<p>Also taking this thread off, but still a little bit on course, I wanted to say this:</p>
<p>As you can see from the last 3 posts, these are our friends from way long ago.</p>
<p>We have known Kyle4578 since 1990. Bullet and Papa flew the same jet in the UK, Their children were born the same time as ours, however we really didn’t know them until many yrs later in the strike community. I can always thank them for giving me the chicken pox for a christmas present LOL. We have not seen ea other for @ 7 yrs, christmas cards are exchanged, okay they send them and then I call to say I got it…I s*ck at mail (another good reason DS isn’t going to the AFA, he probably would be the only cadet with no mail 
!</p>
<p>Anyway, back to my point the AF is a small community and you will make friends that truly will last a lifetime, it will not be just those you make on your journey to a commissioning. Papa is an AFA grad, Bullet as we all know is ROTC. Once you enter the actiive duty world, the commissioning source doesn’t make a difference to the friendships you make, if it did 4 of my dear friends would not be my friends (Peggy is the spouse of an 81, my closest friends hubby is 81, Papa is 86/87 (don’t remember) and Bruno is 84) We also have a lot of ROTC friends, but these are the ones I still keep in touch with.</p>
<p>Also realize ea. and every one of us took a different path. Papa left us many yrs ago to fly in the other world, Peggy’s DH just retired ly (stayed for 15 more yrs after becoming DNIF), my best frend left at exactly 20 yrs to fly for SW, thus Bruno and Bullet are the lone airmen!</p>
<p>Your best years are just starting now and remember to make sure that you only use pencil in your address book ;)</p>