DAY 29: Lost in Service

All we can offer their families is our respect and honor, and the courage to keep the flame of freedom alive.

(c) 2006 and 2011 by Billie S. Noakes. All rights reserved.

I remember when I was a little girl, and my grandma and grandpa would take me downtown to see the Memorial Day parade.

Grandpa would wear his old, stiff Army uniform, and stand on the curb with Grandma and me ’til it was time for him to join the other veterans, young and old, all lining up to march. It made me proud to watch my Grandpa marching shoulder to shoulder with men who may not have served in his war, but nevertheless served the same ideals.

As I grew up, my family’s dinner table discussions gave me a fuller understanding of the meaning of our soldiers’ sacrifices and our duty – no: our privilege – to honor those who lost their lives in service to our country.

Maybe that’s why I was so taken with Tommy, a boy who always stood up tall and covered his heart when our flag was carried by. He was so proud whenever a soldier glanced his way and acknowledged his earnest salute.

Tommy was what you’d call “true blue,” a boy who was always ready to stand up for the little kid on the playground, even if it meant taking on the schoolyard bully.

He was a skinny kid, but he was strong enough to admit when he did something wrong and make it right. When he got older, if anybody in town needed a hand, well, Tommy’s was always the first one offered.

By the time we were in high school, I was sweet on Tommy, and we started keeping company. We were a good match and it wasn’t long before we were talking
about the future. Our future.

Tommy wanted to go to college and study business, then work in his dad’s hardware store. We’d get married, and have kids of our own.

But in our senior year in high school, there was a war on. I wasn’t surprised, after graduation, when Tommy put our plans on hold to join the service. His country needed him, and that’s all Tommy needed to know.

I tried not to cry as Tommy kissed me at the bus station. Tried not to worry. After all, he’d be surrounded by young men much like himself, who would protect his life like it was their own, and somehow they’d bring each other back to their sweethearts and their wives.

Well, they brought Tommy back, all right, but transport ships, airplanes, and buses can only take you so far. When I saw the look in his eyes as he stepped off that old Greyhound, I knew Tommy would never be coming all the way home. The shrapnel and the scars left Tommy disabled, but they didn’t cripple him the way his memories did.

He never talked about those memories, and I didn’t want to make things worse by forcing the issue.

I sometimes wonder, now, if I was right.

I waited for Tommy to call me, to pick up where we’d left off, but he never did. I tried calling him, but he never returned my calls. He didn’t go to college, either. He was on meds that made it hard for him to concentrate, to study, or even to have a good conversation.

He didn’t go into his dad’s hardware business. He didn’t marry me.

Instead, Tommy became part of our town’s landscape, doing odd jobs to keep busy, staying close to his folks’ home, and getting by on his disability pay.

I finally quit waiting for Tommy, and when I did, I met Jeff.

Jeff is a good man, but he was never in the service; his dad was gone, so he went to college while he helped out at home, then started his own accounting business. Jeff and I got married after a few years, and we raised a nice family. Our kids are grown, and I love to babysit for my grandkids, now.

Tommy? He never did marry. His dad died, and Tommy lives with his mom, the two of them alone in that big old house on Main Street.

Tommy stops in for a beer every couple of nights at the VFW hall. He listens to the friendly banter about drill instructors from Hell, reckless nights on leave, and the zany antics of comrades-in-arms, but he grows silent when the talk turns to battle, and he leaves his beer on the bar and goes back home.

To this day he doesn’t complain. Not about the pain, or the medications, not even about the way people stop and stare, sometimes, when he shambles by. Never about being changed forever by the war, and the things he’s seen … things he’s done … things he’s endured.

Today, it’s another Memorial Day, and my husband is off helping the parade organizers and setting up for the Honor Our Heroes ceremony that follows at the pavilion. Our daughter’s children are visiting this weekend, and they’re going with me to watch the parade.

I’m so proud that our grandkids were taught to understand the meaning of this day, and why it’s important to remember those fallen in battle, how precious our way of life is, and how dearly it’s been bought.

They’ve been taught to stand tall and show respect when they meet a man or woman in uniform.

Mikey, Isabella, and I hold hands on the sidewalk as the honor guard marches past. Bella’s eyes are wide as she takes in the flags and the uniformed soldiers, and she bounces on her tippy-toes to get her first glimpse of the company of mounted soldiers. Mikey stands very still and straight, with his hand over his heart, and my mind drifts back through the years to another little boy I used to know.

My eyes wander over the crowd, and I’m surprised to see Tommy looking at me with his never-coming-home gaze. With a start, I realize it’s not Tommy. This veteran isn’t close to his age, doesn’t look a thing like him.

I look around, and I see more than a dozen pairs of eyes with that million-mile stare, forgotten soldiers gazing out on the neighbors they protect, even now, by keeping their private hell inside.

I look around more carefully and suddenly I see him, standing on the other side of the street.

For the time it takes the honor guard to march past him, Tommy is standing tall again, unmindful of the metal embedded in his back and the door he keeps locked tight against his memories.

Then Tommy looks right at me, as though he’s always known just where to find me, and his eyes are quickly drawn to the little boy and girl clutching my hands. I know we’re both thinking of the family Tommy and I might have had, and I see him take a deep, slow breath before his eyes meet mine again.

We nod to each other across the heads of the young Cub Scouts proudly marching by, and as Tommy turns away, I see the weight of pain and loss pull his eyes, then his shoulders, back down toward the pavement.

I watch as he makes his way down the block, and I think about all of the men and women who have lost their lives in service to our country.

Just like Tommy … not all of them died.

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This story was inspired by the late Peter A. Jacobsen, a fine blues musician and a Viet Nam era vet. Miss you, Pete, and appreciate the company on “The Long, Hungry Road.”