Lost My Best Friend

[glennbad]

Sad to lose a friend like that. It looks like he had some amazing artistic talent.

Glenn

[RobesonsRme.com]

I'm not sure anybody else will visit this thread, it seems to have run its course, but I'm going to post a photo I took of Greg and three other young Special Forces Soldiers at Canyon Lake, just north of San Antonio in the summer of 1968, while we were doing the second phase of our SF Medic training.

Greg is on the right, tee shirt, cigarette and sunglasses. The others (r-l) are Steve Zimmer from Kansas, Tom Ventura from Ohio and Wil Koehler from Menlo Park, California. Wil was another very close friend. He was killed in Viet Nam in late 1969.

As you might guess, Greg was a bit in his cups. There was a lot of Lone Star beer consumed that week-end.

The night after this photo was made, we all turned in very late. We were camping with our Army sleeping bags, etc. Greg went to sleep atop a concrete picnic table, mounted on a large concrete slab, with permanently affixed concrete benches on either side. The table was about ten or twelve feet from the edge of the perimeter road that went around the lake. I went to sleep in my bag, on the slab, under the table.

The following morning, a very sunny Sunday with families arriving for a day on the lake, I awoke to the blaring of a car horn as it rounded the curve next to our campsite. A few minutes later, another car passed, again blowing their horn repeatedly. After a third car did the same, I got up to see what it was all about and found Greg, his sleeping bag completely unzipped and draped over the edges of the table, flat on his back, arms and legs spread out to the sides, completely and totally naked and in all his blond haired Swedish glory.

That was Greg. Fun times.

Thanks for listening.

Charlie Noyes

[tjmurphy]

That picture looks exactly like some of the ones we took a Belton Lake at Ft. Hood, TX. Funny how all GI's look alike. We'd swipe steaks from the mess hall and go to the lake for a beer party

[tjmurphy]

Here's the only pic I could find of some of us at Belton Lake. Sadly I can't remember any of their names. That's me front center.

[RobesonsRme.com]

My, how you've changed TJ.

Charlie Noyes

[tjmurphy]

My, how you've changed TJ.

Charlie Noyes

Yeppers!! When I was drafted at 19, I weighed 100 pounds in my skivvies, and had all my hair, with color I might add.

[TripleF]

Deepest sympathies Charlie.

[RobesonsRme.com]

Today is November 5th. Greg has been gone for a year, today, but I've only been aware of it for about a month.

It's taking some getting use to, imagining the world without him in it.

Thanks for all your kind thoughts.

Rest easy, Greg.

Charlie Noyes