pohenry, #83
Henry Flores is professor of political science at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas. He writes, “I teach statistics, research methods and elections and voting behavior. I’m 57 years of age, am married to a literary critic and am the father of a brilliant, athletic, and highly creative 15 year old daughter. Oh yeah, we have a great dog—a dachshund named Caramelo.”9
Got ahold of Rod [Lola] last night. Rod already knew about it; he’d called Puller yesterday, got the brother-in-law who told him. No surprise to Rod.
Peg pointed out something worth noting after reading the newspaper article this morning. While a lot of response focuses on Lew’s being defeated by depression, failing to survive in the long term his injuries, being unable to deal with it all, in fact he was a survivor for 20-odd years. He parlayed a shitty hand into a lot of success, and that’s what he should be remembered for, not his final act. That act tells us just how fucked that war left him, but his life tells us what kind of man he was.
Cap’n Jack
Jack Mallory is a former captain in the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment and Vietnam Veterans Against the War member, now a high school teacher, counselor, and father of two young boys.10
V-Man,
Here’s what happened to me day before yesterday. Being a Vvet helped me help somebody then. I don’t know if this means anything.
A guy people would consider a “bum” was down on the sidewalk. His face was white, he had cold sweat running through his clothes, which were a rag tag collection. He had a beautiful set of Nikes on his feet. An ultimate incongruity.
He was shaking and looking up and down, holding the back of his neck. His hair, an oily mess—remember that?—was pasted to his scalp so I could see completely through to his pate. One person had stopped, but others were afraid to look at him or acknowledge his presence. I stopped, not because I’m a good guy by any means, but because I felt “there but for the grace of God go I.” With my head problems, we could have been bros. There are a lot of bros out there.
We started talking and he shook some more. He was scared because his chest was giving him pain. He was scared because he was having a hard time breathing. He shook some more.
Theresa was standing off to the side concerned about the gentleman.
I tried to have him lay down on his side but he couldn’t do it. He didn’t want an ambulance, but I winked at the other guy (about my age) and he left to make the call. I put my hand on this guy’s shoulder and we started to talk.
His sister had given him his new Nikes. She worked at Nike in Portland. He shook some more and said he’d been having seizures lately. Said he might need some medication. I didn’t think he was strung out. He didn’t look like it. He was down and out.
Who among us hasn’t been at one time or another, whether it was in Nam or here after we got back?
People continued passing at a distance and we talked some more. We talked about what this guy wanted to do. His needs were simple. He just wanted to stop shaking and feel good. (Remember feeling like that?) He tried to breathe more slowly. We breathed together.
Within an instant the sirens slowly approached. A huge fire truck drove up. I was proud to see Eugene’s finest respond so quickly. Three guys jumped out and walked slowly. I told them what I knew. They took over and put a hand on his shoulder. He couldn’t look up. They were good to this guy. They treated him with dignity (remember when people didn’t treat you with dignity? remember those officers who did? Bet Puller was one of those, eh?)
He didn’t want to go to the hospital, but these firefighters treated him with the kind of care I would like to extend to others if I could. Some people I just don’t give a damn about.
I cared about this guy, too. One of the firefighters looked about my age. He may have been a little older. I thought of you Vman. He started talking to this guy again and put his hand on the person’s shoulder. He brought out some tubes and put some in his nose, while another person took this guy’s blood pressure.
I left, but seeing these guys work with this person with such humanity brought back all of the posts you’ve made to this list, Vman. You’re one special dude. A lot of folks need ya. I hope you hang around.
Monte
MtK,
I don’t know when that happens (when the hurt gets too much), but I know what I said for Vman goes for you, too, bro. There are a few other folks on this list who keep me going everyday. Without em, I don’t know.
I can only say I’m glad you’re there. I don’t want you taking no trips. I would be royally pissed and come back to haunt your ass.
Your bud,
Montster [Monte]
MtK,
Doan know, bro. I suspect the answer is highly variable, on a scale we don’t even know the measurement units on.
I know I hang around ’cause I wanna see Weet11 and if I off myself there’s a chance I won’t get the opportunity. I’ve waited too many years to waste that chance now. Works for me, won’t for anyone else. ٭)shrug(٭
You ain’t alone in the question, Murray. And whatever the answer is for you, you won’t be alone in that either. I think there’s a helluva lot of folk like you, with the same damn answer every morning.
As long as you keep answering every morning, it’s the right one.
McMike
Mike McCombs, Sr., died of breast cancer about two years after this message. Breast cancer is usually extremely rare among men, but is not rare among those exposed to Agent Orange. McMike, a veteran of the 5th Special Forces Group in Vietnam, wrote about his experiences with great eloquence.12
As I read the posts about Lew Puller, I thought about a recent thread on this list … the daily decisions being made about whether to go or to stay. Although this poem is written with masculine pronouns, it is meant for each of you who make these daily decisions … you know who you are.
A PRAYER FOR DEATH AND LIFE
By Judee Strott
For one I pray that Death will come to take him in the night,
for he no longer wants to live, he’s given up the fight.
