Before leaving to join the 198^th Light Infantry Brigade in Viet Nam, I talked with my godfather, Bob Zelina. Uncle Bob had been a tanker in The Good One and gave the most succinct and best advice: “If you get a chance to drink a cold beer, kid, drink it.”

He knew far better than I that war is a game of deadly chance and that waking up in the morning doesn’t guarantee you’ll be breathing by day’s end.