Missions From Thailand Jungle Base

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Well, I did reach out to a lot of the people that were stationed at the same place I was, which was in Namphong, Thailand. We were out in the middle of the jungle, uh living in tents, no running water, no electricity, and flying missions out of Thailand every day across Laos, Cambodia into Vietnam. And most of our day missions were around the DMZ area, and uh then we flew night missions up into North Vietnam to stop them.

SPEAKER_00 0:37

Hi friends, this is Read and Write with Natasha Podcast. My name is Natasha Tines, and I'm an author and a journalist. In this channel, I talk about the writing life, review books, and interview authors. Hope you enjoy the journey. Hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of Read and Write with Natasha. I have today with me

From Marine Pilot To Author

SPEAKER_00 1:05

author Doug Xpuhler, who's a former US Marine Corps pilot and a Vietnam veteran-turned author. After a 35-year career in software, he began writing heartfelt books inspired by family, loss, and life lessons, including his latest Letters to Mom, based on real letters from his military years. Okay. Don, so I'm so happy to have you here. And first, thank you for your service.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

Well, thank you, Natasha, for having me on. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:35

Yeah, it's great to have Yvette here. So, Don, you led a fascinating career. You served in Vietnam, so that's you know, amazing. And uh I'm curious to know more about that. But I think the first question for you, Don, is what made you move from being a Marine Corps, uh Vietnam vet software to publishing books? Because, you know, as a Marine Corps, you're a very fit athletic person, suddenly you're sitting down and writing books. How did that happen?

SPEAKER_01 2:07

Well, actually, that's a good question because I didn't really have a whole lot of time to write books until I retired here a few years ago. And that's when I really started writing, had the time to do it. But the letters are kind of a unique situation because I got drafted on the day I graduated from college, and my mom was there for the graduation, and she said, Well, if you're going in the military, you better promise to write me real regularly, like every week. And I said, I promise, mom, I will. And and I did. And they wrote me back and sent me tapes and all that, all the way from boot camp through flight school and then on to overseas. So uh I I didn't even know that she saved the letters until I went up to visit her like six years after I'd come back. And I just asked her, hey, did you save any of those old letters? And she said, Oh yeah, I've got them all. And they're in a box up in the attic. And I'm gonna read them again someday. And I said, No, maybe

Turning Letters To Mom Into A Book

SPEAKER_01 3:10

not. But I said, you know, I'd like to take them back to Dallas and read them myself. And I really got some closure from rereading the letters because so many funny little things behind the scenes going on and the camaraderie of all the guys. And uh, you know, we didn't have any other way to communicate back in those days. It was just letters because, you know, we didn't have cell phones and the internet and all that stuff back then. So anyway, my mom had cancer at the time, and I thought, you know, I'm gonna put these letters in chronological order and put them in a book and give them back to her as a Christmas present. Well, when I did that, most of the letters were kind of hard to read, they're handwritten, so I just took the best parts of each letter and typed them back up and put them in a book and gave it to her for a Christmas present. And she loved it. She uh absolutely loved reading the stories again. And uh she died the next year, so I got the book back and it sat in my closet for like 45 years. And I got it out one day and dusted it off and started rereading them again. And I thought, you know, this might help other Vietnam vets or Afghanistan veterans or even people that have never been in the military, uh what it's really like. Because those letters are written when it was happening, and uh I would have never remembered, you know, 90% of that stuff by now. But uh so I published it last year, and I've gotten a real good response back. People really have enjoyed the letters because they're so authentic and they're so heartfelt, you know, because I was a lonely guy on the other side of the world flying combat missions every day.

SPEAKER_00 5:05

That looks fascinating. What was the most surprising thing that you discovered about maybe the war and about yourself when you read the letters? Because I journal, and sometimes when I go back and I realize, oh my god, I was thinking this way or this happened, you rediscover parts about yourself. So, what did you rediscover about yourself or about the situation in the war in Vietnam? Did it change your perspective after reading them? Like after 40 years?

SPEAKER_01 5:35

Most definitely.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

If you can tell me how, yeah, like how what was the most surprising thing about reading those letters from Vietnam?

