EMOTIONAL SEARING OF THE VIETNAM EXPERIENCE Read online

On the drive back home, I decided to stop off in Fayetteville or as I still called it, Fayettenam, and call one of my Nam buddies, Julian T. Manfred or as he liked to be called, TM (The Man) or Mangy.

  Mangy straightened out “Cherries in the Nam.” He’d tell the newbies, “You just call me, The Man.” The name “Mangy” was given to him in Nam. He was known for wearing the same fatigues until they fell off him. One day someone said, “You are one mangy mother fucker.” It stuck.

  Mangy was into everything, legal and illegal. One of the things he’d gotten into was storage facilities. Before then, he’d been into these rip-off check cashing stores and then he’d had a pawn shop or two.

  He was a good businessman and entrepreneur and one of the few guys I knew who had never left Vietnam and yet was fairly successful. He channeled his PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) into productive activity, at least money making. I think he smoked pot every day and was known to do about everything else known to mankind that harmed his body. I always gave him hell and the most I got out of him was a smile. He’d been generous though with a few of my projects. Several of us had contributed to building a school in Vietnam and he’d come through big time even if his comments had been, “I don’t owe them Cong, nothing,” mimicking, Mohammed Ali in his comments, “I ain’t got nothing against them Cong.”

  Just as I was getting into my car, Mangy drove up.

  “Sarge, what’s going on?”

  “Oh, just decided I’d drop by.”

  “Got time for a drink?”

  “I might have if I’d been able to find you, you sorry mother”, I said, hugging him. I just wanted to tell you about Sergeant Bowman.”

  “Sergeant Bowman, boy, haven’t thought of him in a long time, not since you told me all that stuff about the money you guys found in Nam.” I’m telling you, Sarge, you should have paid the VC off and carted those bucks out of the Nam.”

  I didn’t tell him so, but had always wondered if maybe Sergeant ‘Bowman hadn’t figured out how to do it. I had wondered for years and was thinking of it even as we talked. I couldn’t see how he could. We aren’t talking about a few dollars, but money stacked waist high, everywhere, all around. It must have been quite an effort to get it into that hole. How did the VC do it?

  The Mary Black Retirement Center was in this wonderful little town or so it seemed, Spivey’s Corner. I had read one of those historical markers where it was named during the Revolutionary War. Spies literally convened to share their notes. This was my interpretation. The truth was that messages were maybe passed. All the marker said was “a historic meeting took place here.” The little town had a town square with a big courtroom, I guessed, and looked probably like it did 200 years ago.

  Mary Black had been a Baptist Missionary for years and had actually bequeathed her sprawling old home place as the very first building. Now, there were dozens of buildings spread out throughout the several acres: cottages, a gigantic common area, beautiful kitchen, and other facilities. It reminded me of a college but most of the people were gray hairs. Some used walkers, canes, and most had various physical or mental ailments. Damn, this getting old was no picnic.

  Here I sat in the special Alzheimer’s unit. It was a long building with small rooms jutting off from the sides of a long hall. These must have been the residents’ rooms. I had made the mistake of saying patients and one of the nurses corrected me, “We call them residents.”

  “Sergeant Bowman, how’s it going?”

  “Well, I’m doing just fine sir.”

  Long pause.

  This was actually my first visit since the funeral. Why? Well, I owed it to my Sergeant. This is the way I still looked at him. He was my squad leader.

  “I’m glad to see you”, I said. “Are you doing OK?”

  Long pause.

  I continued, “How do you like this place?”

  “Well, I guess it’s OK. There’s some strange fellows here,” he said, kind of glancing at a man sitting at the other end of the couch. I was pretty excited; he’d spoken and maybe knew who I was.

  “Strange, what do you mean?”

  Sergeant Bowman got up and walked over to the man who immediately stood and said, “How are you? I hope your day is going well.”

  Sergeant Bowman just stood there and the man said again, “How are you. I hope your day is going well.” He repeated it over and over. I got the picture.

  I decided to risk it, “Sergeant Bowman, do you remember Vietnam?” Long pause.

  “You know they took away my car.”

  “Who are they?”

  “And, I can’t find my checkbook.”

  “Your checkbook?”

