Sixty-three years ago, when I was 16 years old, I published a series of anti-Vietnam war articles in my teeny-tiny home town newspaper.
As often happens, the passage of time has changed how I view that. I thought that my motives were entirely intellectual and religious at the time.
My mother was furiously anti-war and anti-military… and with good reason. Her father was destroyed by his experiences in combat in WWI. He returned home a broken man and an alcoholic.
Mom’s brother, Jim, suffered an almost complete mental collapse from his experiences as an Army Ranger in WWII, fighting behind enemy lines. He stank of death and alcohol the remainder of his sad life. Jim’s family fell apart when Vicki, his daughter, killed herself and her baby sister, ramming her hot rod Chevy into a tree at 100 mph.
You could call this an accident, but it wasn’t. Jim’s family life was a nightmare of alcoholism and abuse.
Mom’s nephew, Bill, was destroyed by combat in Vietnam. After he returned home, he simply disappeared for decades. His sister searched for years for him and finally found him when a newspaper published his obituary. Bill had been living in seclusion in a cheap apartment above a bar in a little town in Pennsylvania.
Uncle Benny, Mom’s brother, died in a training accident in California. He never even made it into combat in Korea.
In Mom’s view, our family had suffered enough. And she was damned if her son was going to be another sacrificial lamb.
“Let the damned politicians send their own sons!” became her motto.
Mom died two weeks ago. She was an extraordinarily tough woman, definitely no teddy bear.
If you can hear me up there in heaven, Mom, all I have to say is… I made it!
I’ve lived to be an old man. I’m not a mental basket case or an alcoholic. I’m an educated man, free of the stench of bloodshed and death. I have grandkids.
You did it, Mom. You saved me.
Always Merry and Bright 