Naha AFB, Okinawa, Japan, 1970… This time line is starting to get clearer, but I still have some more to recover in that time line…

Our leaving Japan, never set well in my memory… I know this much…

We stayed in this hotel for several months and my brother who’s birthday is in December, mom made a cake in that electric skillet… Sis and I had a room down the hall, our first taste of independence…

I labeled these pictures so long ago before I boxed them up, not sure the year is correct, but we have some clues that it is…

Riots happened outside Kadena AFB, back in 1970 I think it was called the KOZA riots… They happened before we got there, so, I am really struggling with the time line, which means, we got there either right after those riots or??? Hopefully, something will jive and make sense on the time line…

Okay now that I have you thoroughly confused, because I almost forgot why the write… had to look at the title and remembered, I was telling Homer about this and knew I should document it!!!

So we are on Okinawa and in base housing and I joined a junior league, actually a good bowler, I missed a 300 by one spare in the 10th frame and it’s documented at Yokota AFB bowling alley, that’s another story from the 80’s…

That saturday morning I get up, put shorts on, it’s summer and hot and humid and I head for my morning league… As I approach the front door Don and Freda are arguing and I knew, if I left and they got into a fight, the baby that wasn’t Don’s could be in trouble and yea… I REMEMBERED!!! That’s the memories that hit me the other day…

So, like I usually do, since brother Larry is no longer living with us, I stand up and put a stop to the fight by saying what Don doesn’t want to hear and the next thing I know…

Yep, stupid knocked me across the room… all 110 pounds of my 17 year old body went flying through the air like I had wings and those wheels were my knees…

As I stood up after that blow I walked up to that 6′ 4″ 280 pound man and stared up at him as I wiped the blood from my face and said….

“You ever touch me again and you are a dead man”… I turned and walked out the door as I was leaving Freda said…

“Don you shouldn’t have done that”… and I looked at her and smiled, she knew…

I owned them.!!!

I owned them for Texas and that near death and Don getting locked up, I owned them for the stroke on Japan a year later and now… He just laid his hands on me for the last time at 17 and his Air Force career was now in my hands!!!!

I get to the bowling alley and these guys are waiting for me and oh my, yea, I am smiling…

These were the best buddies and big brothers and dates a girl could have on Okinawa and they are the ones that gave me my nickname, “Maggi”…

So I walk in the bowling alley and they are sitting there waiting for me and they take a look at my face, then there eyes travel to my legs and they stand up and demand what happened and I told them Don did what he did and they knew where the house was and out the door they headed my marines, to save the day… Yea, I am laughing… We were so young…

After I calmed them down they settled in to watch me bowl and shoot the bull shit we all did, during Vietnam…

After a while Don walks in the alley and I tell the guys to take off, I didn’t want anyone in jail that day… and Don is carrying a brand new suitcase with makeup bag, back in 71, it was a nice samsonite set… and I knew… He wanted me off the island and I owned him and Freda…

I couldn’t quit grinning the whole time Don went on about how sorry he was and how it would never happen again and I was thinking, I lived in that home 17 years and all of a sudden no more violence, yea… bible thumper dijour!!!

So I send my dad home with the suitcases and the guys come back to watch me bowl and things that go down next… Lets just say… Maggi no longer followed rules…

I remember…

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