Growing Skin

My Brave Little Man series continues….

Terry joins the Navy and finds himself back in the real world, a world far removed from the soul modeling community he had been adopted into at the age of seven. Here, he returns to the world of street fighting. In electronics school alone, he gets into seven fights. And for this, he is promoted.

Two weeks after reporting aboard the USS Mahan, Terry disobeys a direct order–resulting, again, in a promotion. With it, a sharp mind emerges to deal with the many emergencies he will face in the Tonkin Gulf as both Surface Watch Supervisor and Radio Talker.

Follow Terry as he takes on challenges normally assigned to those higher in rank. See how his actions save the ship from a disaster predicted by the psychic, Jeane Dixon; how he gives last-minute instructions to pilots going in for air strikes and calmly deals with maydays; how some pilots never returned due to decisions made by self-serving higherups.

Read about his many adventures in port: About a sailor shoving a gun in Terry’s stomach before shooting himself; about taking on a barracks full of Korean marines; and about the day he stopped fighting after coming close to killing someone. To ease the stress, Terry creates what became known as, Degner’s Give-A-Shit Button; he quarterbacks the Navy football team–loaded with NFL & AFL draftees–to a championship; he becomes a certified scuba diver; and he takes up acting.

Following this, Terry enters college; a bright new world appears, and he begins to grow skin. Until, that is, the weight of the world bears down on him again.