by Luke Lively
“I was different. The world was different. After joining I went straight to Pensacola and trained as a pilot. When I finished my training, I went straight to Vietnam.”
From the sheer luck of the date of my birth I had avoided the Vietnam experience. But I was old enough to remember the newscasts and how the war split much of the country apart. I asked, “How long were you in Vietnam?”
“Four years, nine months, and three days, a total of 1,736 days,” he said as he continued to maneuver through the fog.
Not knowing anything about the military, this seemed like a long time for a noncareer soldier. “Did you sign up for more than one tour of duty?”
“No, Jack. I was a prisoner of war for 1,548 of those days,” Benny said without emotion.
I was stunned. I asked, “How were you captured?”
“I was flying an A-4 Skyhawk. We were based on an aircraft carrier, the USS Oriskany. On a mission no more or less dangerous than any other, my plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire. I ejected from the plane and was almost immediately captured after landing. After being in several different prison camps, I was finally housed at the Hoa Lo Prison. You may have heard it called the Hanoi Hilton.”
Again, the experience was something I couldn’t imagine. “How did you survive that long?” I asked.
“I was lucky, in a sense. The North Vietnamese dragged me half-alive to their camp. I had broken my leg when I was ejected. I was an officer, so my value to them was worth the effort. They saw me as a potential part of their propaganda. Vietnam changed me forever. I never understood what freedom was until I was a prisoner of war.” After a pause, he said, “There’s a lot more to the experience, but I would rather not talk about it now.”
We went back to banking. Benny talked about how Citizens had grown and changed over the years. He talked about the successes and some of their failures. Citizens had won the Medallion Service Award, the most prominent national service award of its kind. It was the only bank that had ever won the award. But other than the award, his pride in the bank’s accomplishments focused on people. He rattled off name after name and the person’s achievements. He always mentioned how the person “made a difference” and that “everyone had the same purpose—to serve.” Benny’s voice brightened.
We arrived at a small park entrance and drove on a tight, two-lane road up to what appeared to be a picnic area. “We’ll park here and start our hike. We’ll be going about twelve miles up and back. Are you up for this, Jack?” Benny said with a smile. “I can’t carry you out if you give out on me!”
“If I drop over, just leave me for the wolves,” I said, pulling my backpack from the back of the Jeep.
I twisted the backpack over my shoulder, feeling the weight for the first time. “This is kind of heavy,” I said.
“I tried to go light,” he said. “On a twelve-mile hike, you want to be prepared. Here’s your snake stick.” He handed me one of two long pieces of what looked like tree limbs that had been tucked in the side of the Jeep’s storage area.
“Snake sticks?” I asked.
“When we see a snake today, I’ll show you how useful it is,” he said with no hint of humor in his voice.
I had dealt with snakes most of my life, but that was at work. At least the kind I worked with didn’t bite, I thought, trying to smile as we prepared to start up the trail.
We began the hike up a less-than-obvious dirt path that wound its way up the steep slope. The fog was still providing a dense cover, hiding the early morning sunlight from us. The thick shroud of trees and foliage made the side-to-side winding trail upward seem like something in a Dracula movie.
The fog appeared to be getting a little less ominous. Rays of light were breaking through. “Is the fog always this heavy?” I asked.
“Fog is fairly common in these mountains at this time of the year. We should walk out of it in about thirty minutes,” he said. “I think we timed it perfectly. Some of the people who grew up in the hills believe that the number of heavy fogs—like this one—will predict how many big snowfalls they’ll get in the winter.”
“Is it true?” I asked, now panting from the climb.
“Only if you believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy,” he said.
As we walked up the narrow path, I was nearly out of breath. The years of tobacco, liquor, and inactivity were creeping up on me. I started to sweat heavily, despite the cool morning air. Benny was walking ahead, almost thirty years older than me, without breaking a sweat or even showing any signs of difficulty in breathing.
We finally reached a clearing in the trees and the fog. We had walked for almost two hours with only two short breaks for me to catch my breath and get a drink of water. As we came to what he called a ridge, I saw a large outcropping of rocks ahead. The path forked with one path continuing a steep vertical ascent and the other leveling out near the rocks. “We’re going to take a slight detour—this is the first scenic view of the day,” he said. We walked back down a slight decline through an even thicker overhang of trees and leaves. It looked like a green tunnel, but there was a light ahead.
Stepping out into a clearing, I found myself standing on a huge rock. I realized what a scenic view was now.
I had never seen anything like it in my life.
You’re already who you need to be—be yourself.
—BENJAMIN FRANKLIN PRICE
31. Where Are You Going?
“WHERE ARE YOU GOING?” I asked.
“To the edge,” Benny said. “The view is much better.”
“Be careful—you could fall,” I said with an air of urgency. He seemed to be one step away from a deadly plunge into the mountain canyon.
“I love the view from here, Jack. You need to step closer to really appreciate it.”
“I don’t think so. I’m afraid of heights.”
“You are?” he asked, still looking down into the gorge.
“Yeah,” I said, stepping closer, but still leaving at least three feet of rock between me and the edge. “I’ve always had a fear of heights.” As I peered over the brink I immediately stepped back.
