He was always a part of my life.

I was born in California in the early 1960s, and so it is no surprise that the first politician whose name I knew was Ronald Reagan. He became our Governor around the time I as three-years old, and since my father was stationed in California for most of the late 1960s, I heard that name often. He was a giant of a man in the eyes of the boy I was.

Jump forward to the mid-1970s. I was a kid living on Guam. I remember listening to radio commentaries by Ronald Reagan. Twelv-years-old, and I looked forward to hearing that voice, talking common sense about the issues that faced our country. I knew he was right when he spoke of the evils of Communism, for I had watched the refugees from Vietnam flood my island home in the spring of 1975. I cried the day he went off the air, saddened by the loss of a friend and teacher.

My family returned to the US in the heat of the 1976 primary campaign. My parents, of course, were supporters of Ronald Reagan. I hoped and prayed that my hero, my mentor, would snatch the nomination from Gerald Ford. It was not to be. But four years later it would, and I was ready to work on my first campaign -- the campaign of my hero, Ronald Reagan. Reagan's triumph in the primaries, his nomination in Detroit, and his victory in November excited me like nothing before.

Two days remain linked forever in my mind. The first, twenty-five years ago, was Ronald Reagan's inauguration, and the flight to freedom of the hostages in Iran. I think that day set a tone for the future of the Reagan Administration -- the next eight years would be about a strong America and freedom for captives. The second is that awful day in March -- the man I admired wounded by an assassin but spared by the hand of God. If any of us had doubted that Ronald Reagan was marked for greatness, that day seemed to dispel all doubts. And it was eight years of greatness.

I will leave others to recount the deeds of Reagan as president. What mattered to me was the vision he set forth of America as a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom. What inspired me was the call to live out the heritage of liberty imparted by the Founders, and to spread that freedom abroad. It was his ability to move us to seek to do great things, and to comfort us in moments of tragedy, such as the Challenger explosion. In all of this, Ronald Reagan inspired us to be something better than what we were, and pushed us to move beyond ourselves. It is this vision that led me to become an active Republican, and to remain one.

And then came the day when my hero died. I wept for Ronald Reagan that day, and in the days that followed -- tears of joy that his suffering was done, and tears of loss that this man I loved was gone.

But is he? Or does he yet live in the dreams of those who hold fast to his vision?

Let us be faithful to that vision.

It can be morning in America again.

MY FIRST REAGAN POST

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