In April of 1987 I left my new, blushing bride, and headed off to my new assignment in Bangor Maine Many of you know that I was out of the Air Force for 15 months. In that time I worked at Zondervan Family Bookstore and went to Columbia Bible College. When Becky and I decided to get married we figured that if I could get back into the Air Force things might go smoother for us. I don't know if you know this, but the active duty Air Force doesn't take people back in any more! I am one of the last people in history that you'll ever hear of that snuck back in. For four months we were separated until Becky was able to gerce out of the Air Force. When she got out she came up and we got into base housing.
Bangor Maine1987-1989 Maine was a great place. We used to take drives along the coast And I used to eat lots and lots of lobster. I say, "I". Becky wouldn't have anything to do with eating a lobster. Now, you just can't eat a lobster by yourself. Why? Well, because eating a whole lobster involves a certain amount of violence. First, you have to pick the lobster up and break off one off its arms. Then grab it's tail and break it in half. (Water and lobster juices usually go shooting about at this stage. That's why they give you a bib. Too bad they don't give one to the people watching). After a while of man handling and abusing this lobster, you stop and look around at all the horrified looks on the other peoples faces. Y'see, this is why lobster isn't a kosher food. It's "unclean". HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...........................Whew.......... "unclean"....Oh, that's funny. For church, we went to the chapel. We tried going to a Baptist church down town but got discouraged when, after four months of going there, someone came up to us and said, "Glad you could visit our church." Ticked me off is what it did. My job in Maine was not a very good one so I tried several tricks to get myself out of there. What I did was volunteer for a remote. And in 1989 I got sent, unaccompanied, to Iceland.
The Job I Had In Maine I worked at the 776 Radar Squadron. It was the Over The Horizon Backscatter (OTH-B) radar system. It was a radar system that bounced it's radar energy of the ionosphere and so it had a really long range. How long? Very long.
And so, July 12 1989, I left Becky alone at the house in Bangor and left for Iceland.