From the outset, the voice of Cal Meddigo draws you into his world and time. The time period is the early years of the Cold War era, when Cal is a young man. Attempting to escape the inevitable event of his day, conscripted military service, Cal runs dead on into it and the early days of the Vietnam War. This heartfelt coming-of-age novel follows Calas journey from his hardscrabble but happy childhood in small-town Texas to the Kansas plains. He recounts hilarious episodes from his childhood and disappointments from his young adulthood. The bookas strength is its great wounded but hopeful heart and the individual insight it provides to some of the great historical events of the era, such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, the assassination of JFK, the Vietnam battle in the Ia Drang Valley, and the dividing of a nation. It is a bittersweet story of love gained and lost, and of honor gained and lost.