We reached Fayetteville after dark. As it was the spring of
1972, there were lots of Vietnam Vets enrolled, all celebrating survival, if
you know what I mean. The semester was ending, but the town still bustled with
students. Mike and Wayland were waiting for us. The first sign of oddity was
that they had a pet.
It was some kind of small python that they kept in a closet, thank
goodness. Brenda was not amused, but she took it all in stride. She warmed to
Mike quickly, despite his strange choice of a pet, and they began what would become a lifelong friendship. If she was
affected by Godshall’s charms, she never let on.
Fayetteville was still a quiet little place back then. We
saw the area and I showed Brenda my name on the sidewalk that proved I actually
was a graduate of that bastion of higher learning. Mike and I swapped war
stories while she listened. Godshall was mostly out roaming about with his many
female admirers.
Mike was enjoying himself. Actually, he would have stayed in
the Army had he been allowed. That organization, however, had no use for
OCS-commissioned officers after they had served their tour in SE Asia. Those
who managed to come back whole or in part learned quickly that they were of no further
use to America as far as the Army was concerned. Further, as we all learned, most
civilians had little use for them at all.
The Department of Defense and the Veterans Administration
were two separate organizations and gave no indication of communicating with
one another at all. Once a soldier received his DD214, or condition of discharge, he
no longer existed as far as the Army was concerned. As Eric Bogle described many
of them, “… the armless, the legless, the blind, the insane,” they were left to
fend for themselves.
College proved a good escape. As I noted earlier, the campus
teemed with veterans, most in a continual state of panic over GI benefits that
weren’t arriving on schedule or at all. It was better that their previous gig,
though, and most prevailed.
We enjoyed our time there, hit a few of the old spots,
laughed and joked with Mike, and enjoyed a couple of quiet walks around campus,
holding hands. We talked about what a racket going to college was, though we
hadn’t realized it at the time.
It was a good time. Actually, it was a great time, one of
the best of my life. For you see, at one magic moment during the time there, while
we were all alone, that woman—the one I had adored since the first time I saw
her—looked into my eyes and said, “I love you.”
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| What now? |
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