Time and Loss Transform a Vet’s Attitude

I have a few things planned for this Memorial Day.

First, there’s Andy of City Terrace. You remember him. He’s the Chicano Vietnam vet I discovered one day selling oranges on a street corner in East L.A. He was out of work and desperately wanted to hang onto his dream house in Hacienda Heights.

His story of trying to make ends meet touched me and we became fast friends. We had so much fun at last year’s Memorial Day cookout at his place that we decided to get together again today. But before I get there, I’ll stop off at the Garden of Valor--a special section set aside for veterans at the Rose Hills cemetery--to honor a special soldier.

My dad is buried there.

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In the past, I didn’t give much thought to Memorial Day, or how I’d spend it. It was just another chance for a three-day weekend. But it was always a big deal to my father.

He served five years as an Army private in the infantry during World War II, and treasured those years in the Pacific. He’d tell the same stories over and over. I know them by heart.

His favorite seemed to be about the vexing inability on one island to dislodge the Japanese from a strategic hill. Each morning at 9 for several days, the hill was bombed from the air, shelled from the sea and assaulted by GIs, but the enemy could not be overcome. The Americans seemed stymied.

“Then, some wise guy got the idea to hit the hill at 8 o’clock,” Dad said. “We bombed the hell out of it. When we got to the hill, there was nobody there. We couldn’t figure it out. Around 8:45, here come the Japanese to take up their positions on the hill. We wiped them out.”

He’d laugh about it but would inevitably turn serious. “War is hell,” he’d say, “and you may find out about that.”

Like those who swore allegiance to Eisenhower for his leadership in Europe, Dad had his own favorite: Gen. Douglas MacArthur.

Whether he was leaving for work or for his ritualistic Saturday visits to the union hall, he would intone the general’s immortal words to state the obvious: “I shall return.”

When President Harry Truman sacked MacArthur for insubordination, Dad without reservation sided with the president. “Truman was right,” he growled. He rarely talked about his favorite general after that, but he never gave up that famous line.

He also did the little things to celebrate Memorial Day. He readily dug into his pockets for change when bemedaled veterans showed up on local streets each Memorial Day to sell plastic red poppies. “You always must help veterans,” he said.

I didn’t take seriously my dad’s views of war, veterans or Memorial Day. Those things were for him, I decided. I had other things to consider.

I did turn to Dad when one particularly tough decision was to be made. The war in Vietnam was in full swing by 1965--my freshman year in college--when I was asked whether I wanted to join the Army’s ROTC program in school.

I didn’t have a clue, but Dad did. He reasoned that there was no guarantee of my finishing school and earning a degree in four years. Getting drafted by 1968 was a real possibility.

If I joined ROTC, I could complete my studies without interruption and then enter the Army afterward as a second lieutenant. There was risk involved, but he explained that I should serve my country.

Mom was against the idea, but Dad persisted. “If you have to go in, be an officer,” the former Army private said. “Don’t be like me, a dogface.”

I then promptly joined ROTC.

After Vietnam, I just wanted to forget about it. I had no funny stories or sayings to share. I never told my dad about surviving two typhoons in the field or getting mortar fire from your own troops.

I was too ashamed to tell him that on my trip home from Southeast Asia, I had to change uniforms at the San Francisco airport because an anti-war protester had purposely vomited on me. “Baby killer,” she screamed.

When the plane arrived at LAX at 4 in the morning, Dad was wearing his sunglasses. He was crying.

*

After Miguel Antonio Vargas Ramos died of cancer just a few days before Memorial Day, 1988, my attitude changed.

I now buy red plastic poppies to benefit disabled veterans. I can now tell stories about Vietnam or my favorite C-ration meal, chopped ham and eggs. And I make it a point to visit the graves of veterans on Memorial Day.

I wish Dad were around, so I could share all this with him. In my own way, I try.

Whenever I visit his grave, I tell him, “Old soldiers never die. . . .”