richardwboyanton

Veterans day to me!!!

I will spend a lifetime with memories that come to life for no apparent reason; I was never good with names, but faces appear to me from time to time; these men have been long gone; I remember not in the horror of the war they died from but eating, talking, joking I think that my mind doesn’t desire to feel the pain of death. Three hundred sixty-five days one year, each morning, if you are lucky, you wake up from your sleep on the hard ground; you wonder what the day will bring, weeks without changing clothes, leeches, insects, so many different types each bite your life could be in jeopardy. Drinking untreated water, I acquired both types of malaria, so sick that dying would be welcomed. The endless walking through water infested with snakes and water animals I had never seen before or after, 109 degrees day after day. When you add 30 or so firefights that men died in, from minimal engagement to fighting for days, it wasn’t A pleasant time. Veterans day to me is special, the flag of our country stands tall, the men that died in my unit were real men, their families real people, and their fathers and mother’s loss sometimes unimaginable. When you read a letter a mother sent to our unit wanting to know everything about her son’s death, not whether he was a hero or not, but how much did he suffer. I am lucky, wounded but not bad, mentally hurt but not damaged; my heroes will always be the men I left behind; they weren’t white or black soldiers. They were soldiers that served the country with their families, feeling the most extraordinary sacrifices of all. God bless “happy veterans day.”