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| USS Okinawa: BLT 1/3 August 1967 (click pic to enlarge) |
47 Years
August 1 will be 47 years since I left active duty in the Marine Corps. I still think about Vietnam every single day. When I was in Vietnam I never thought it would be with me this far down the line. I didn’t even know there would be a “this far down the line.” I really did expect to die there.
There is a country road that goes past one particular field about a mile from my house. I pass many fields all the time, but this one puts me right back into Vietnam.
The field looks like a rice paddy, especially when it rains. About a hundred yards away across the field are several structures that look like hootchs in a jungle village tucked within a tree line. Near the road is a long ditch like a fighting hole.
I can see Marines in fighting holes along the ditch, waiting for dark. And then I’m back there. It doesn’t look exactly like Vietnam, but close enough to bring everything back again, and it’s not a positive thing. I had spent too many nights sitting in the dark waiting.
The next day my wife asked me if I was in a bad mood. I wasn’t in a bad mood but I was having trouble dealing with that damn war again. I just don’t understand why I can’t let it go. I’ve been through about every form of treatment the VA has to offer, and nothing seems to change.
I go back to the war every single day, and it’s horrible. The only time I really feel comfortable is when I’m with other combat vets or close relatives, or isolated at home with my wife. I love singing and performing, and when I do that, I can escape for a few moments and be a performer. Then, no one can see the side of me that deals with PTSD each day.
Survival guilt is part of it, and feeling as if I didn’t do enough is another part. The fear of being ambushed if I fall asleep is still another part of it. Maybe my lack of empathy for the enemy is another part. While I was with 1/3, being responsible for the lives of enemy prisoners in the field is another part.
It was hard enough dragging my own body through Nam without having to keep some VC or NVA alive long enough to get them to the rear so they could be interrogated again. I participated in field interrogations, what today would be called torture. I felt nothing for them as humans, and I still don’t. Getting any information that would save Marines was our job, and some of the enemy were real hardcore. I would do it all again.
Even this far down the line, if I went back to Vietnam, I would want to start shooting. I’ve never wanted to go back to that country.
I think some veterans believe they can find peace by returning to the war zone. I don’t believe it. Things always seem smaller and out of proportion when you visit some place that was a big part of your life at one time, and it’s never the same.
I’m still a Marine inside, with survival skills, wondering how all the time went by so fast. Sometimes, a sight or sound will send me back. I hate it, but this is my life now. The person I was before Vietnam is gone forever.
