Veterans Day 2017

Although I've posted Jimi Hendrix' version of the Star-spangled Banner four times before over the years on my blog, I'm moved to post it again today.  My beloved veteran was a high school dropout who was drafted into the U.S. Army at age 19 in the spring of 1969.  He did his basic training at Fort Lewis, Washington, and was sent to Newport News, Virginia, for helicopter mechanic training school.  He and his buddies had a plan to attend Woodstock and see Jimi Hendrix, but it didn't materialize.  I am sure that there were veterans in the crowd at Woodstock.  Jimi Hendrix had been drafted into the Army and served in the 101st Airborne Division, which was the same division my veteran was in, although Jimi Hendrix did not serve in Vietnam.  My veteran loved the music of Jimi Hendrix.

In late January 1970, I drove R to Oakland Army Base on the day before he was to fly to Vietnam.  He asked me not to cry when I said goodbye to him.  I honored his wish but cried hard on my way home across the San Francisco Bay Bridge.  That night he called me and asked me to come back and pick him up and take him to a draft resistance office.  I sat in the hallway while he talked with a draft resistance counselor.  When he returned to the hallway, his heart was heavy.  He said, "I will meet the defeat of her challenge."  He didn't believe he could be granted conscientious objector status.  He didn't want to go to Canada and doubted that Canada would accept him anyway because of his lack of education or skills valued by the Canadian government.  He did not want to go to prison (although he ended up in prison later in his life). He made the fateful decision to go to Vietnam. He was against the war when he left and against the war when he returned home on December 8, 1970, but when he returned he was broken by his experience of war.  He struggled for the rest of his life. We separated for the last time in early October 1971.  In one of the last letters to me in around 2006, he wrote. "All we are saying is give peace a chance."

May all veterans and their families, all over the world, find peace.