I pray for Death to take him, and yet he still lives on
while others only half his age have died and now are gone.
He’s so old, he’s lived his life, he’s nearly 90 now,
he’s weak and frail, he cannot walk, his back is bent, head bowed.
His wife has gone before him, and he cannot figure why
God makes him keep on living, and will not let him die
For one I pray that Death will come; for one I pray for Life.
For one I pray he overcomes the demons and the dreams
that haunt his sleep and torment him with silent deadly screams;
the memories he can’t forget that fill him with such dread,
that daily he decides between the living and the dead.
For one I pray that something can entreat him to remain
to try again for one more day, to live with all his pain;
’till all the sufferings of the past can finally fade away,
and a sweet peace overflows his cup, Lord help him decide to stay.
Judee
Judee Strott is neither a veteran nor a teacher or scholar of the Vietnam War. She and her husband, Jerry, are retired and devote enormous time and energy to the support of Vietnam veterans. She wrote in her VWAR address list profile, “Jerry and I provide information from data bases and various printed records related to POW/MIA, Names on The Wall, DoD Combat Casualty Files, etc. to anyone who requests it. We attend meetings of organizations to demonstrate what these data bases contain; provide information to assist organizations with special events such as stand downs, organizing POW/MIA recognition day ceremonies, etc.; participate in Friends of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial’s programs (In Touch, In Memory, etc.) and distribute FVVM literature at events (Moving Wall, county fair, etc.).
“We do not charge for any information we provide … to borrow a phrase from a friend … VN Ve
terans have already paid the price.”
Despite the derision that members of the discussion sometimes heaped upon “ReallyCares™”—the sarcastic label hung on civilians who seem mostly interested in their own self-images as compassionate and deep, and in their own touristic avidity in interesting and intense emotional experiences (much like the Phaeacian courtiers for whom the Trojan War was pure entertainment)—this motherly presence seemed to be accepted as genuine.13
I don’t know what the demons all were but I think that Lew did what most Marines do when their gear wears out … they survey it. I think he realized that his body and his life had just worn out and it was time. I know his father will understand. We all wish him well and we will miss him.
Semper Fi. Helmuts
Helmuts Feifs has an excruciatingly—I mean that modifier to be taken literally—funny imaginary business firm called Weptronics and mock advice column called “Ask Mr. Guilt.”14
pain slips away in the dark of night
demons are put to rest
no more!
no more
pain
guilt
rage
no more
what if
home It puller
home at last
peace
mtk
Warren Murray moniker
I am reminded of the apocryphal joke about the lady caught in the flood; convinced that God will save her, she refuses help from two rowboats and a helicopter, and drowns.
Arriving in heaven, she rails at God for not saving her.
“Lady,” God says, “I sent two rowboats and a helicopter. How much more did you want?”
Lewis Puller could or would no longer reach out to grasp that skid. If you live for another and they are removed, you may not be able to see the true answer to your prayers.
As MaryBeth [the writer’s wife] once told me with some surprize in her voice. “You seem to be the answer to my prayers, not exactly what I was praying for; but apparently the answer.”
For many of the vets on this list, Vwar-l is the helicopter, and we are the crewchiefs.
And I, for one, intend to grasp every hand that reaches for the skids; even if I have to slap the owner of that hand upside their heads to make them look up at the rotor noise.
Terminator
W. T. Edmonds is the author of the poem “Lewis Puller Ain’t on the Wall,” near the beginning of this chapter. He is the person mentioned by Mike Viehman at the end of the previous chapter as having taken him to the Wall for the first time.
>and then just put all of Vietnam behind me. [Excerpt from a posting by another list member.]
Forget it, Steve. Nevah hoppen, GI. Best you can do is live with it, and plan on continuing to live with it. I spent a long time waiting for “it” to go away. Finally realized that “it” was me, and I wasn’t going away.
>(I have never believed that I suffer from post traumatic stress. I honestly wasn’t exposed to that much trauma.) [A further excerpt from the earlier posting.]
I don’t know how many times I’ve said this to myself and others. I don’t know what you saw; I know what Rod and Lew and Jay-Bird and lots of others saw and experienced was far worse than what I went through. But, if you accept Jonathan’s thesis, there are two things that combine to produce PTSD: a sense of deep moral betrayal, and experiencing the death of close friends. Many of us felt the moral betrayal, either through a conviction that the entire war was wrong, and/or through a sense that, regardless of the justification for the war, the government wasted our lives and society didn’t give a shit about us. That, combined with the deaths of those we knew, even if not close friends, with viewing the death and dismemberment of other human beings, may bring to all of us a degree of post-traumatic stress. Such stress must be a matter of degree, rather than something you either “have” or don’t “have.”
Cap’n Jack
This message responds to one that I have not included here.
Tracey,
Thanks for saying this … it’s what I’ve been thinking all day as I’ve read the messages from other vwar-l folks responding to Lewis Puller’s death. It’s especially meaningful since I took Jay to the VA hospital last Friday to seek help with his VN demons. You really have said it well.
