Friendly Fire

"To dream magnificently is not a gift given to all men, and even for those who possess it, it runs a strong risk of being progressively diminished by the ever-growing dissipation of modern life and by the restlessness engendered by material progress. The ability to dream is a divine and mysterious ability; because it is through dreams that man communicates with the shadowy world which surrounds him. But this power needs solitude to develop freely; the more one concentrates, the more one is likely to dream fully, deeply."

Deepak Chopra?

Nope. Bauldelaire.

Here’s how he prefaced his great work of poetry, Les Fleurs de Mal (The Flowers of Evil ):

    ..If rape or arson, poison or the knife

    Has wove no pleasing patterns in the stuff

    Of this drab canvas we accept as life—

    It is because we are not bold enough!

Words directed at his readers; now re-directed at you, 150 years later.  His accusation is that each of you bears as much hypocrisy and sin as he the writer.

It speaks to my concupiscence. And…Ju?

Rounding the second turn with the thundering herd, the ancient lawn chair held another broadside this morning: ‘Only you can prevent Socialism!’  The new placard was encased in a clear plastic flimsy, so I would have no opportunity to vandalize the stupid thing.

I tried everything to get one of the dorks to shit on their easement, with no success.  Scooter finally obliged, but waited till the fourth corner to dump his prodigious do-doo on a lawn—of people whose politics I also suspect.  A poor second showing, but a showing nonetheless.

Socialism my ass.  Socialism theirs to boot.  I subsist on Socialism and so do they.  Old fart idiots.

What they really fear is not the S-word, but Communism.  They think government subsidies and entitlements (Yes, Mittens, you bourgeois schlock! I said entitlements, not handouts!) are the Road to Perdition.  Bullshit.  Bull fucking Shit.

But I don’t blame them, the old dears.  Their fear was spoon-fed to them by the slogan makers that keep changing the slogan to keep pace with their program.

In the tenth century, it was the heathen Islamic.  Justification for the Crusades that lasted three hundred years.  Next came the Protestants. 

Kill the Huguenots!  Crush the Calvinist heretics! After that, the Royalists. Vive le Republique!

I won’t fill in the numerous historical examples.  Suffice it to say that we have come all the way around the block from 1000 years ago: Death to the Islamic Terrorists!  Death to the hoarders of Weapons of Mass Destruction!!!

And always—ALWAYS—in the guise of the Greater Glorious Cause: Holy Mother Church, Christ, Democracy, Freedom…whatever.

I will cease my opinionated slogan making here, to return to the focus of my own journey to Perdition: my forty-two years in Viet Nam.  That would be one, plus forty-one equals…a lifetime. 

After four months, the newness had worn off my fleet of Boston Whalers.  Ask any boatman what saltwater does to engines and hulls.  Go on—just ask them.  Tell them I said it was OK for you to ask a rhetorical question in the name of clarity.

The outboards weren’t my problem.  EN-1 Byrd would probably arrange to have my right hand severed if I even dare pull the cowling on his precious engines. 

I wanted to scrupulously avoid that heathen punishment; so maintenance service was provided by a scowling Smee, ass-licker to his thrall Red Byrd, who differed from Captain Hook’s right hand man by possessing no humor whatever.  Maybe he laughed it up in the Snipe Shack; but around me, I was a blood enemy of Big Byrd and that made me his sworn enemy too.

Good and fair enough.  He could scowl to his heart’s content, as long as he changed the plugs and checked the timing once a month.  Ass-wipe little lifer snipe.

What concerned me were the hulls accumulating barnacles like an aging dock.  They had grown so thick; the boats were losing 15 mph off their top end.  That was unacceptable.  If I couldn’t outrun every skimmer in the harbor, I might lose my bragging rights.  Something had to be done.

Next morning, I announced to the Boathouse Pirates and CBM Scott my intention to beach the skimmers and scrape that shit off the hulls.  I wasn’t looking for volunteers to give me a hand.  I was going to do this dirty job all on my lonesome.

Scott gave the project his imprimatur, seeing as how I wouldn’t be dragging anyone else off the work details for what he thought unnecessary fastidiousness to detail.  Sour Puss had no regard for bragging rights.

I figured a two day job.  It ended up being four.  Each boat was beached on the sandy little cove where the fuel barge had gone off from a welder’s spark a month back.  I did need some hands to heave the hull onto its side, but once set up, I was on my own.

I will skip the tedious day-after-day particulars of shit duty.  Using a large sharp paint scraper, my work went from 0730 hrs till quitin’ time.

On the second or third day, I do recall it was mid-morning; I was resting against the hull which provided all the shade there was on that hot little beach.  I had just popped a couple more salt tablets and guzzled tepid water when the sound of an approaching aircraft caused me to stand and look up.

As I did, a C-123 Provider passed over from the landward side of the peninsula.  It had obviously hugged the ridge and dipped down to fly twenty feet off the deck.  It was trailing a vapor spray.  As the cloud descended, I caught an odor which made me think of every nasty high school gym locker I had ever smelled.  The strength of the stink was like all the body sweats in all the unwashed jock straps of my youth.

Shit!  I thought; now they’re out here spraying DDT just like at Camp Tien Sha!

The aircraft was finishing its run, because it continued across the harbor and disappeared from sight.  I returned to my labors and the smell of my own considerable sweat.  If the Navy wanted to douse me with Dioxin, what the hell could I do?  Put in a complaint chit?

Well, it wasn’t DDT, but it was Dioxin.  It was Agent Orange.  Operation Ranch Hand had come to my tiny cove of a war.  

In researching this monograph (Did you think I just pulled everything out of my ass?), the facts that I uncovered for myself are not fit to put in print.  If I begin a futile harangue of wrongdoing, then I would be voluntarily stepping down into the cesspool with the wrongdoers. 

Not my shtick.  Counter to my purpose and the deal I cut with the Divine Plan.

When I eventually come to the end of this painful self-examination and my tale is told; then I must begin to assemble that arduous list of offenders to which I must paradoxically offer my amends.

The list is already long and not complete.  Many are dead, many are lost and the corporate entities on the list will no more give a fig for my quixotic gesture than they gave when this special horror was released on Viet Nam, her people and all my brothers and sisters who suffer to this day. 

Regrets for the polemic, guys and dolls.  Stay tuned for something a bit lighter in the days to come…