Fluttering Leaves and the Fighter Pilot

by Colonel William D. Garner

Description This book contains inspirational messages coming from the grassroots of a life well lived. It holds up the possibility of achievement by anyone, regardless of their beginning. Bill Garner was a painfully naïve country kid. He lacked career guidance but had an abundance of ambition. He pursued, with consuming vigor, a vision of what his life might be and came to realize his vision during a long life of successful endeavors. This is a how to guide to success in challenging times. Bill shares many lessons he learned along the way and offers a personal philosophy of life that others might adopt for their own lifelong benefit. He is a gifted writer. You will gallop with him through terrifying pony rides that end in no imaginable measure of glory; rather, in huge crushing disappointments. You will be transported to the complex cockpit of a Mach 2 fighter aircraft as you accompany him on harrowing missions in the black of night and driving rain during the Monsoon Season of Southeast Asia. Soaring tens of thousands of feet above the hostile terrain of North Vietnam and Laos, you will ride through in-flight refueling while connected perilously to a KC-135 flying gas station, soon thereafter to be shot at - and too often hit - by some of the most accurate and deadly antiaircraft artillery gunners the world has ever known. Following combat, he advanced through several assignments in Europe before attending the Air War College, en route to the Pentagon, his last assignment. He retired from the Air Force after 26 years of active duty. Bill shares his experiences in the two later careers of health services management and real estate. You will witness his innovative successes as he builds new and diversified programs and makes existing ones better.