Military Mama
Shortly after my mother died, I started to read the obitiuaries. My parents lived in Denver, I live in Seattle and I have yet to see anyone I know in them. But for some reason the habit persists. My son came home last May and said he wanted to join the Marines. I was shocked--not that he wanted to join the miltary, because veterans in our family go back to the revolutionary war. I put in 20 years and 5 days in the Air Force. His father, aunt and uncle were AF. His stepfather was a subhunter on helicopters in the Navy. One grandfather fought in Korea, the other from an LST in WWII. A great uncle fought in the Argonne Forest, and his great grandfather was a Machinist's Mate in WWI.
I was shocked that he wanted the Marines. My military heart was proud, my mother's heart was horrified. I constantly fight my conflicting emotions--deep pride in the military and an uneasy feeling we've bitten off more than we have the stomach to chew. Wilson and I don't discuss the war any more. Our disagreement started when the war did. He thought it was necessary, I didn't. But now we're in it. Now it is personal--real personal.
All services have their rivalries, each one confident of it's own superiority. Our two services, Wilson's and mine, are long-range fighters. Lo-o-ong range. Marines, of course, are anything but. I've seen war injuries. The ones that scare me the most are the ones not visible from the outside, the ones carried in the heart.
My father is the bravest man I've ever known. He was at Tarawa, Iwo Jima, in kamikazi attacks, and if that wasn't enough, he was in a typhoon that sank half of his group. I asked him once how he handled the fear. It is a question that often concerned me, how I would handle the fear. He said "You quickly get to the point where you decide 'If I live, I live. If I don't, I don't.' And you stop worrying about it." He is a relentlessly forward-looking man and he doesn't waste time looking back or worrying about things he has no control over. My father survived his hell with his soul intact. It is my son's soul I worry about.
I was shocked that he wanted the Marines. My military heart was proud, my mother's heart was horrified. I constantly fight my conflicting emotions--deep pride in the military and an uneasy feeling we've bitten off more than we have the stomach to chew. Wilson and I don't discuss the war any more. Our disagreement started when the war did. He thought it was necessary, I didn't. But now we're in it. Now it is personal--real personal.
All services have their rivalries, each one confident of it's own superiority. Our two services, Wilson's and mine, are long-range fighters. Lo-o-ong range. Marines, of course, are anything but. I've seen war injuries. The ones that scare me the most are the ones not visible from the outside, the ones carried in the heart.
My father is the bravest man I've ever known. He was at Tarawa, Iwo Jima, in kamikazi attacks, and if that wasn't enough, he was in a typhoon that sank half of his group. I asked him once how he handled the fear. It is a question that often concerned me, how I would handle the fear. He said "You quickly get to the point where you decide 'If I live, I live. If I don't, I don't.' And you stop worrying about it." He is a relentlessly forward-looking man and he doesn't waste time looking back or worrying about things he has no control over. My father survived his hell with his soul intact. It is my son's soul I worry about.
posted by mamaworecombatboots at 7:40 PM
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