March 29, 1973 - The day Nixon declared all American troops
had been removed from Vietnam. Of
course, he forgot to mention the men and boys we left behind, both dead and
alive. They mattered not to the
We read about a fictional Vietnam vet every fall when the
class studies the Chiam Potok story "Zebra." Every year I teach the kids about Vietnam,
the conflict, and the horrors the young men who served went through while over
there, at the hands of both North and South Vietnamese governments, as well as
our own.
One year, I had a student whose father was older, old enough
to be, and truly was, a Vietnam vet. It
broke my heart to tell the class how we treated those boys when they came home,
how society turned their backs on them and called them "baby killers"
and spit on them, refused to give them jobs, refused to help them recover from horrors
that were inconceivable, some horrors of which they wrought by their own hands
for whatever price their honor and sanity tolerated.
After we had finished the Powerpoint presentation and the
discussion, I turned to that student and asked him to thank his father from us
all for his incredible service to our country, and I told him to be proud of
his father because most of us were not like the fringe protesters and
appreciated what these men had endured.
Students today come to us with zero knowledge of American
history and certainly none of the 20th century world. They know geography and ancient world history
and some random explorers, but they have no concept of world war or the
fracture of our own country or even the roots of patriotism. It's almost as if they've lived in tiny
vacuums, protected from newspapers and news broadcasts and anything that
doesn't have the name Kardashian attached to it.
March 29th was Vietnam Veterans Day, and I'm
willing to bet very few people knew that.
The radio knew it, though.
As I was driving home rather tardy on Friday evening, one radio station
was playing the entirety of "Alice's Restaurant," the anti-war anthem
of its time. I quoted the entire script
pretty much word for word (except those bad words they cannot say on the
radio). It amazed me how much I
remembered since I recited it in 1976 for Mr. Becker's English class. I remember he said, "Oh, I hate that
song." Why he hated it, he never
said. Had he been pro-war? Had he been to too many rallies? Maybe he was high … again … and didn't
realize he was actually speaking out loud.
Either way, I recited it, took my "A," and sat down, refusing
to acknowledge much of what he said for the rest of the semester.
It may not be a particularly happy holiday remembrance nor
is it entirely unhappy. However, March
29th is Vietnam Veterans Day.
If you cannot remember that much, just remember that you can get
anything you want at Alice's restaurant (excepting Alice).
