Going along with yesterday's US Navy post - I have been a member of the VFW, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Old Settlers Post 4659 in Disco, Michigan since February 2018.
When I was thinking of joining some sort of veteran's organization, my brother who retired from the Air Force suggested AmVets, which is open to all veterans. I looked into it, but saw they stick their female vets in the auxiliary with the family members. Um no. I don't feel that's a good combination.
I looked into the American Legion, and while I see a lot of females on their website, it was hard to find info for us specifically. And while I spoke to a lady (a former Marine) from the local Legion at a blood drive who invited me to come visit / to join - I wasn't feeling it.
For some reason, it just felt right when I looked into the VFW. Back many moons ago, when Spawn was in Girl Scouts in elementary school and I was one of her leaders, we took the troop to this very same post for Veteran's Day. I had a nice chat with the commander at the time and he suggested then that I should join. But all I knew about any of these places was based on my grandparents who only went to "the Legion" to drink & play bingo.
I was made to feel welcome as soon I walked in to meet the guy in charge of membership. I could tell he was very proud of the post as he showed me around. So yeah. I started out with a one year membership, but this February upgraded to a life membership. And there's only one other female who attends meetings with any regularity.
Ya know, hearing about things that happened in Vietnam, Korea or even WWII on TV or newspapers is NOT the same as hearing it directly from someone who was there. Every time I go to a meeting, I'm in awe of being in the company of these gentlemen who have experienced things that I cannot imagine. I may qualify to be a member under a couple different bullets on the VFW eligibility list but my time in was cake compared to these guys who saw real close-up combat.
There is a WWII vet who still comes to meetings and when we all stayed after the last meeting of the year in December to have a drink to celebrate, I purposely sat by him. I was expecting him to be casually sipping on scotch or whiskey or something totally bad ass. Nope. He had a nice white zinfandel! But he is an absolutely adorable old man.
Last August, we got a M-60 tank in front of the post!
I was really entertained when I heard a couple guys wondering if it still had a drivetrain and them looking at each other with raised eyebrows and winks. But thankfully it is no longer driveable so nobody could take it out for a joyride, for old times sake.
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