Roommate lottery

Sometimes it seems that getting a good roommate while making a hospital can seem like your chances of winning the Lottery. Pay your buck take a shot.

I have seen many crazy roommates who lucked out with each other. The hard of hearing roommate who has the TV on 'full blast' with the patient with chronic migraines. The religious patient with a patient with interrupts the prayer of the other person's pastor to tell them to shut up. You just don't know.

I walk into Room 100 to visit Bill and Charlie in Beds A & C, respectfully. Both are dressed in their form fitting gowns with tie straps in the back. Bill and Charlie are fully engaged in conversation and I am interrupting...

"I am the chaplain here in the hospital. Anything I can do for you gentlemen?"

"Hi padre! Come on in! We just found out that we were both B-17 pilots during World War II. We were in different squadrons, but the good news we both made it home."

"Absolutely! That was a very dangerous job."

"In my squadron we started with a 119 crews and when it was over we had 69." Charlie states.

"We had 87 and ended with 72." Bill states. "I lost many friends."

"Where did you guys fly?"

"Everywhere...happy valley, dams, trains, factories, everything...all the way to Berlin."

"Me too."

"What was your scariest moment?" I ask.

"One day we were on a flight to bomb a heavy water factory. We had to hit it. There were 100's of planes in the air. There was ack-ack fire everywhere. This target was well fortified. We had to fly straight through happy valley to get to it. Planes were going down. My plane got hit and I thought we were done, so we dropped from 30,000 feet to 5,000 feet."

"Did you turn around?"

"No. I discovered they couldn't see us. They were firing over us so we just kept on going. The amazing thing is that we were the only crew to hit the target. We blew that factory up and lived to tell about it."

For the next half hour Bill and Charlie told incredible stories of ordinary guys doing what they were trained to do. Full of pride, understanding the moment they were in, grateful to be alive and honored by those who served and gave their lives in the crew next to them. Between the two of them they flew over 250 missions.

Way to go Bill and Charlie!