David Leighton:  

What a ride its been. Not too many dull moments for this kid. Middle of 3 children. Played music my whole life which has taken me all over the place. Out of high school joined the United States Air Force on delayed enlistment, slated to become a radio and radar repairman just like my dear old dad...well, while at Lackland doing basic training a recruiter asked if anyone in the room wanted to make more money and I jumped up and said I do before I even knew what was entailed! I only had to run 10 or more miles each day and blow stuff up, parachute out of aircraft, scuba dive, rappel out of choppers and climb mountains but first I had to successfully graduate from Air traffic control school. I thought okay I can do that! Failure was not an option because if you failed one segment of Air Traffic Control school you were placed in the carrer field they had the hardest time finding willing personnel. This unfortunate situation was known as N.O.E. Because you were trained as a cook and said 'next on eggs' for the next 3 years! Once I completed these programs and half a dozen others. I earned my red beret and became one of the silent professionals known as Combat Controllers. I was now an FAA certified Controller that was capable of being deployed literally anywhere in the world at a moments notice. This field is now combined with all branches of the military's elite forces and known as Special Operations. I wont bore you with all my war stories. (Unless you want to hear them) I had so much pride and I absolutely loved my new career path which I had chosen on a whim (for the money) and excelled at every challenge that came to me. I was able to travel and see most of the world doing what I loved. If I had to do it all over again I would make the same choice. My class called 81-4. (So named for our scheduled graduation date) started with around 200 students like me and in the end 14 of us graduated and myself and 7 others were the only ones that never failed one single segment of training. After I exited the service I really didn't know where I wanted to go and what i wanted to do. I knew there wasn't much call for someone with my specialty skillset. Besides being a mercenary! I did seriously think about...Expand for more