(CNN)There is an old saying among soldiers and correspondents who cover them that when two people drink from the same canteen in some desert, jungle or other war zone they have a bond for life. This came to me in the middle of the night last night as I failed to make sleep come hours after learning that my friend and long-time colleague Bob Simon had lost his life. Death took him in a car crash in New York City. Bob and I had drunk from the same canteen more than once during the 48 years we had known each other, 38 of those working together at CBS News. Once, in South Africa I think it was, we were talking over an adult beverage or two in the shank of an evening about dangerous assignments, a subject about which Bob was experienced and expert. With a piercing look and a hint of that slightly off-center smile he sometimes had, he said something along the lines of, "More correspondents are injured getting out of the shower and more are killed in automobile accidents than probably anywhere else." The irony of that memory mixed with how death took him is painful and lingers.
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"60 Minutes" correspondent Bob Simon died in a car accident Wednesday
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Dan Rather: Simon was one of the best writers ever to work in TV journalism
To look at @placeholder's roll call of overseas postings is to see the embodiment of a foreign correspondent.