Loon - Jack McLean [89]
Ruthie came to pick me up for the last time and drove me to the San Francisco airport for the flight home.
Later that night, after boarding the half-loaded plane, I noticed that I was the only one in uniform. Most of the other passengers looked through me as though I weren’t there. They didn’t know that I was going home and had no way of knowing what the medals on my chest represented. To them I wasn’t even a curiosity.
Stewardesses were different—always friendly, solicitous, and eager to give a first-class upgrade when available. Many could spot a homecoming veteran across the tarmac. Most troop flights in and out of Vietnam were on commercial air carriers—complete with airline food and movies. The stewardesses would drop off a planeload of nervous eighteen-year-old boys in Da Nang at two o’clock and leave with a load of exhausted battle-weary veterans an hour later. Incredible in retrospect. On the next day they would do it again. The following week, they might be back on domestic routes dealing with business travelers.
In several weeks, I was to become the first Vietnam veteran to enter Harvard University. I would then become unique in a not very good way. Student dissent against the Vietnam War was rising to a crescendo on college campuses around the country in the fall of 1968. It was not a good time for a returning marine to publicly express pride in having served his country in harm’s way. It was, in fact, a bad time.
Throughout the night of the six-hour flight, thoughts of Dan Burton and the boys of Charlie Company slowly and inextricably faded as I began to contemplate the reality of my life ahead. By the time the plane landed, I had pushed much of the experience out of my consciousness into a deep bottomless well, from whence it would not begin to bubble up for another twenty-five years. My brother-in-law Jim Lizotte later described my Vietnam experience as an impenetrably dense little pellet deep within me to which no one, including myself, was permitted access.
Early the next morning the plane lowered through the clouds and began its final approach across Boston Harbor. Gazing with wonder at the changing skyline, I noticed the singular clock tower of the old Custom House and shook my head. My memory took me back to the clutch of five boys huddled around Sergeant Miller’s desk in the first-floor recruiting office nearly two and a half years before, with our right hands held high and our hearts filled with pride as we enlisted in the United States Marine Corps.
I wondered at that moment where the other four were—indeed, where Sergeant Miller was. One or two of them were certainly dead. I remembered the hundreds of boys in their underpants wandering from station to station around the cavernous Boston army base, while being subjected to their pre-induction physicals. Where were they? Across the nation, throughout the years of Vietnam buildup, that scene was repeated thousands of times as millions of boys were processed. In the end, nearly sixty thousand would not come home alive.
We landed and slowly taxied to the gate. As the door opened, I could feel the heavy humid New England summer air ooze into the cabin. We filed down the steps, onto the tarmac, and across to the gate area, where my parents were craning to see my head among our group. I was very happy to see them. The greeting included a quick kiss from my mother and a handshake from my father. They were all smiles, as were several neighboring people who added handshakes and back pats when they realized the nature of this homecoming.
I was home.
Alone.
My mind was on the future. I couldn’t wait to get out of my uniform and on with my life. Minutes later, the seabag in my hand, we headed for the car and made the