I woke up this morning thinking about “Dove” after another restless night of PTSD compounded by an aching hip.

That’s odd since I hadn’t thought of him in years; perhaps, it was the death of “Dr. T” that brought him to mind.

“Dove” was the guy in front of me in line when I went for my Reserve Officers’ Training Corps physical on September first, 1968.

At six foot six and 275 pounds, with a distinctive smile and laugh, and a shock of the most unruly hair, he was formidable and intimidating, the type of guy you would want to cover your six when he was serious about stuff.

I would find out later he was as funny as a horny squirrel, one with an incredible talent.

He also was like me, wondering what the hell we got ourselves into.

Captain Mallard, regular Army moved the line along. The Captain was a Texan, served two tours in-country, and somehow ended up under the command of Colonel Birdsong. He got his gold leaf before leaving for his final tour in Germany, where he died in a truck crash doing what he loved racing a backroad with a fellow officer.

Passing a physical for Reserved Officers’ Training in the 1960s in Kentucky was not a big deal; if you got two-eyes, you could march or at least walk and breathe you’re “in like Flint” want to be or not.

Every non-disabled male would spend two years playing Army games ostensibly to develop into a “leader.”

It was part of signing up to go to a state University in those days.

Now, “Dove” was not his given name. It was much more dignified; Fredrick something or another, but he came to be known by the fast little avian within weeks after we met.

September first is the opening day of the dove season, and in Kentucky, that’s akin to a religious holiday much like April twenty-sixth.

I am not a dove hunter, which means I might take a dove or two out of a box of 25 shells; however, I can grill ‘em and eat those juicy breasts with a side of my Momma’s potato salad alongside an ice-cold Stroh’s any time they are offered up.

Thus, Fredrick and I became close friends. I had the contacts to get on a dove field, and little did I know Fredrick was an incredible shot, who made us boys more beer money than penny poker in a blind fellow’s dorm room but not because he could kill doves with a shotgun.

Fredrick was on the University Rifle Team on scholarship. He even let me shoot his Winchester M1-Garand several times on the range below the Field House. I felt honored.

He said one day, as he and I, George, Tom, and Adam watched, well Adam couldn’t watch he was blind, so Adam listened to “All My Children” in the fourth-floor study-TV room, “You interested in making a little money this weekend?”

Ears perked when such questions were asked. What 18-year old college kid didn’t want to make money?

Always being the one to double-check such propositions as some could be questionable, “Is it legal?”

“Yep,” he said in an authentic Southern Sheriff drawl minus the toothpick, “I can shoot doves with a .22 rifle. You call ‘em out, and I take them down.”

We all sighed; bragging is one thing, but shooting birds that can dip and dive at speeds akin to a Martin B-57B with a .22 rifle shell, which by the way is illegal, well that’s kind of as they say, “beyond the pale and we thought impossible.”

“You do know that is illegal?”

He took a toothpick from his shirt pocket and hadn’t taken up dipping yet, “Yep, but then again, it only takes a couple of shots, then we collect the money and go back being within the law.”

My dorm in those days was the “jock dorm,” don’t even ask me how I, Tom, and Adam got there and jocks; well, they will bet on almost anything.

And, thus, I being the one person they, the jocks, mostly trusted since some heard I was gonna become a preacher (never happened), gathered the two-dollar bets.

Now, two dollars might not sound much to you reading these days, but in 1968 it would buy at Mario’s next door two sub sandwiches, side orders of fries, and extra-large drinks so you and your date could “eat high on that hawg” before the movie with popcorn and drinks.

Forty dollars later, including Captain Mallard’s contribution, we went to the dove field the following Saturday. The jocks came along to keep everyone honest, as did the Captain. The agreement was three shells, and Fredrick had to hit two out of three doves.

Need I say more, Fredrick was forever known afterward as “Dove.”

Dove would be a First Lieutenant and serve his country well. He died in 1973, I am told, somewhere in-country, shortly before the fall of Saigon.

Years ago, on an Honor Air Tour, I and the Marine Sargeant I was escorting went to The Wall. I left two .22 shell casings; he only needed two after all.

Semper fi Dove. Semper fi.