  “And, this is what worries me most, my son is stealing my money and he won’t tell me where he’s hiding it. What I worry about is my bills.”

  Long pause.

  “I think it is time for me to go now.”

  “Go where?”

  It dawned on me that I wasn’t carrying on a conversation with Sergeant Bowman. This man I was talking to was not Sergeant Bowman; I didn’t know who the hell he was.

  “I’m thinking about moving to the Mary Black Center.”

  I smiled and decided it was no use. With a big sigh, I leaned wearily back into the cushion of the sofa and then stood. I put out my hand and with the other one reached down and placed Sergeant Bowman’s hand in mine. I squeezed and smiled and turn to walk out the door fully expecting this to be my last visit.

  The attendant came over and asked me to sign out, I did and he punched in a couple of numbers on the code to let me out. I turned and looked at my squad leader and gave a hell of a weak smile. F…

  He walked toward me and gave a half-assed grin like Sergeant Bowman always did in Nam, “Jake, you come back to see me, OK?”

  Phil was on R and R to Thailand. Sergeant Bowman was in at the fire support base doing some paperwork or something. It must have been important as the Sarge rarely left the field. I don’t remember, but I was the acting squad leader. No big sweat. Things were in a lull. We’d had some activity the night before but not heavy action.

  “Jake, stay relaxed and just be cautious if you get in any shit,” the Sarge had said.

  “No sweat. Don’t you be hangin out in no villes”, I replied. I knew he wouldn’t, but it was a usual thing when a guy went in to the fire support base or especially the base camp( and God forbid if he were to get into Hue or somewhere) it could be a good time...Getting laid was a good possibility. We didn’t get to do that.

  Bowman was always saying, “When you are trying to kill Charley and he’s after you, pussy is down the food chain. But, let’s don’t rule it out” We’d all guffaw.

  Tim was a handsome guy who had black hair, combed straight back. He shaved everyday and kicked our ass if we didn’t do the same. I idolized him but didn’t know it at the time.

  It was about three o’clock and the dark was coming. I always hated the dark. Everything happened at night. Our platoon leader didn’t know shit. He’d only been around a week or so and I hadn’t even talked to him. The briefing of our mission was about what it always was. Bowman had told them that while he was gone, we needed to lay back. Let 1st Squad take the lead.

  We loaded up and moved out. I was a little uneasy. Without the Sarge and Phil, who was a really seasoned soldier, I was the next guy in line. Most of the squad had been in the Nam less than three months; but, in this hellhole, that was a lifetime.

  We packed our shit up and sat around. It was about an hour before we moved out. I was walking point. I did it lots, but for a weird reason, I felt safe. The Sarge would have kicked my ass; but, we weren’t the lead squad and so if Sir Charles was after us, we wouldn’t get hit.

  Over to my left was a cherry, I didn’t even know his name, maybe in Stitch’s fire team. Stitch was a trip. Big tall, drink of water, as Bowman called him--skinny and black and scared shitless of everything. The thing that kept him going was Bowman who hassled
and philosophized to him about everything and made him respect himself.

  It happened so fast that at first I didn’t know what it was, but there was screaming and shouting and firing. Somebody had stepped on a booby trap and then there had been contact somewhere in front of us. I saw the explosion and started crawling on my hands and knees and screaming, “Stay put!” into the radio.

  What often happened with booby traps, a bouncing Betty (explosive that propels upward about four feet into the air and then detonates) in particular, is that when someone stepped on one, the others panicked with the natural tendency to get away, but then they were in jeopardy of stepping on others.

  The VC were masters at laying down these deadly little fuckers. The cherry had been blown to smithereens when I got to him. I picked up his boot with his foot still in it. I immediately threw up.

  “It’s not your fault”, Sergeant Bowman said. “This is war and it ain’t no day at the beach. Get your ass together, Jake”.

  I was lost in thought about a dozen times since I had seen Sergeant Bowman. Calling me Jake had blown my mind. Here was a man who was supposed to be out of it.

  I immediately got on the net and started learning more about this insidious disease. What I discovered quickly was that there was no typical Alzheimer’s victim. It appeared that with many people it happens in stages. At first it is the simply forgetting names, places; and, then as it progresses, there’s a loss of reality. There are a few lucid moments when he seems to be with it.

