where
are you, papa?
you didn’t show me how to
plow the field
Children
lost their fathers during the Vietnam War. Some lost their
mothers. On both sides. Lessons untaught. Examples
unlearned. Lives scarred by anger, loneliness, and the
absence of a primary role model. One day, a parent is there.
The next day, he or she is not. War shows no mercy, no
preference. People die. Families are torn apart. We must not
forget this. I long for a day, idealistic me, when war is no
longer a reality. I saw firsthand, the ravages of war.
Soldiers and civilians were shot, maimed, and
psychologically scarred for life. Over a million lives
needlessly erased from this earth. And for what? Oil?
Tung-sten? Rubber? Power? Where were the politician’s sons
and daughters during the war?
forced
to shoot others
this manchild, one year
a thousand summers
Nothing
changes a young teenager quicker than when he is forced to
kill another human being. Young boys were drafted into the
Vietnam War right after graduation from high school. At
eighteen, their lives had centered around going to school,
playing sports, courting girls, helping out at home, and
other youthful pursuits. Overnight, they were trans-ported
across the ocean to a foreign land where they were armed
with automatic rifles (machine guns) and told to shoot the
enemy if attacked. I had a friend who was forced to shoot a
nine year old boy who charged at him with a hand grenade. He
told me it was the most horrible thing he ever had to do,
killing a little child. But as he told me, "What else
could I do? It was kill or be killed." The taking of a
human life changes a person forever.
Gone
is the innocence of youth, the naiveté of adolescence. Some
soldiers had to kill others on a daily basis, witnessing
some of the most gruesome sights imaginable.
Psychologically, of course, it took its toll. Some of my
friends had glazed over eyes. Others drunk or drugged
themselves to oblivion on a nightly basis. Others I know are
plagued even today by horrendous dreams of what they
experienced and saw during their stay in South Vietnam.
The
sad thing is, when we returned stateside, after completing
our tour of duty, few of us received counseling. After
discharge, we were sent back into the civilian world,
dysfunctional, emotionally. Drug addiction, alcoholism, and
post traumatic syndrome laid waste to many of my fellow
servicemen. I too, went through hell and back. It was only
through years of counseling and spiritual journeying that I
was able to rise up from the chasm of self destruction and
reoccurring spectres to a headspace today that gives me
peace of mind and inner happiness.
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