Dare to Be Great

By Brandon Mena

Dare to Be Great is a compilation of actual events. It tells the story of a young boy who yearned for adventure. He traveled up and down the United States from one crop to another. He always workeddishwasher, newspaper carrier, etc. As a child, he worked the bars as a shoeshine boy. As an adult, he went on to become a very successful realtor, helping hundreds of families attain the American dream.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 18, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503592339

Brandon Mena

Brandon E. Mena is a historian, writer, and cosmos aficionado at heart. He has followed the NASA space program from its very beginnings, from the first American to orbit Earth, Alan Sheppard, to Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landing on the moon on July 20, 1969. All the Mars landers. He has witnessed the comet Ison come in close proximity to the Sun then disappearing after being declared comet of the century with its twenty-million-mile long tail. Today he has seen the July 14, 2015, New Horizons Space Craft encounter with the planet Pluto. If NASA sent it, he has been there. His most tenacious accomplishment was in finding the root origins of Christopher Columbus. Working through a US senator and the king of Spain, he spent over ten years on this endeavor. He has been a licensed real estate broker for over thirty years. He personally sold over five hundred homes. His home sports a twenty-thousand-dollar bedroom set, which includes a double-king-size bed. No more sleeping on the floor. He loves people. He has been a real estate teacher and trainer in the state of Arizona. He is a graduate of Phoenix, College. He served and protected in the community of Holbrook, Arizona, as a police officer in the mid 1960s. He is a father, grandfather, and husband. He is an air force veteran. He enjoys golf and college and professional football, as well as soccer and baseball. He might even drink a beer or two but prefers scotch or tequila. You may reach him at [e-mail].

Book preview

Copyright © 2015 by Brandon Mena.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2015912560

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-5035-9235-3

                Softcover        978-1-5035-9234-6

                eBook             978-1-5035-9233-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 10/06/2015

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Contents

Introduction

Introduction II

Purpose

Donald Trump

Prologue

Disclosure

Name Disclosure

Doctor of Humane Letters

Preface

President Reagan

Chapter 1

My Beautiful Mother

Long Before

The End of the World

Milk Bottles

My Dad

Chapter 2 Our New Home

The Outhouse

Comforts of Home

Our Goats and Castle

A Snake Lives under the House

Lee Trevino

Lee Trevino

Little Efren

First Day of School

My First English Word

Gilbert, My Hero

Roll Call

Mrs. Ahrens, Third-Grade Teacher

Donald Trump

Chapter 3 Columbus Dares to be Great

His Majesty the King

Columbus Sacrificed

El Chapo

Teacher Observation

Foreign Students

Egyptian Pharaohs

Migrant Ingenuity

Who Is the Idiot Here?

The Iran Nuclear deal

Chapter 4 Before We Knew the Farming Fields

Shoeshine Boys Working the Bars

A Man Was Shot

Chapter 5 The Call from Uncle Seve

Hello, Michigan

Hello, Lake Michigan!

Day 2 in Michigan

Chapter 6 The Bridge Out

Back Home in San Antonio

Car Crash

Our Clan Favorites

Splendor of His Youth

Big Purple Cherries

Saturday

Chapter 7 Changes

No Hazardous Pay

Moses

Chapter 8 Greely, Colorado, Potatoes, Here We Come

He Called Them Indian

Potatoes

Chapter 9 The Woods Are Lovely, Dark, and Deep

It’s Cotton Time

Ol’ Man River

Chapter 10 The Gambler

Chapter 11 Back Home with Grandpa

Testing

Chapter 12 Bullies

Chapter 13 We Moved to Houston

Hopping a Freight Train

Forever Grateful

Belgium Farmers

Our Farmers Feed the World

Chapter 14 Acknowledgment

Acknowledgment of Nobility

Primitive Beginnings

Salinas Genealogy and History

Other Acknowledgments

The Eternal Flame

John F. Kennedy

Many Heroes

Chapter 15 In Hindsight

Chapter 16 River Monsters

English

You will find where you look

Chapter 17 Roswell, New Mexico

Lonnie Zamora

Travis Walton

First Nuclear Blast

Chapter 18 In My Lifetime

Potpourri

In Our Castle

Epilogue

The Hubble

Hubble Telescope Twenty-five Years in Service

Hubble’s Successor

My Eyes Saw the Images that Mary Saw.

Bibliography

Asterisk zone

Dare to Be Great

Denzel Washington

Dare to Be Great

Dr. Ben Carson

Black Lives Matter

Laughing Like Children

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death!

Patrick Henry

Author Bio

Introduction

The Magic.

How do you feel about you?

You are the most important person in the world.

No one is better than you.

You are equally important as the next guy/gal.

But you must prove you are not better than anyone

How do you prove it?

By becoming responsible for the person who you are. You are the champion who found your mother’s egg at inception. You beat out millions. You won.

But I don’t know who I am you say.

I don’t want to know that you don’t know.