SPEAKER_01 5:42

I think the most surprising thing to me was that we were always, it seemed like playing defense in in Vietnam, always reacting to what they were doing, but never going on the offense. And at least we finally did that over the Christmas bombings that uh when I was over there. And that was the last year of the war. And we did start bombing Hanoi and North Vietnam, and they finally said, okay, we'll give back the POWs and we'll we'll go to the Paris peace talks. And and so we did get the POWs back and we did end the war, but I really didn't feel good about it. I I was very bitter. I'd lost seven of my best friends who were shot down in our squadron while I was there. And it just seemed like such a waste to me that that we had spent all that time and over 55,000 guys had died there. And for what? You know, I I think most of us came back feeling very bitter and we just didn't feel welcome back home. A lot of the people really were almost held it against us that we even went to Vietnam. So I think that's what helped about reading the letters later, and I got some closure because I really didn't talk about Vietnam to my friends or my family or really anybody for six years. And then I finally and I kept all those feelings inside. And I think that was kind of a form of PTSD, survivor's guilt, whatever you want to call it. I felt bad because some of my buddies were married and had little kids, and you know, they're never coming home. And for what? So I think one of the best things I learned from my letters is that, you know, everything is gonna be okay. Everything is gonna be okay, and I was very lucky to come back and live a normal life and get married and have three kids and get to do the kind of jobs that I wanted to do, which was in computer software. And, you know, I'd just been very blessed to have a to have a good life where they didn't. The guys didn't come home.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

It's fascinating. But did serving in Vietnam or even like reading the the letters later on change your perspective about life, the meaning of life, and how to live life? And how if if how how did that change you?

SPEAKER_01 9:05

It really did. Uh and uh, you know, I I think Vietnam is it's such it's it's happened so long ago now that a lot of people have kind of forgotten how it was back then. But it was uh it really did divide our country, kind of like it is today. You know, it seems we're very divided as a country over politics and uh the other wars that we've been involved in all around the world for you'd think we'd have learned a lesson from Vietnam, but we really didn't got involved in Iraq.

SPEAKER_00 9:37

But what about you as yeah, but not even the politics, but about living life to the fullest or embracing life? How did that change you? Did it give your life more meaning, or did you feel like life is fragile and that you know you can lose it any moment, like what happened to your friends in Vietnam and what you've seen there as well? How did that change your perspective about living life? About if you want to give lessons in living, because I know you like lessons, so if you want to give lessons in living based on your experience being

Bitterness, Loss, And Finding Closure

SPEAKER_00 10:16

you were a pilot, right?

SPEAKER_01 10:17

You're a pilot in Yeah, and and again, I was I was thinking that, you know, a lot of people ask me, were you really scared while you were on the missions and so forth? And you're so busy doing your job and concentrating on the airplane and the the bombs and the and what's going on, that you don't have time to get nervous. It's actually when you're finished with the mission and you're flying back home that you start to realize what you just went through. And you feel very lucky that you got through that last hour or two hours of flying. And I think that has given me over the years now an appreciation of how lucky I was to come back and be able to live a full life. And and life is really fragile, let's face it. You know, it's it's uh I'm in my late 70s now, and you start to think, you know, that's only 25,000 days or so if you live to be over 70. That's not very many days. And so I try to just live each day and live it to the fullest and enjoy it because it's all a blessing.

SPEAKER_00 11:27

And what do you tell your children when you were raising them about what kind of the lessons? I know you wrote a book about uh lessons from like kindergarten to third grade, but what kind of lessons did you pass to your children based on your experience in Vietnam?

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Well, you know, that's I really didn't talk to my kids much about Vietnam at all. Because it was they never asked. They they knew I was in the military, they knew, you know, I flew in A6 jets and all that stuff. But and I did go talk to their schools a little bit when they were in grade school about Vietnam. But again, I don't think they really had any idea of what it was really like and how our country went through such a tough time during that. But and I tried to shield them from that, I think, quite a bit. That uh they knew I'd been to war, but they also knew that I was just dad and I was home every day, and and you know, just trying to bring them up in a normal, happy life. And and they all have had a very successful life on their own, had their own families, and they got grandchildren now, so it's it's it's all good. But I think the wounds from Vietnam were really for the people of the families that lost a loved one. Not even so much for the person that lost their life, but for their families and their kids and their parents and their wives and so forth. Um, they have to carry that forever. And they try to rebuild their lives, but it's never gonna be the same. And if you figure that, 55,000 guys didn't come home, that's that affects an awful lot. Tens and thousands of families and and people that have had to live with this for the last 50, 60 years.

