One night, I fell asleep before sundown and when I was awakened for my turn on watch, I couldn't believe my eyes. All of the decaying leaves on the jungle floor were glowing like a bed of hot green coals due to the phosphorous in them. It was truly amazing, the glow was bright enough to see by on this moonless night. The last night of this patrol was miserable. It poured rain all night, so hard that it roared, you couldn't hear any of the night noises or the enemy, if they were there, that was dangerous.
Time is evenly divided in the bush, into day and night.
The bush is the closest thing to reality that you can get in a gargoyle infested nightmare like Vietnam. The most beautiful sight in the world is the flaring of a helicopter coming in for a landing to pick you up. Accompanying that sight is the WHAP, WHAP sound of the helicopter blades, their concussion beating your body into an adrenaline rush in the frenzied and terror ridden seconds of boarding and the beginning of flight out of danger. But, not this time, not today, today we win. Copyright 1995 Robert Baird.