I want to know that you are in possession of the magic!

The magic that propels. The magic that propelled you to find your mother’s egg. The magic that tells you to go on. The magic that tells you that you can and you will!

How do I do that? You do nothing! You allow your inner self to guide you. That inner self who is your very best friend. The voice that speaks to you at 600 miles per second.

The voice that keeps you guarded and always safe.

Who is this voice? It is your very own sub-conscience mind. Yes, your other mind. The one that solves your problems while you sleep.

How do you get in touch with it? Simply want! Want for a worthy cause. A new home, a car, money. Respect from others. Respect for yourself. Respect for your fellow man. Just want! Your very best friend, your sub-conscience mind will do the work.

You will wake up feeling refreshed every morning, ready willing and able to go to Work! To work on your dream. With no worries. Your best friend solved your problems while you slept.

Now, how do you feel about you?

Don’t ever tell me you can’t! Tell me you can.

From here on, nothing will get in the way!

Because now you know who you are.

You are the most important person in the world, and nothing can stop you. Simply believe.

Your future is whatever you and your magic voice decides.

So dare make it a good one. You too can Dare to Be Great.

Introduction II

When I was in the military, I had a top secret clearance. There are some areas in this book that are worthy of being classified.

The author herein tends to move around much as newscasters presenting formidable daily news events.

We find ourselves in an election year for President of the United States of America and much of the news is dedicated to this subject. There are some 17 or more candidates declaring their candidacy. This interesting subject is worthy of a complete book all on its own. Since I don’t have the luxury of a Bill O’Reilly platform to promote my books, I will leave it to my audience who can search the web site Migrant Dares to be Great under GoDaddy.com or find me as Dare to be Great Brandon E, Mena in Xlibris. I will touch only on a number of candidates. Am staying away from Hillary. She has entirely too many landmines surrounding her to be objective. To think that I once changed my voter registration in 2008 and drove to Globe, Arizona some 100 miles away just to vote for her in the primaries. I did vote for her husband twice, aside female intolerances he was a great President. He balanced the budget and has done a lot for humanity post president.

It is a very perplexing campaign for most of them. The front runner of the Republican Party is Donald J. Trump. He is simply a very rich wise business man. He does not pander to special interest groups or lobbyists. He pays his own way. Does not use a teleprompter and attracts literally thousands of followers.

He was ambushed by Megyn Kelly of Fox News on his first Presidential debate. She has lost millions of fan followers because of how she approached Mr. Trump including yours truly. We quickly saw right through her. A beautiful woman who had reached the pinnacle of Fox News; its mountain top, almost untouchable. Now there is hearsay she may have options to moving to another station. Perhaps CNN.

Throughout the book I comment on what I perceive to be important topics. IE. Iran, ISIS, Border Wall, Anchor Babies, Civil Liberties toward undocumented immigrants and Jorge Ramos of Univision.

When reading my book, just make believe you are watching the news and subliminally the under wording captions take you to the 2016 Presidential election, the fights and dog fights between candidates and media.

When I first heard that Donald Trump wanted to run for President, I internally thought: He is just in it for the $2 Million the government gives all candidates who run. He will then disappear. Boy was I in for a shock. Once he started talking, saying he wouldn’t be bought by any special interest, lobbyists or foreign governments, that he would use his own money for the campaign he caught my attention.

I honestly now believe that he means every word he says. Donald J. Trump is a billionaire. He doesn’t need the $2 million. He turned down $300 million by NBC for another season of The Apprentice. His passion to serve his country in the highest office can be compared to Arizona Cardinal Pat Tillman who enlisted in the U.S. Army after being awarded a $3.6 million professional football contract. He could have taken the money and played football but the honor to his country was more important. He enlisted right after 9/11. He was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan in 2004.

Heaven forbid something should happen to Donald J. Trump who just wants to serve his country crying out in the words of Patrick Henry Give me Liberty or give me death! Build that Wall. Protect our borders. Protect our Sovereignty. Build our Military. Bring back the jobs. Make America Great Again!

Let me ask the other 16 candidates Would you turn down $300 million dollars to run for President? I think not.

Donald J. Trump is a great man who dares to become even Greater. May the Lord God watch his every step and keep him safe. We need a President who has convictions.

Carly Fiorina would be a great choice for the 2nd spot. One can say she is beautiful and very intelligent. She brings with her a vast amount of business experience in corporate America. Marco Rubio is qualified to run for President on his own, but because of the Jorge Ramos debacle, he would be the right one to fill the Hispanic void. But hey, who knows, perhaps Ted Cruz could also be a good choice. They must speak Spanish and Marco can do that.

I have met Jorge Ramos. He is a very pleasant man. He should consider the fact that he is an American first, and and Hispanic person 2nd. I know, he has his following with Univision. He has an obligation to use his platform at Univision to teach the undocumented the steps they must take in order to make it into our country legally. Instead he turns almost militaristic against the person who is trying to plug