“Is it heights you’re afraid of,” he said, turning toward me with a mischievous grin, “or falling?”
I had never thought about the difference. Still nervous, peering at an angle into the deep chasm, I began to chatter. “No—I’m afraid of heights. That’s what I’m afraid of. I’ve always been afraid of heights. I don’t know why. I’m even afraid of ladders. Anything that takes me off the ground makes me nervous.”
“So you aren’t afraid of falling—just being off the ground?”
“Yeah, I guess so,” I said, taking another half-step backward.
“Does flying in a plane bother you? You’re really off the ground when you fly.”
“Well, not really, only when I look down.”
“You’re still on the ground here. This rock has been here a lot longer than you and me,” he said, stomping his right foot down as if proving the worthiness of the rock’s strength. “It’ll probably be around a lot longer. The only bad thing that can happen to you would be if you fell off the rock . . . or a snake bit you.”
I turned and looked slowly around to make sure a snake hadn’t joined us. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m afraid of falling. I hadn’t thought about the difference.”
“Why don’t you sit down on that rock,” he said, pointing toward a large boulder to the right of the ledge. “You can get a good view without looking straight down—and you’re still on solid ground. I want you to enjoy the view. It’s changing every second.”
The vista looked like something from an IMAX movie. The fog surrounded us. As it was lifting skyward, it allowed cracks of sunlight to shine into the deep canyon below. From my new vantage point I could get a sense of how steep the drop was into the crevice hundreds of feet below. A narrow, winding river was at the bottom, barely visible through the slowly breaking fog. I felt a wave of dizziness come over me.
“Amazing,
isn’t it?” Benny said, looking directly down into the canyon. “That’s why getting here early is important. The fog rises quickly. You don’t get this view very long. Everything appears to be changing, right in front of our eyes.”
It was. You could see the fog lifting gradually and dissipating as it moved leisurely upward, vanishing as we watched. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” I said.
“I’ve been here many times looking down into the same gorge at the same time of the morning yet it’s always different. The gorge hasn’t appreciably changed—it’s a canyon, rocks, and a river—but the view is different. But you have to be awake to notice the difference.”
Awake? Being awake wasn’t a problem, I thought. My fears and worries kept me awake. I looked down into the gorge at the fog’s methodical rise. I felt more comfortable perched on the rock, but I wondered what Benny’s view, peering from the edge, was like.
Benny turned away, facing the gorge less than a foot from the edge. “Thirty minutes ago, you couldn’t see anything except the fog. You wouldn’t have been able to realize the depth of the canyon or that a river cut its way through at the bottom. If you wait another thirty minutes you’ll be able to see the railroad track that runs along the rim of the river. You can even see the white water the river churns out from pouring through the slim channel. But as the day passes, the sun will start to set behind the mountains, darkening the gorge. The view changes again.”
“If you came over here and stood with your eyes closed, so you couldn’t see down into the gorge, would it get rid of your fear of falling?” he asked. A smile started to form on his face.
“No,” I said with a definitive tone. “I would still know the cliff edge is there.”
“What if you didn’t know you were close to the edge? Would that change how you felt?”
“Yeah, but I do know. I can see the drop-off!”
“Well, unless you make a foolish error in walking or you choose to jump off, a fall is very unlikely.”
“That’s why I’m not going near the edge,” I said. “I’m playing it safe.”
“But you’re missing out on a great view,” he said, looking back over the ledge.
“I’ll take your word for it,” I said, laughing.
“What’s the worst thing that can happen?” Benny asked, still standing near the edge.
It was another question that I had never spent time thinking about. “Dying,” I said. “What could be worse?”
“Is that the worst thing that can happen to you, Jack?” Benny asked. His back was turned toward me.
I thought for a moment before responding. “No, there are things worse than my own death. The death of one of my children or seeing them injured or suffering would be worse.” I paused again. “If I were paralyzed and unable to move—that would be worse than death to me. You know, Benny, I had never thought about some of the things we’ve talked about.”
“That’s one of the challenges of living a fast-paced life. We don’t have time to be meditative, to think calmly. We surrender our lives to our schedule and don’t leave time to consider what we’ve done and what we intend to do—now. But open spaces and a slower life can bring you that.”
“The only time I had to think was when I was driving. But my cell phone rings constantly,” I said, laughing.
“We all need time to think,” he said. “Thinking is a choice. You have to be awake, present, to think the right thoughts.”
I thought about the thoughts that kept me awake at night. “My problem is turning off my brain—it seems like it just keeps churning,” I said, “even when I don’t want it to.”
“I was the same, but I learned to discipline my thoughts. At one point in my life I was faced with having little to do except think.”
“In Vietnam?” I asked.
“Yes. It’s almost funny that I had to go half way around the world and be kept in a cage to find some time to think,” he said. He turned and walked back to the rock I was sitting on and leaned against an adjacent boulder. “When I was a POW, I came face to face with a lot of my fears. I asked myself a lot of questions. While it was an experience that could not be termed as good by any means, I learned from my time there.”
