Senior officers, fellow chiefs and enlisted
personnel, family and friends..... First, I want you to know how much it means
to me to have you present here to help say THANK YOU to the individuals who
made my twenty year career a success. Some of those people are here today, but
others could not make it.
For those who know me well, you know that I
am not much on formalities. You know I
am much more comfortable in a pair of jeans, tee-shirts, sneakers and
ballcaps. If I get emotional, please
bear with me, this is one of the toughest things I have ever done. I got choked up at Chuck' retirement
ceremony and all I did there was be the Master of Ceremony.
A friend of mine sent me this via email just
a couple of days ago--It is wise wisdom and I hope to be able to follow it
today..... . Stand up straight,
speak clearly, and mind your manners. Remember now "Pretty is as
pretty does." Grandma
As we all know, protection of the freedoms we
hold near and dear sometimes means the loss of life in that effort....I'd
like to have a moment of silence to recognize those individuals who have given
their life in protection of those freedoms so we could be here today....
Thank you
Where does one start to replay the events of
twenty years gone by? How does an
individual recognize all the people that have made them into what they are
today? I must try to do that now. I am sure I will miss someone, if I do, I
apologize, but here goes....
To my darling wife, son and daughter.. Words
will never be able to express the love I hold for you.
To my parents, in-laws, and other family
members......Your advice was always sound, and you graciously allowed me the
freedom to find that out for myself.
For friends of the last twenty years... the
closest of which are here today....I would have never gotten to this point
without your help along the way.
Friendship is something I hold near and dear, I'd much rather have a few
close friends than a thousand fair-weather friends.
Coworkers-I have always tried to work
with, not for or against people. For
those in the other departments here at FTSCLANT that I have interacted with, I
hope that principle was evident each time we worked together. I know of no product or service this command
creates that does not require teamwork.
________________________________________________________________________
Gifts for Cindy Davis, Phil
Graziano, and the Prosoft contractor bunch
A wise man once said" The only
thing constant is change itself" Today
is about change...
________________________________________________________________________
Gifts for Chris
and Katie
_____________________________________________________________
Changes in
the Navy...
Many good, some not so good...600 ship Navy to one of just over 330.... To survive and prosper in the upcoming changes in the Navy-- we must get smarter, more focused on the mission and how we accomplish that mission. The need for teamwork will become even more obvious. Blind faith will no longer be a way of doing business and personal character will be even more important. With that thought - I pass the words of Abraham Lincoln along to you:
"I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound
to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with
anybody that stands right, stand with him while he is right, and part with him
when he goes wrong."
Changes in Society as a whole:
1981-Reagan nominates Judge Sandra Day O'Connor, 51,
of Arizona, as first woman on US Supreme Court (July
7).
AIDS is first
identified.
1982 E.T. – the Extra-Terrestrial,
1983-Terrorist explosion kills 237 US Marines in Beirut (Oct. 23).
With the introduction of
noise-free compact discs,
the vinyl record begins a steep decline.
More than 125 million viewers tune
in to the last episode of M*A*S*H.
1984- Reagan orders US Marines withdrawn
from Beirut
international peacekeeping force (Feb. 7).
1985- Arthur James Walker, 50,
retired naval officer, convicted by federal judge of participating in Soviet
spy ring operated by his brother, John Walker (Aug. 9).
"New" Coke is poorly
received, and the company soon reintroduces the original, "Classic"
beverage
1986- Space shuttle Challenger
explodes after launch at Cape Canaveral, Fla.,
killing all seven aboard (Jan. 28).
1987-Iraqi missiles kill 37
in attack on US frigate Stark in Persian Gulf (May 17);
Iraqi president Hussein
apologizes (May 18).
Prozac released for use in US
1988-Pan-Am 747 explodes from terrorist bomb and
crashes in Lockerbie,
Scotland, killing all 259 aboard and 11 on ground (Dec. 21).
Rain Man, Mississippi Burning
1989-After
28 years, Berlin Wall
is open to West (Nov. 11).
1990-Iraqi troops invade Kuwait, setting off the Persian Gulf War (Aug. 2
et seq.). East and West Germany
reunited
1991-Cease-fire
ends Persian Gulf War (April 3); UN forces are victorious.
The
Silence of the Lambs,
1992-Gopher, the first user-friendly
internet interface, is created at the University of Minnesota and named after
the school mascot.
US forces
leave Philippines,
ending nearly a century of American military presence (Nov. 24).
Johnny Carson hosts The
Tonight Show for the last time.
1993-Twenty-two
UN troops killed in Somalia
(June 5).
First
humans cloned.
1994-ER
and Friends debut on NBC, establishing NBC's dominance of the
Thursday-night lineup.
1995-Sores
killed as terrorist's car bomb blows up block-long Oklahoma City federal
building
1996-Approximately
45 million people are using the Internet,
1997-Titanic
1998-Europeans agree on single
currency, the euro
An
estimated 76 million viewers watch the last episode of Seinfeld.
77-year-old
Senator John Glenn,
the first American to orbit the earth, returns to orbit in the space shuttle Discovery
(Oct. 29).
1999-War erupts in Kosovo after
Yugoslavia's president Slobodan
Milosevic clamps down on the province, massacring and deporting ethnic
Albanians. NATO begins Operation Allied
Force on March 24, 1999,
The world
awaits the consequences of the Y2K bug, with more drastic
millennial theorists warning of Armageddon.
number of
Internet users worldwide reaches 150 million by the beginning of 1999.
With all those
thoughts in mind, today I must change, from active duty to retired Navy. With the closing of this ceremony, I will
transit into a new dimension of my life...that of civilian. My twenty year Navy career has changed me
forever. If I were to be asked what
the one single most important principle the Navy has taught me- It would be the
principle of decision making. The right to make our own decisions as a society
and individuals can never be taken lightly.
You must only do one thing in your life-- Live by the consequences of
your decisions.
I searched and searched for the words to close these remarks with- I leave you with the words of the philospher Machavelli....
"There
is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more
uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new
order of things."
—
Niccolo Machiavelli
The Prince (1532)
Thank you.