Suezq
A number of members of VWAR were spouses or siblings, or like the author of the next message, siblings-in-law of Vietnam veterans.
Disclaimer—I’m not a vet, and I haven’t yet had to ask these questions.
What I ٭did٭ have was many nights, 11 years ago, listening to my brother-in-law ask the same question. And many more nights wondering what else I could have done, and explaining to my husband what I didn’t really understand myself—that there ٭was nothing٭ else that we could have done.
That said—I don’t think the answer is “when is the struggle no longer worth the effort,” but rather “when do you stop asking the question.”
As long as you’re still asking, you’re still hanging on.
Catwoman
Catwoman writes that she “grew up in the 60’s with a WWII vet father who came back from WWII swearing that he never wanted anyone else to go through that again, and therefore at an early age was taken along to activities that included WWII vets against the [Vietnam] war.”15
Veewees,
I second all the good stuff that everybody said about Lew, I also was moved by his book.
In addition to all his other fine attributes, his writing showed a deep love for his Dad, his wife, and his country. He gave tribute to them and the nurses, doctors, and physical therapists that were involved in his recovery.
He did an ٭awful lot٭ for vets, with his book, his job as a lawyer with the VA, and many other ways.
We lost a good friend.
Polecat (aka Jim Schueckler)
Jim “Polecat” Schueckler writes that he is the “founder of the (original) Virtual Wall at www.VirtualWall.org.” He volunteers as a National Park Service “Yellow Hat” docent and visitors’ aide at the Wall.16
I guess I was the ultimate REMF [Vietnam vet slang for “rear echelon motherfucker,” in this instance meaning noncombat support personnel], but Puller’s death did hurt, reminds of all those others who don’t make the news. His death and the coverage is for them, too.
“THE FORTUNATE SON”17
For Lewis Puller, d. 1994, from a festering wound
They shouldn’t call it suicide,
this self-inflicted gunshot wound—
the trigger squeezed so many years ago—
day by day, the fragment slipped inside.
His name won’t be chiseled on the Wall.
He won’t reflect your face for you.
He doesn’t qualify. He missed
the cut-off date. He died too late.
Lewis Puller? You’ll find him on the Wall.
He’s always been there. Chesty’s son,
Marine lieutenant, tripped a mine, lost
his legs, made his hero daddy proud, wrote
a book, held firm the lives of all of us,
but, finally, could not hold his own.
—Palmer © 1994
H. Palmer Hall is a poet and editor of A Measured Response (San Antonio: Pecan Grove Press, 1993) and author of From the Periphery: Poems and Essays (San Antonio: Chili Verde Press, 1994), in which this poem appeared. His fourth book is Deep Thicket and Still Waters (Chili Verde Press, 2000), a collection of poems dealing primarily with the murder of James Byrd, Jr.18
Palmer,
Well, you did it. Thus far in these days since Puller’s death I’ve been beleagered by it, a bit obsessed with it, but hadn’t actually reached the point of tears for him and all those who’ve gone before, and will go after, by their own hand. Your poem broke open the floodgates.
Thank you for a thoughtful contribution, a painful truth in a lovely package.
Michele
Michele is Michael Viehman’s wife.
I did n
ot know Puller. I have not read his book. I am saddened by his passing, as I have been saddened by the passing of others, but life does go on.
------ was a friend of mine. ------ had a wife and three daughters, all of who adored the man. ------ also had his demons which, although he put in his tour in VN, had little to do with that. We knew about ------’s demons before he went. In 1971, the demons won. ------, with his 15-year old daughter in the next room, ate a.357, doing grievous damage to himself and the wallpaper.
What he accomplished for himself I do not know, other than the fact that for one brief nanosecond he must have realized that the pain was ending. For him. It was just starting for his family and friends, who were left to clean up the mess, literally and figuratively.
A friend of mine called me this morning, disturbed by Puller’s death and worried about me. I’m not sure why he was worried about me. He need not have been.
’Tis indeed, at least in my tired old mind, better to endure the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune than to end it with a bare bodkin or anything else. I believe that, like ------, there would be only a hint of relief, satisfaction, revenge, self-pity, or whatever else I might have chosen as the reason, and then there would be nothing. I would not be here to revel in the result of the action. The only consequence would be the lifetime of recrimination and wondering why by friends, and a new set of problems for family and loved ones, far more serious than the ones I fled from. I’m not that selfish. I’ve devoted most of my adult life to making those I love comfortable and secure. The fact that I have not always succeeded in this will not deter me from continuing to try so long as I can still draw a breath.
And like Term, I—m willing to grab the hand of anyone else who is reaching for the skids or scrambling over the gunwale.
sharkbait
Dear All,
When I was in DC and met Corkster, I learned from her that the Friends of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial have a program called IN MEMORY devoted to Vietnam veterans who have “died prematurely” as a result of their service in and around Vietnam. My impression is that the program has just started. I looked through the IN MEMORY book, and about two-thirds of the men remembered in there died of Agent Orange related illnesses and most of the remaining third had killed themselves.
Odysseus in America Page 24