SPEAKER_00 13:15

Yeah, I mean, I don't I although I'm from the Middle East, I try not to get political on the podcast and and focus on books. But I'm curious to see how you feel now. The US's uh or the current presidency is talking a lot about bombing Iran now, and that's on the mind of everyone and going after Iran and others. Do you get like PTSD from hearing this or seeing the news? How do you feel about the US might engage in yet another war very soon?

SPEAKER_01 13:47

Well, I did go through, I think, uh some rough times about actually about 10 or 15 years ago. I was just I was just feeling sad about, I don't know why, but I just kind of got depressed. So I I did go through some counseling, especially uh with a guy that did a lot of counseling for Vietnam vets. And he understood kind of what we had gone through and how we repressed a lot of those feelings. And it helped a lot. It really helped me to kind of get back on track. And so I I feel again, I'm one of the lucky ones. But no, you know, you mentioned uh a minute ago that I I've written some other books. I I wrote three books on life lessons learned in grade school and in junior high. And they're short little books, but they're just little lessons you learn as you're a little kid from growing in a up in a family. I was the oldest of five kids, so we had a big family, and lots of funny things happened, but you learn things that you remember for life, life lessons. And that's what I was trying to bring out in those books is that everything that you experience teaches you something, good and bad. And you learn from life and you learn from your experiences, and if you can pass that on to the next generations and hopefully help them understand themselves and their situations better, I think that's makes it all worthwhile to write the books in the first place.

SPEAKER_00 15:17

So um I want to pivot a bit and talk about your publishing process. Did you self-publish all of your books?

SPEAKER_01 15:25

All of my books have been pretty much self-published so far, mainly because I I want to get them out there on Amazon, and I did the audible books

Life Is Fragile And Still Worth Living

SPEAKER_01 15:35

as well for uh for letters tomorrow, so that it would be in my voice, all the letters that I wrote and so forth. A lot of people our age can't even read that well anymore because of their eyes and so forth. So uh I think the audible books really help for older folks that that have a hard time.

SPEAKER_00 15:54

How did you do that? Did you record it at home?

SPEAKER_01 15:57

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just did you have to be in like a closet or like how did you get the sound quality to be like uh just gotta make sure that there's no noise going on around and uh uh and eliminate that as much as possible. And then of course the editing process takes out a lot of the any kind of static or noise between when you're talking. So the editing process actually is what takes the most time to really get the recording uh top quality. But again, it's it's just And you did it yourself? Yeah, I did I I bought all the equipment, a whole studio of uh microphones and recording equipment and so forth. So Okay. And it wasn't that difficult. Uh you just kinda have to take one letter at a time, record it, and then edit it, and then you submit it to Audible, and and they do a double check on all of the recording quality to make sure it's really good quality before they release it. So it's it's a whole process.

SPEAKER_00 17:02

Have you thought of starting a podcast? I think I think you would be a great candidate for having a podcast talking about other vets and the lessons learned and all of that. I think that would be and you can call it Letters to My Mom. I think that's that's a great title for for your podcast. Okay, so you said that Letters to My Mom was like reviewed, like highly reviewed, and people really liked it. And I'm curious because this kind of book, in in terms of its historical significance, it's it's like it should be in like the National Archive or somewhere like this because of the historical significance. Were you what was the reaction in terms of like the Vietnam Vets, I don't know, association, if there is one, or like organizations that work with Vietnam vets, or people who actually document what happened in Vietnam? Did you manage to reach out to them? What what was what did that book cause or like affect people that way?

SPEAKER_01 18:11

Well, I did reach out to a lot of the people that were stationed at the same place I was, which was in Namphong, Thailand. We were out in the middle of the jungle, living in tents, no running water, no no electricity, and flying missions out of Thailand every day across Laos and Cambodia into Vietnam. And most of our day missions were around the DMZ area, and then we flew night missions up into North Vietnam to stop the traffic, the rook the trucks bringing more supplies and ammunition down from the north. And those were probably the scariest missions of all because it was total radio silence. Once we went into North Vietnam, and if you got hit, if you got shot down, nobody knew where you were or when you got hit, because we were in total radio silence. But it was yeah, those were put some pretty scary missions. And when I wrote letters back to my mom, I did tell her about some of the missions, but I also tried to keep it light and keep it humorous, and hey, everything's fine. And uh and it was a very historical time for our country because uh it was the, like I said, the last year of the war after that war had been going on for ten years. And we got to see people like Bob Hope. He came over to our base for the very last show that he did over overseas. He brought uh Red Fox and Lola Falana and his wife Dolores, and I think Miss World was there. You know, he brought a whole bunch of beautiful ladies that were Miss America or Miss World or whatever. And what a show. What an amazing show he put on for us. And uh I just remember I saw like 500 Marines sitting out there watching his show, and then and when Dolores sang White Christmas at the end of the program, you saw 500 Marines out there just crying their eyes out. So it was it was really moving, and and it was something to get to see. And that's in the book as well about all the pictures I took and so forth.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

