Loon - Jack McLean [93]
Harvard had admitted me, but there was little if anything about the institution that was friendly to veterans of the Vietnam War. I knew that I had earned my place, but I would never feel respected by my class or the institution for my achievement of the previous two years. Those precious few who were curious about my time in the Marine Corps dwelled more on their complete inability to understand why someone like me ever would have enlisted in the first place. Mostly my Vietnam service rarely came up. When it did, I was not the initiator.
The interior of Memorial Hall was more akin to a Gothic cathedral than a university building. High above, great wooden arches dwarfed the interior. Entering exterior light was refracted through dozens of enormous stained-glass windows. Before me was stretched the length of a football field of folding tables manned by a cross section of university life, including athletic teams, academic and social clubs, and volunteer organizations and antiwar groups.
Hundreds of voices echoed off the walls and then echoed again—then again. The discordant cacophony was disorienting and grated on my every nerve. The occasional loud noise still made me flinch and would instantly take me back to Vietnam. It could take minutes for me to recover my composure. Noises really rattled me—to a large degree, they still do. The involuntary responses for my survival that had been so finely honed were not as easily buried as the memories of the experience.
I was approached by all manner of hawkers eager for my participation in their chosen extracurricular area. It had elements of a bazaar. The rowing coach took particular interest, given my height and muscularly lean frame.
The students all looked young. How was I ever going to fit in? Not even ninety days had passed since the horror of LZ Loon—less time than most of these students had just spent on summer vacation.
After a bewildering several minutes of absorbing the frenetic scene, I was directed to a corner table over which was displayed a sign with the letters K-P. I stood briefly in line and then recited my name to the person behind the table and was given a fat manila envelope that contained registration materials.
My name was typed boldly on the outside.
No service number.
No rank of corporal.
Just my name.
Unlike how I felt on my first day at Andover, I now felt that I belonged and had earned my way through the front door as surely as if I had gotten 800s on my College Boards. I had little concern that the academic difficulties I had faced at Andover would follow me. I’m pleased to report that they did not.
I registered for courses in the areas required for freshmen that included the full range of liberal arts disciplines. There would be no Care and Cleaning of the M60 Machine Gun with Sergeant Rodriguez here. The college pep band wandered through the building playing fight songs. One such, “Ten Thousand Men of Harvard,” was composed to raise the blood of the faithful on the football field against Yale—not exactly “The Marines’ Hymn,” but then again, Yale wasn’t exactly the North Vietnamese Army either.
It all seemed simply manageable.
Almost quaint.
Later that afternoon I was sitting on the steps of the Fogg Art Museum prior to an orientation session. A lovely girl sat on a step nearby. Nervously, I took a deep breath and opened.
“Hi.”
She turned slowly, as though lost in thought. “Oh, hi,” she responded.
“Are you here for the orientation?” I continued.
“Yes.”
“Where are you from?” I asked. She didn’t appear to