Commentary: Powell is just a regular guy

I've always been an admirer of Gen. Colin Powell; I always thought he was bright, well-spoken and charismatic. After seeing him in person at a leadership conference Sept. 6, I have to say that I was blown away.
When you think of Gen. Powell, you think of the military genius, or the former Secretary of State. But I realized he is just a regular person ... sort of.
"What I miss most is my airplane," Powell said of stepping down as Secretary of State. "A band would be playing when I walked down the carpet to the plane; an honor guard would be saluting me; I'd wave to my adoring fans... it was cool."
Yes, a regular guy who visits heads of state and had his own plane, but still a normal guy who thinks having his own plane is pretty darn neat.
The 35-year Army veteran and alumnus of the City College of New York spoke of the difficulties of stepping down from a high-ranking office, and dealing with life after.
"One day, everyone wants to talk to you," Powell said. "One day every president, king and dignitary wants you to visit them; one day you're the Secretary of State... then one day, you ain't.
"When you step down from a high position and you're just another guy, and emptiness comes over you. So, I bought a Corvette - it worked great."
Such an uncomplicated answer, yet one I wouldn't have expected to come out of the mouth of the great Colin Powell. Could he really be just like you and me?
Well, I think we can decidedly say he is not; most of us weren't Pres. Ronald Reagan's right-hand man, didn't have conversations with Mikhail Gorbachev, or have a bevy of bodyguards.
But I think what makes Powell so engaging and likeable is that he knows this; he knows he is a regular person, in an extraordinary position. He could have ended up like you or I just as easily as he ended up Secretary of State ... okay so maybe I'm reaching a little, but you get what I mean.
My favorite anecdote of the day was the story Powell told of his first flight after stepping down from President Bush's cabinet: he made the three deadly sins of flying - he had no reservation, he paid in cash, and he carried no luggage. Of course he was red flagged and had to be searched, and as he was being wanded by a security officer, he said the man looked up at him and said "Hello General Powell."
"I thought, 'if you know I'm General Powell, why are you doing this? Why aren't you over there looking for Osama Bin Laden?!'" Powell said. "But, of course, I knew why he was doing it ... I set up the system."
It got a huge laughter and applause. But the point of his story was this:
"We're a lot safer than we were in 2000," he said. "This new world we're coping with, it is still more promising than the one when I joined the Army."
And I think a lot of people forget that, and maybe it takes someone like Gen. Powell to remind us; to remind us why our Soldiers, our sons, our daughters, our husbands, our wives, our children and our friends, are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"My friend Tom Brokaw, he says that World War II is the 'Greatest Generation,'" Powell said. "I have to say, those guys are no greater than our Soldiers today, fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan."
But, he reminded me that we can't let war change us; we can't let it change how we view those from other nations, or how they view us.
"The terrorists can attack us again, and they will if they have the chance," Powell said. "What the terrorists can't do is change who we are and what we do: we are a welcoming people. So we need to be what we are - proud, unafraid Americans who welcome the rest of the world to come to our country."