Well, so how did you promote that book? What was your marketing

Counseling, PTSD, And Passing Down Lessons

SPEAKER_00 20:31

tactic like? And so appeared on podcasts in addition to that, yeah. Well, how are you marketing it?

SPEAKER_01 20:38

You know, just press releases and and doing book signings and podcasts with various people. You know, it's tough as a as a you know, you can you can advertise it on the social media and so forth, but not a lot of books are sold through social media. It's they have to kind of hear about you somewhere and have some interest. And uh, but all my books are on my website, which will take you directly to Amazon if you want to order one. And if you're a prime member, you get free shipping. But uh my uh website is lifelessonsbooks.net. So pretty simple to find my website, and then from there you can just click on letters to mom and it'll take you right to Amazon so that you can or Audible to get the book or the ebook, the Kindle book, or the uh uh paperback or hardback. So I've I've tried to promote it as much much as I can, but again, unless people are familiar with you and your writing and other books, you know, it is tough because I'm not a celebrity or a famous movie star or anything putting out a book. It's it's just my recollections from Vietnam and actual letters.

SPEAKER_00 22:02

What do you think worked the best in terms of marketing? Like if if you can look at the ROI, what what do you think worked the best?

SPEAKER_01 22:11

I think the best is just the amount of exposure you can get from like television or on podcasts.

SPEAKER_00 22:19

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 22:19

I I really do. Again, there's no medium like television as far as but that's really hard to get on television shows as a new author, you know, unless you're a celebrity or something like that. But I think again, it's just it it tends to be just word of mouth. Ultimately, if you write a good book, people will tell their friends about it and and if they enjoy it, they'll buy it for their friends or their children or whatever, if it has a good message.

SPEAKER_00 22:48

What was the reaction of the people uh the of Vietnam vets who read the book?

SPEAKER_01 22:54

I think it's kind of been kind of a a a very nostalgic look back for most of the guys that were over there because they had kind of forgotten a lot of what went on also. They remember the friendships they had and they remember the day-to-day work that they did. But I I I think this brought together a lot of things that they maybe had forgotten about. And so with them, I think it was kind of like it was for me. It was just a real, it was a lot of fun to go back and kind of relive that at that time. Now that we're away from the danger and it's all over, we can kind of look at it more objectively. And uh I I think the reaction's very good. They really have enjoyed.

SPEAKER_00 23:38

Did you did any of your kids serve in the military?

SPEAKER_01 23:41

No. Luckily, uh, none of my kids I have two daughters and then a son, and they haven't uh my son's

Self-Publishing And Recording An Audiobook

SPEAKER_01 23:50

a lawyer in the Cleveland area and uh never had to go into the military, and I'm kind of happy he didn't have to go in.

SPEAKER_00 23:58

Interesting, why?

SPEAKER_01 24:00

Well, you know, that's funny because I kind of said the same thing to I was uh my very last few months in the military, I was an officer selection officer back in Columbus, Ohio. I went to Ohio State, so I went back to that area thinking I would find a job in that area after I got out of the military. And I talked to a lot of students that were getting out of college and were maybe interested in an officer program or in flying. And I told them I think the military helped me a lot. I learned a lot about discipline, I learned a lot about working hard and learning the training and so forth to get through. And I think it helped me mature after college into a man. And so for some people, I think it's one of the best things they could do, especially high school graduates that maybe are concerned about how they're gonna pay for college. If you go on the military for a couple years, you can come out and they will pay for your college expenses. And I've had a couple of family members that have done that, which has helped them a lot. So I think the military can be very good for a lot of young people. But also, war is not fun. And once you're in, if they tell you to go do something, you go do it. You follow orders, and whether you like it or not. So that that's can be the tough part about being in the military.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Wow. Do you still fly?

