast ultimately took his legs at arm. He had earned the silver and bronze stars for heroism in combat. In 2014, Chad reflected on his injuries with gratitude. Life is so rewarding. When you give yourself the opportunity to have success, don't let what happen be the anchor that you gotta drag around for the rest of your life. When you consider the nature of my mother's and the fact that I survived, I mean, I was that close right up against this veil. They all said, fail. Between here and here after, I saw many men put in a body bag that she could have covered the wound with a quarter. So do I feel blessed? You better believe it. Wow. We three made our way back to the states to face surgeries and uncertainty. It was a different time. There was no Americans with Disabilities Act. The world was a much less accommodating place. In 1976, I met Donna, who would go on to become my wife of the last 40 years. I felt whole again for the first time since the war. We, each of us, tried to move on. I met Chad in 1980 when we both served as national line officers for DAV. Because we had similar disabilities, we became known as bookends. Chad was a pioneering athlete in winter sports. After serving as national commander, he represented the U.S. in the 1992 Paralympics in France and won two gold medals. He was DAV's longtime national disabled veteran's winter sports clinic chair. He and his wife, Betty Ann, held workshops with recently injured veteran couples to share their experiences and offer advice on relationships and living. Chad excelled in real estate and remained a lifelong advocate for disabled veterans. And while he was able to convince me to try out one of his sit skis, an experimental sit skis in Austria in the 80s, one thing he never could convince me to do was fly with him in his private plane. I met Jim in 1991 at an Orlando Magic basketball game. He was in the handicapped area across the court. I thought, this guy has to be a veteran. After the game, I introduced myself and I asked, did you lose your limbs and gnom? He told me instead, he had been involved in a tragic tricycle accident when he was two. That was the start of a lifelong friendship. We hunted together and developed so many different ways to joke about our disabilities that people really weren't sure how to take us. Jim didn't use a power chair, so if we were going to lunch at an event like this, he'd grab onto the back of my chair seat and we'd get around. If someone saw him, he'd say, shh, he doesn't know I'm back here. Jim had returned to the States and tried to make a go of life in Minnesota. But the winters and the lack of accessibility brought him to Florida. Like Chad, he went into real estate. He married his lovely wife, Jeannie. He had four children, 12 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. He was a complete success and a leader in every sense. Until the pandemic, we were three. Three soldiers, three triple amputees injured in the same war in the same year. Three with many of the same challenges and a shared desire to make life better for our fellow veterans and their families. Three past disabled veterans of the year and former national commanders. We were a community within the DAV community. We were never alone because even though we lived apart, we knew we had each other. Then came the pandemic. Though COVID-19 didn't take Chad's life, it took him away from us for the time that he had left. After 53 years of marriage, Betty Ann, his children and grandchildren bid him farewell at the end of January. Jim had just completed the grand slam of turkey hunting. He was staying with his son, Dax, in Montana when he fell ill. While the Viet Cong couldn't stop him, this terrible, insidious, microscopic virus took everything he had. These are not the only people that we lost since the last time we were here. They're not even the only past national commanders. Larry Paulzine and other Vietnam-era veteran past and Craig Johnnican, Donna Tanner, Lucille McCarthy, Marybeth Schultz and Maureen Peterson, all past national commanders are no longer with us. And all of us here can think of a loved one we lost too soon or the separation that made a difficult time worse. And yet here we are. While this pandemic has taken much away, we have a lot left. And that is what we're here to celebrate. Just before the pandemic, I reconnected with someone I hadn't seen since I was in Vietnam. Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce you to my friend, Doc Hayes. I was serving with the 9th Infantry Division in the Mekong Delta in South Vietnam. We were out on a mission and I tripped a land mine and the explosion costed the loss of both of my legs above the knee and my left arm. I never lost consciousness when this happened. So I knew everything that was going on and without Doc and the sergeant probably wouldn't be here today. Yeah, I thought about him a lot through the years. I wonder how he was doing and what he was doing and mother, you know, had done anything other than just sitting in a wheelchair with life. I just want the opportunity to get with Doc. First, I want to thank him. Secondly, it was just a part of me that kind of wants to apologize to him for what I put him through that day. And I know it wasn't my fault, but that's just something inside of me that I'm sure he's had a vivid memory for a lot of years for as bad as I was wounded. I can still picture that day, but it's going to be there for the rest of my life. It's very restless last night, thinking about it all night long. What do I want to say? How do I want to say it? Could I ever thank him enough? Hey, brother. Thank you, thank you. Oh, you're welcome. I was afraid I'd be starting to be like, hey, I'm not reliving a lot of those experiences. I didn't, you know, how I'm not going to react to that. But I would say now, reach out to him. I'm glad you did. Glad I did. Reconnecting with Doc before this national tragedy struck reminds me of the mercy of our creator. Doc is a life member of the DAV, and he's joined us here today, Doc. Without this man, I wouldn't be here today. Thank you, brother. While we can never fully replace what is taken from us, our DAV gives us a common calling, a shared mission. We honor our fallen by participating in our community. We remember their contributions by serving the cause that inspired them to greatness.