(Note: This diary is not about current politics, so if that is your only interest, please return to the other entries. This story is placed here for those on KOS who have said they enjoy my writing. Thanks, Will.)
The Viet Cong prisoner in the helicopter made a big mistake. He was thirsty. He saw the water cooler. He meant to show the American what he needed by touching him on the shoulder and then pointing toward the water.
He never made it that far.
When he reached to touch Danny, it startled the young American as he looked out the open bay toward the ground far below.
In one swift motion Danny grabbed the man and threw him out of the helicopter...
High above South Viet-Nam.
He realized immediately all the man wanted was water.
And he was sorry he for what he had done.
But it was too late. Way too late.
This was war.
You had to depend on instinct and reflexes to survive.
Sometimes the instincts, the reflexes were wrong.
But you don’t dwell on it.
You had to go on.
Danny went on.
The Viet Cong did not.
Of all the early Rock and Roll songs to have ever been written,
There is one much stranger than the rest.
It is called "Dixie Fried," by Carl Perkins.
It tells of a crazy young man who carries a razor and everybody is afraid of him
because he was "born and raised in a butcher shop."
That’s what I think about when I think about Danny.
He wasn’t born in a butcher shop,
But he was raised in one.
Because that’s what war is.
A Butcher shop.
That's where our young men who go off to be soldiers, are raised.
I met Danny years ago when we both worked for the same company. He retired. I kept on and am still working. I hadn’t seen him for years and didn’t think I would see him today.
He was not on my mind.
But I’ve never forgotten the few stories about Viet Nam that he told me.
And the way he was.
And how he lived.
Danny took absolutely no sh*t off anyone. No matter how big they were. Or how powerful.
He wasn’t a big man. It didn’t matter. He was what my grandma would call "wirey."
And he had that knife.
I once heard him tell our boss - the man who had the power to fire him - that he, the boss, "didn’t have a ball to his name."
The boss - weasel that he was - kept on walking. .
And Danny kept on working.
And kept on being a mystery,
A hero to me.
I had asked him to tell me more war stories.
But it bothered him.
Danny is the only man I know who has walked the Ho Chi Min Trail...
As a prisoner.
But he didn’t wait to get taken to Ho Chi Min City.
When he saw a chance he got that damn knife out - I don’t know if it is the same one he still has - and gutted that Cong that was marching him North, and fled into the jungle.
He was sorry about that, too.
But it was the Cong or him.
And he lived.
And the Cong didn’t.
So there I was today, at a surprise "over the hill" birthday party for a friend who just turned fifty. When I looked around... and there came Danny.
He looked the same as ever. Wiry. Pony tail coming out the back of a baseball cap.
Dixie Fried.
And I knew that somewhere on his body...
Was that damn knife.
F**k all that. I gave him a hug anyway.
I said, "Man, how long has it been? Ten years?"
He thought about it. "Eight," he said.
I said, "How in the hell are you?"
He said, "You know they declared me crazy six months after I retired."
I said, "Is that so? How’s that working out?"
He said, "Wonderful. One Hundred Per Cent disabled. I’m making more money than when I worked full time."
"And you’re crazy, too," I added, as if that were an extra added benefit.
"Damn right," he said.
Then the knife came out of nowhere and the blade was open in front of me and he said, "And I can still fix anything that’s wrong in the world with this."
"I believe you," I said, and the knife disappeared as if by magic.
He asked about my family and I asked about his.
The surprise birthday man arrived and was sufficiently surprised, walking around, shaking hands and thanking people for coming.
When he was by us, I said, "You know, Danny, you told me some great stories. And I’d like to hear more if you ever want to talk about them."
His face frowned.
I could tell it was not going to happen.
He said he just wasn’t sure. He wasn’t ready for it. He did not
want to look back.
I told him I understood.
So I’m left with only one story left to tell you about Danny, and that’s it.
There will be no more.
And to me it is my favorite story because
Nobody gets killed in it.
Sammy just tried to do something great
And he probably didn’t even realize it.
He was just living his life and being himself.
But what he tried to do...
All those years ago...
Was break the color line.
That was in the sixties...
And just like now there is still racism,
and to a slightly lesser degree, segregation.
He told me that the mess hall where he was at in Viet Nam was segregated. Not by order but by choice.
The choice of blacks as well.
This was also the time of "Black Power."
Danny didn’t give a damn about all that. He needed a new gunner for his helicopter.
And the best man he had heard of...
Was a black man.
Danny got up from all his white buddies,
walked across the invisible color line in the mess hall,
and walked right over to where the black man sat with all his black buddies.
He stood by the man.
The man looked up and said, "What the hell do you want!"
Danny told him, "I want you to be my God Damn gunner."
The man said, "Why me?"
Danny said, "Cause I heard you’re the best damn gunner there is."
The black soldier said, "I’ll think about it."
Danny told him, "What the hell is there to think about? I just want you to be my F*****g gunner - I don’t want to MARRY you!"
With that they all laughed, and the man stood up and they shook hands.
And the man rode gunner for Danny.
And Danny made it home alive.
I asked him when he told me this story about the black man. What happened to him?
He said, "He didn’t make it."
That was then as they say. This is now.
And there will be no more stories from Danny.
He has been declared crazy by the government.
I don’t believe it, not a word of it.
He is not crazy.
He just saw too much,
Felt too much.
And it’s all inside his head...
Knowing what happened when the body hit the ground.
Feeling the blade going in on the Ho Chi Min Trail.
And
Reaching across the color line...
Only to see someone you befriended not make it.
And he knows many more stories
that those who glorify war
will never hear about
but will have to learn the hard way -
when they or someone they love
doesn’t come home
or comes home in a box
or comes home without a leg or an arm.
Or comes home crazy.
With a knife.
And a lot of regret.
But Danny was a lucky one.
A woman found him that wanted to love him.
Today at the surprise party
She was with him,
Still with him after all these years
and nightmare awakening memories.
Love is the only hope.
Danny’s got it.
He’ll be O.K
I had to leave the party early and go to work.
And there on the bulletin board by the time clock
was a new note from a coworker who is now doing time in Iraq.
It said,
"We have been lucky here at this base since I have been here.
No one has been killed and only about 30 have been injured.
I will see all of you in July.
Until then, thank you and be safe."
ONLY 30 have been wounded.
Will they be ok when they return.
Will someone find them and love them?
Can we expect them to come back "normal,"
After being in a butcher shop.
WillBevis.com
April 18, 2010