Posted on 11/11/2018 11:58:14 AM PST by pboyington
On Veterans Day, it is important for those who have never served to take a moment to understand the solitary world of a vet.
Millions of vets are and have been successful in all endeavors. They are doctors, lawyers, business people and a thousand other professions. Not all have PTSD; not all are the troubled, brooding, street corner homeless guy, although they exist and need help desperately.
No matter how successful a vet might be materially, more often than not, vets are often alone, mentally and spiritually each day and for the rest of their lives.
Vets’ stories are all different, but some elements of the common experience exist.
Many vets experienced and saw and heard and did things unimaginable to the average person. They also lived a daily camaraderie that cannot be repeated in the civilian world. In fact, many vets spend the rest of their lives seeking the same esprit de corps that simply is absent from their civilian lives and jobs. They long to spend just 15 minutes back with the best friends they ever had, friends that are scattered to every corner of the earth, and some to the afterlife itself.
Vets are haunted by visions of horror and death, by guilt of somehow surviving and living the good life, when some they knew are gone. They strangely wish sometimes that they were back in those dreadful circumstances, not to experience the dirt and horror and terror and noise and violence again, but to be with the only people a vet really knows, other vets.
Civilians must understand that for a vet nothing is ever the same again. Their senses can be suddenly illuminated by the slightest sound or smell or sight: sights of death all around, a living version of Dante’s Inferno; sounds so loud that they can only be described as Saving Private Ryan in surround sound on steroids; smells vast and horrific; rotting death, burning fuel and equipment, rubber, animals and…people. The smoldering ruins of life all around them.
All vets have these thoughts nearly every day. Some may experience them for fractions of second, or for minutes at a time. They replay over and over again like an endless 24 hour war movie.
Part of the solitary world of the vet is being able to enjoy complete bliss doing absolutely nothing. This is a trait grating to civilians who must constantly search for endless stimuli. Unbeknownst to them, the greatest thrill of all is just being alive. A lot of vets have an Obi-wan Kenobi calmness. After what they went through, how bad can anything really be?
As King said to Chris in Platoon, “Make it outta here, it’s all gravy, every day of the rest of your life – gravy…”
So many, if not all vets walk around each day lost in their own special story. They were once great actors on a giant stage with speaking parts and props. Maybe they were heroes and now they aren’t anymore. Maybe they helped save the world and now they can’t. Maybe they gave orders and now they take them. Maybe they thought that they could accomplish anything and now they know they can’t. Perhaps their lives now are smaller and slower and sometimes in the vet’s mind, just incidental, even though they’re not.
Most civilians are oblivious to the solitary life of the vet. But, it’s there. It’s the same eternal and universal philosophy, whether you fought in World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, Iraq or Afghanistan. The experiences may have been different, but the emotions are the same.
A problem with the solitary world of the vet is that the vet has a hard time explaining what he or she did to those who didn’t serve. Some vets want to talk, but they have no outlet. Maybe their only outlet is watching a war movie or reading a book about the conflict they were in.
How often do people say, “Grandpa never talks about Korea.” That’s because Grandpa knows no one can understand except other vets. That’s because Grandpa knows most people don’t care.
Part of this taciturn mentality is that vets speak another language, a strange and archaic language of their past. How do you talk to civilians about “fire for effect” or “grid 7310” or “shake and bake” or “frag orders” or “10 days and a wake up” or a thousand and one other terms that are mystifying to the real world?
You can’t.
All of this adds to the solitary world of the vet. Some are better at handling life afterwards than others. Some don’t seem affected at all, but they are. They just hide it. Some never return to normal. But, what is normal to a vet anymore?
So, this Veterans Day, if you see a vet sitting by themselves at a restaurant or on a train or shopping at the grocery store alone, take a moment to speak with them. Take them out of their solitary world for a moment. You’ll be happy you did.
I was never more important and vital than I was at 19 and 22, when I played a large role in keeping the North Koreans from invading the South. I look upon the developments in Korea today as a natural extension of work that I and thousands of others did in past decades to keep the fragile peace there. If it brings lasting peace and reunification it will vindicate us.
PING
For the files
When you swear in, (like I did under my Dad doing the swearing in) your turning your existence over to the government to do with as they wish up to and including getting you killed. THAT is the blank check vets have written.
If there is one thing I would change about the military, it would be paid, round trip airfare for any military person stationed overseas who takes approved military leave to return home for whatever reason...........
Furthermore, unless things have changed when I was in, I would create a department of the military focused solely on providing travel arrangements for military personnel going on leave or going home following discharge.
When I left the Army back in 1972, we flew from the Canal Zone to Ft. Jackson, SC for out processing and arrived on a Friday night. When all the paper work was done the following Monday afternoon, they gave me a check for unused leave time and said good bye. (They may have given me travel money but I don't remember).
After I got back to the barracks, I had to find a pay phone and a yellow pages and book a flight back home to Michigan. Fortunately I was able to share a cab to the airport with one of my buddies...........
That weekend was the most surreal time of my life..........
Important to remind people that a veteran is someone who has fought, or at least served in a combat theatre with significant risk of getting killed, not a chubby gal who got PTSD flying a desk for the Air Force while never leaving the CONUS.
I really don’t know a response to this...It is beautifully accurate...Always in my mind....
As a follow up, my experience was nothing compared to a friend of mine who DID serve in Vietnam and processed out in California and had to find his way back to Michigan.........
It is also important to remind people that everyone who has taken the oath and put on a uniform was committed to duty 24 hours a day from that point on. It is especially true in this day and age that we have no idea what tomorrow may bring.
Best regards to all who have stepped up.
Thank you and other veterans here more than I can say — from the bottom of my free heart.
I think you'll appreciate these remarks from cowboy poet Baxter Black.
A group of my vet buddies and I attended a Veteran’s Day thank you event today...A very nice affair, and I’m grateful to be recognized...But...
As I was thanked for “my service” and wished a Happy Veterans Day, over and over, couldn’t help but think there’s something incongruous and contradictory about the expression of such sentiments...
How many of these people just days ago may have marked their ballots for socialists who intend to wreck the Constitution and Bill of Rights we swore to protect and defend?
Makes me wonder sometimes what was the point of it all, and where do I go to get my 4 years back?
“Important to remind people that a veteran is someone who has fought, or at least served in a combat theatre with significant risk of getting killed, not a chubby gal who got PTSD flying a desk for the Air Force while never leaving the CONUS.”
I spent twenty years in the Navy. I did a 4 year sea duty tour and 16 years recruiting. Can I please be a veteran under your standards?
Oh, YES! Wonderfully worded, he hits it all there — thanks for link.
What I was referring to and what I think the men who said it to me were likewise is that the military has become something of a "job's program" to some people. I remember taking a class with a MA National Guardsman (who complained more than once that the Military has too many Republicans) who stated "I wear this uniform and I am an extraordinary person." No combat or overseas service, from what I recall he was fresh back from Basic Training, but he more than willing to lump himself in with those who did serve in adverse conditions. Also met a lady who had some desk job that gave her PTSD, somehow.
“Not my standards, this has been said to me by multiple combat vets over the years.”
You didn’t reference any of your own service. Please tell me you served because if you haven’t...well, I’ll put it nicely. Your moral authority to determine who is and is not a veteran is severely lacking.
Good piece. I recall Ray Starmann posting it last year.
I spent 25 years in the Army. Combat arms. Infantry and Aviation. Never fired a shot in anger and was never shot at, except by a couple of moonshiners up in the mountains of North Georgia.
Not all veterans are combat veterans. In fact, most who served after Vietnam and before Desert Storm never were.
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