In 1990, author Tim O'Brien released "The Things They Carried." This was his third book about the Vietnam War, written as a collection of short stories based upon his personal experiences in the Army's 23rd Infantry Division.
“They carried the sky. The whole atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all of it. They carried gravity. They shared the weight of memory. They bore what others could no longer bear; often they carried each other, the wounded, the weak, the dead,” O'Brien penned. “They carried the common secret of cowardice barely restrained, the instinct to run, freeze, or hide – in many respects, this was the heaviest burden of all, for it could never be put down. It required perfect balance and posture.”
In 1966, my parents saw their youngest son off to war. At first he went to college, but after a semester it was off to complete basic training, which led to his next destination: Vietnam. He served two tours there, one in Forward Reconnaissance and, like O'Brien, one in the Infantry.
In ways they could never have known, after my parents bid their young son - now a soldier - farewell, their bond with him became permanently affected by war's terrible toll.
As O'Brien put it, “Where the brutal killing of innocents on both sides cannot be explained... soldiers dealt with the pain of their feelings, forced into extreme situations that have no obvious solutions and devastating lasting consequences.“
It would be a defining moment for my parents, for though their son survived the jungles of Vietnam and returned home to the farm, for a time, he was not content, nor could he contend with “normal” life. He reenlisted, and this time, when he was discharged, he settled out west. My parents would never see him again.
War wreaks havoc on soldiers and their families. The Vietnam War was especially devastating.
"By daylight, they took sniper fire, at night they were mortared, but it was not battle, just the endless march, village to village without purpose, nothing won or lost; at night, the eerie quiet of the jungle caused soldiers’ imaginations to run wild with fantastic images stranger than anything they might actually encounter,” O'Brien recalled in his book,
Not only were these soldiers not considered heroes in the eyes of some of their compatriots, but the psychological ramifications of the war were just becoming apparent:
In O'Brien's words (words which could have been my brother’s), “I’d come to this war a quiet, thoughtful person...with fine intellectual credentials, but after seven months in the bush, I realized those civilized trappings had been crushed under the weight of the simple daily realities. I'd turned mean inside."
My parents always loved their son and came to accept his need for privacy, however, they never stopped hoping and praying for a miracle. As the part of the Prayer of Saint Francis goes: “O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love.”
Estrangement from her youngest son pushed my mother’s faith and trust in her Lord to the limits; however, she brought her suffering to Him and laid it at the foot of the cross. She never forsook her Jesus, though she cried out in sorrow, “My Lord, why have You forsaken me?” and then in obedience and humility, “Not my will, but Thine be done.”
