The CrossRoads Diaries
The title of the book has significant meanings. “Cross” is for the One who saves us all, and “Roads” represents the paths we travel. “Diaries” represent a written account about what has occurred at a place and time that may include emotions and reflections. We all encounter crossroads in our lives.
Crossroads are a place of decision because there are several paths that can be taken. We can go straight, left or right, or turn around and try to go back from where we came. The “Crossroads” in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam was a nickname for a difficult place for the Mobile Riverine Force. It was an intersection of a river and canal situated between My Tho and Ben Tre and known for hundreds of firefights.
– Thomas Center
Author of CrossRoads Diaries
Brittany and Tom in Dong Ha, Vietnam – College of the Ozarks Patriotic Education Program – March 2016
My boat, Tango 91-4, during a combat operation.
The pictured flag is now part of the College of the Ozarks’ Vietnam Memorabilia Collection
Tango boats, moving forward in operation.
The CrossRoads Diaries is a mixture of poetry, pictures, Bible scripture, and musical lyrics, but most of all, it is the innermost feelings, the actual diary of a young man who spent over 300 hours a month on river operations in the Mekong Delta, was in over 100 firefights, earned a Purple Heart courtesy of the Viet Cong, and came home, only to return for a second tour as a minesweeper on the Cua Viet River, just south of the DMZ. This work is in the same genre as Philip Caputo’s – A Rumor of War or Tim O’Brien’s – The Things They Carried, but in many ways, it is more personal, which makes it appealing.
– C. David Dalton, Ph.D.
Elizabeth Hoyt Clark Chair of Humanities/Professor of History, College of the Ozarks
The CrossRoads Diaries 