“I could’ve never survived something like that,” I said, trying to picture myself in a POW camp. “Being trapped and held captive against your will had to be something that was worse than death.”
“In many ways it was. But I discovered what freedom was,” he said.
“That’s something only a POW could probably appreciate.”
“No, I think there are a lot of people who are prisoners and don’t realize it.”
I wasn’t sure where Benny was going with this.
“People build their own prisons. I’ve met a lot of people who are trapped in a prison of their own making—a prisoner of their mind. They refuse to change. Their fears blind them. They may not be in a jail cell, but in many ways it’s worse. They’re never fully awake to reality. It’s almost like they’re sleepwalking. I was one of those people before I was a POW,” he said.
Worried that he saw me as a sleepwalker, I brought the subject back to his experience as a POW. “What kind of prison did they keep you in?”
“It wasn’t anything like a prison or jail here—I spent most of my time in a bamboo cage.”
“Did they ever let you out?”
“No, there were a limited number of jailers, so they kept us locked down in the cages.”
“How did you survive?”
“I survived because I remained awake,” he said. I realized being awake was more than having your eyes opened.
“I knew I couldn’t leave. Being rescued wasn’t a reality. So I had to find a way to live as a prisoner and keep my hope alive.”
“Did they try to brainwash you?”
“That’s an interesting term—brainwash. Actually, they were trying to clutter my mind, not clean it. A confused mind is a fearful mind.”
“But weren’t you afraid?”
“Yes!” he said, smiling at the question. “That’s what I fought every moment I was there. My worst enemy wasn’t my captors—it was fear. It can paralyze you—it can stop your mind from being awake and alert. You stop seeing things as they are. You’re blinded by horrors real and imagined. Doubt destroys your hope.
“But a Buddhist monk named Chi Mai helped save me. He helped me learn to stay awake.”
“Was he a supporter of the North Vietnamese?” I asked.
“I asked him the same question. His response was, ‘I’m human.’ I trusted him after I heard him say that. The NVA accepted him as he was, detached from the war, and allowed him to bring some food to us POWs. As a Buddhist monk, he didn’t present any challenge to them, but they watched him. His visits were brief and didn’t allow much time to talk. He spoke fluent English, but because the North Vietnamese were suspicious that he was a spy, talking with him was limited. Conversations that you and I could have in two minutes took us months. I listened closely to everything he said. I also thought about what I would say. Words were precious between us, and I didn’t want to waste any.”
“How did he guide you with so little time to talk?”
“He asked questions.”
We lose what we fail to use.
—BENJAMIN FRANKLIN PRICE
32. What Is Freedom?
“WHAT IS FREEDOM?” Benny asked.
“Being able to do what I want, when I want to,” I answered. “No one having control over me.” It was an honest answer, something I had been thinking about during our conversation.
“That was probably how I would have answered before I was a POW. But there’s much more to being free than being free from someone else’s oppression. It was the first question Chi Mai asked me. Imagine having nothing else to do or think about for weeks except that simple question. That gave me some focus.”
It was difficult for me to imagine the agony of being locked in a cage—that loss of freedom. With nothing else
to do but think, fear could take over your thoughts.
“I thought about what made people free. I concluded it was the power to choose what they thought,” he said. “It was almost a month before I could tell him my answer. I knew I would only have a couple of seconds, so when I had my chance I said, ‘My choice.’ I expected him to say ‘That’s right’ or at least nod his head to acknowledge the answer. Instead, he asked, ‘What binds you?’ He left, leaving me with another question to ponder. At first, I thought of being caged in the prison. I thought about my captors. Then, I thought of what I had lost. I realized that the desire to go where I pleased remained inside of me. I directed my thoughts. I found I could adapt them and find my own motivation and will. These were all choices I made—not someone else.”
“That’s amazing,” I said, soaking up every word.
“On his next visit one of the jailers was standing nearby. When Chi Mai handed me a piece of bread, I looked at him and said as quietly as I could, ‘Nothing binds me.’ He smiled and said, ‘You’re awake.’ It was a wonderful moment—I still had my freedom, but I had to exercise it and keep my mind active. Knowing I could choose my thoughts and responses kept me free inside, even though I was sitting in a cage that didn’t allow me to stand up straight. Freedom is seeing things as they are. As long as I was awake, I was free.”
“Why wouldn’t seeing things as they are depress you and make you more fearful?”
“Being awake meant that I still had a choice to make in life. By having a choice, change was possible. Change gave me hope, Jack. We create our own destinies. The reason I survived as a POW was because I never surrendered my mind, never turned my destiny over to my captors. The other person who helped me was my jailer.”
“Your jailer?” I was stunned.
“I learned to understand the world from his point of view. Everyone has a different view. Everything a person sees goes through filters of prejudice, hopes, and dreams, and, of course, fears, jealousy, and desires. We think we see the world as it is. But really, what we see is the world as we want to see it. His view was much different from mine. When he looked at me, he saw a man who came uninvited to his country to harm him and his world. It was easy for him to be a jailer. I was being punished because I was his enemy.”
