I am visiting in Pljevlja, in the north of Montenegro—less than 10 miles from the border with Serbia and 20 miles from the border with Bosnia. I’m here at the invitation of Radio and Television Pljevlja, the municipal broadcasting stations of this area of 40,000 people. The city includes an electrical plant, coal mines and timber industry as major employers.

What do you say to someone, about your own age, who tells you he lost 10 of the most productive years of his life when Milosevic was in power? This person doesn’t mean he was imprisoned by the Milosevic regime….he’s simply talking about the frustration of living during that time and having so many options eliminated by war, sanctions, inflation and certainly hatred….all kinds of hardships most people in the U.S. under the age of 50 can’t recognize as being part of their existence. The conversation certainly made some of the problems and concerns of my comfortable life seem very small. And to look at this person’s life now, is impressive.

Some people may say this is why you have to go for the gusto, grab the brass ring, don’t look back, plunge ahead in all that you do in life. That’s one perspective. But another, perhaps, is to cherish what you have and have accomplished. Cherish it today because there might not be a tomorrow. I am struggling, as I sit 5,000 miles from home, to determine the course for me.

I met and interacted with my first hardcore anti-American. The man, it turns out, is a normally mild-mannered traffic engineer for the municipality. But, today he was drunk and happy to tell me, in Serbian, how proud he was of Slobodan Milosevic and that those NATO planes had better stay away from Serbia. My new friend, who lost 10 years of his life to Milosevic, does his best to firmly but politely tell him to go away. I don’t want his rambling to continue either. So I tell my host to tell the guy, “This is the beauty of having a democracy. You and I can speak our minds and know that freedom protects our speech.” I don’t know if this got translated but I hope that perhaps the drunk understood enough English to understand. At the least, it was something to say and I feel better for saying it. And, no, there was no reason to fear for my safety.

How paradoxical that I can meet this fellow after having another person discuss with me the lasting damage to Serbia-Montenegro from the Milosevic regime.

How strange that this should be one of my last encounters in Pljevlja, a city I have thoroughly enjoyed visiting. I’ve spent a day and a half lecturing on media sales and marketing and how to do audience research. With a little luck and planning, I will come back in late May to actually help them conduct a listener/viewer study.