SPEAKER_01 25:32

I flew up until just a few years ago. I uh but it's it's expensive, and it uh, you know, to rent a plane and to stay current and so forth. And I I'm over 70 years old now, so I felt it was kind of time to get away from from flying. I'll I'll ride on airliners now. But I always loved flying. I really did. I I got my pilot's license back in college at Ohio State, and I just fell in love with flying, got a helicopter rating, got commercial rating for for airplanes, multi-engine instrument rating, you know, so you you just kind of keep progressing as you're learning flying. And then, of course, the years I was in the military, I flew an awful lot almost every day.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

But so you you're retired now, right? Yeah, you're retired now?

SPEAKER_01 26:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:26

So do you spend all your days writing, or like what is the chunk of the days that you spend writing versus, you know, being a granddad and enjoying retirement?

SPEAKER_01 26:37

You know that is, it's it's a it's a balance, I think, of enjoying your life, but also if you have a hobby, and I really have looked at writing as my hobby, that I just I love to do it. It it uh kind of brings me peace to get something down on paper. And I I like I said, I just didn't have the time earlier in my life. I was so busy raising kids

Marketing, Word Of Mouth, And What Works

SPEAKER_01 27:00

and doing my job and all that to I couldn't really sit down and write. But I don't write any certain amount of time or day. I kind of go through periods where I really feel like writing and it just flows, and then other times you just want to get away from it. Go play golf or you know, just go out and enjoy a nice picnic or something once in a while.

SPEAKER_00 27:22

Uh do you have any plans for future books?

SPEAKER_01 27:25

Oh yeah, yeah. I am finishing up a novel right now, and I am not gonna self-publish that. I'm I'm gonna run that through literary agents and traditional publishing houses. And I think it's got a little bit wider audience. Novels, you know, a thriller have have more of a wide audience for publishing. But I've published six books so far, and I'm gonna keep on doing it as long as I can, because it's kind of what I love.

SPEAKER_00 27:53

What's the novel about?

SPEAKER_01 27:54

The novel is about a couple that get abducted on a camping trip in Mexico. They they go down to Mexico to attend a wedding, a family wedding, and they get abducted by a drug cartel and held for ransom.

SPEAKER_00 28:10

That's very relevant to what's happening now in the news.

SPEAKER_01 28:14

So yeah, I've been I've been working on that novel for about uh five years now, and just a little bit at a time, and it's finally finished. It has a lot of bullfighting and a lot of uh it's called cartel abduction. So it was it's it's just the latest thing I've been working on, and I'm I'm hoping it it finds some success down the road.

SPEAKER_00 28:40

But again, if sounds like a really fun project, and uh I can see from your face how like your face lit up when you when you described it. So it seems like you're having a lot of fun. So, how can people reach you if they want to buy your books, they want to connect with you? What is the best way to reach you?

SPEAKER_01 28:58

Well, I I do attend some local events here in the Dallas area every once in a while, but I think the easiest way is to just go to my website if they have an interest in the book and uh lifelessonsbooks.net. And uh that makes it a lot easier that that way I I'm not having to worry about shipping out books and things like that all the time. I just let Amazon handle all that.

SPEAKER_00 29:21

Yeah. Before we conclude, what is one life lesson you want to leave us with?

SPEAKER_01 29:27

Great question, because there are so many that

Future Novel, Final Life Lesson, Farewell

SPEAKER_01 29:30

uh I've actually written about in my books. But uh I think most of all, you know, life life doesn't go the way we always think it's gonna go. Okay, you're gonna have ups and downs, and you're gonna have curveballs thrown at you that you just never saw coming. But somehow, if you just it's how you react to a lot of things, that's the most important. And whether it's you find yourself flying combat missions in a war or you find yourself in a traffic accident or whatever it might be, if you can just kind of keep your head and keep your composure and say, you know what, I'm gonna get through this, it's gonna be okay. And that's funny how life turns out like that. Most things are okay afterwards.

SPEAKER_00 30:15

That's true. What's the saying, the saying is this too shall pass. So it this too shall pass. And on that note, thank you very much, Don, for joining me today. And I'm sure everyone is gonna enjoy this conversation. And please make sure to check out Don's uh books on his website, and for anyone who's listening or watching, thank you for joining us for another episode of Read and Write with Natasha, and until we meet again. Thank you for tuning in to Read and Write with Natasha. I'm your host, Natasha Time. If today's episode inspired you in any way, please take the time to review the podcast. Remember to subscribe and share this podcast with fellow book lovers. Until next time.