Healing

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If life is indeed a "box of chocolates" then mine would probably be a box of Goo-goo Clusters. I was adopted as an new born in 1960, but, only IF my dad stopped drinking. Which he did for three years, and then in 1965 I was awaken in the middle of the night to loud voices. It was my mom and dad; daddy had ben on a binder and I jumped out of bed to run and see him. Well I got to the living room just in time to see daddy walk out the front door. Let me explain something here. Daddy was a WWII vet, he was a Merchant Marine and received a purple heart on Iwo Jima. But, all I knew was that daddy had broke my heart. Thus this is the image that stuck with me all my life. Years of heart ache, broken promises, and NEVER opening a present from my dad. This is what had festered in me since child hood.

And growing up with no man in the house we didn't watch a lot of war movies, let alone talk much about the war times. And since I was either to young or self absorbed to pay attention to Korea and Vietnam it never dawned on me what war was really all about. While I did see daddy fairly often growing up he was either drunk, getting drunk or coming off a drunk. This is all I knew, it never occurred to me to wonder why he drank so much.

By now your asking yourself "What does this have to do with a gift?", I'm about to tell you. Like 90% of America I was glued to the TV after 9/11. I watched all the police, fire fighters and all the other first responders and heard all the accolades which were rightfully theirs. The more I saw this something began to happen. I began to get angry. What about our veterans? The men and women who helped build and defined this country the ones who drew the proverbial line in the sand and then made and outsider terrified to cross it. Where was their praise? So I decided that I would thank every veteran I met. And it was not to long after this that I got slapped silly by my past. All these years I lived with the thought that daddy never gave me a gift. But, now I sat in amazement. Daddy did give me a gift, a very precious gift that has kept on giving for 53 years with no sign of stopping. And I never opened a gift from him because the only thing he could find to wrap it in was "Old Glory" and this gift is my freedom. Bought and paid for on an island in the South Pacific.

And now that I'm a little older and wiser I can understand why he drank like he did. It may not explain all of it ,but some of it. I think daddy hide in the bottle to get away from his memories of the war. So if you know a solder or get a chance to meet one no matter what he or she may look like hug em and say thank you. I mean how would you look if you had come out of a war?

FOR MYSELF AND MY FAMILY TO ALL WHO SERVE OR WHO WAITE FOR ONE TO COME HOME FROM THE BOTTOM OF OUR HEARTS - THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!

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