Memories

  Reality My plane landed at Lambert field at 6:42 am after an overnight flight from Los Angeles. That was the last leg of a very long flight originating in Honolulu the previous morning. My three-year stint in the US Army ended with little fanfare. On day I was an olive drab soldier at the end of the Viet Nam era and the next day I was back in civvies. I had avoided serving in Viet Nam. Thank God for that. I knew lots of guys who went to “the Nam” and came back different. It was like they were shell-shocked some of the time. There was a distant look in their eyes some of the time only to be brought back to awareness of their surroundings by interaction with their Army buddies. To a man, they found refuge in either booze or marijuana. Sometimes both. I found that same refuge but not from war. My demons weren’t nearly as traumatic, but they were still there. The girl at the end of the rainbow in Pago Pago had rejected me. I was home now. Back to the womb. Back to a little suburb j