  To be honest, I knew more about Alzheimer’s or maybe dementia, nobody seemed to differentiate very much between them, than I thought I did. My father-in-law was a full blown case and I had watched it progress. In fact, I’m the one who first noticed that he was affected.

  When I would float through on a brief visit after he retired, I could see changes. And, toward the end, I once said to my wife, “Your Dad has really gone down.” What I meant was that he was constantly repeating himself, and seemed to exist in a world, not totally glued to the earth. But, nobody seemed to be concerned. I put it as classic denial. Next case.

  When my mother-in-law died, they realized quickly how he had “gone down.” My mother-in-law’s Dad had been a pastor for over 60 years. She was the quintessential pastor’s wife and had made sure she was a positive representative for her husband and church.

  What I suspected is that my mother-in-law was a very proud woman and had covered up her husband’s sickness for years. She was embarrassed. I didn’t quite get it. What to me was sickness, maybe to her, was weakness. I don’t know. In some ways, this was the same as Sergeant Bowman’s wife--strange that the circumstances were similar.

  I had read about the brain plaques, the brain tangles. What fascinated me was the concept of “janitor” cells. Janitor cells are protein cells that vacuum up these awful gooey secretions (which eventually become plague) that steal our memories.

  In my mind’s eye, I could actually see this goo being vacuumed onto these cells. This is awful; I couldn’t get it out of my head. Alzheimer’s patients have lost their janitor cells.

  I guessed that the old Sergeant Bowman was in there somewhere. He forgot he had been a soldier, but he did call me by my name. He couldn’t remember Vietnam, so he didn’t really know me or did he?

  Sergeant Bowman asked me several times, whenever I visited, did I know that his wife died. He said that he had been to a funeral, but didn’t know who it was for. Yet at the reception, I had watched him talk to people like he was very much with it. Maybe if the family had known he was progressing so quickly, his condition could have been arrested. Damn.

  I read that most Alzheimer’s patients are “hardwired” into certain things. They can’t remember what they talked about or had for lunch ten minutes ago, but can recall in great detail past events. Sometimes, there’s a moment of lucidity that is uncanny.

  “Sergeant Bowman, it’s good to see you again. How’s it going?”

  “Fine and you.”

  “Well good, thanks for asking, do you remember me?”

  “Of course, I remember you. How’s the wife and kids?”

  “Good,” I said, realizing that he didn’t have a clue. I sat down beside the bed. He was laying on it, watching TV.

  “What are you watching?”

  No answer. I stood up and walked over to the window.

  I had decided to visit Sergeant Bowman one last time for closure. He really wasn’t Sergeant Bowman. It was almost like the invasion of the body snatchers; but, in this case, it was the invasion of the mind snatchers. I was intrigued while at the same time feeling this overwhelming sadness.

  An attendant came in and announced lunch.

  Tim stood up and said, “Let’s go to chow, Jake, what about it.”

  I almost fell over. We walked over to the dining area. An attendant called on someone to pray and this short man immaculately dressed offered the most beautiful prayer I’ve ever heard. I knew this was part of being hardwired. The man didn’t know who or where he was; but, when asked to pray, it was like pushing a button and out comes this activity he has done all his life. Hardwired.

  At the viewing of my mother in law’s body came my first “whoa” when my father-in-law prayed the most beautiful prayer. His wife was in the casket and he placed his hand on hers and said something like, “Dear God, thank you for all these wonderful years of dedication. We have had this wonderful life. We’ve tried to be good servants and now take my loved one into your bosom and prepare me for that time when I will join her.” There was not a dry eye to be found, mine included. Fifteen minutes later, he was asking, “Who are we having this funeral for?” Hardwired.

  Suddenly Sergeant Bowman said to me, “Jake, let’s go outside to a restaurant.” Still stunned from the Sarge’s suddenly being “back”, I tried to recover. With the staff’s approval, we loaded up and drove downtown to a local diner. We sat at a table in the far corner, one that Sergeant Bowman led us too.

  The Sarge looked around and said, “Jake, guess you wonder about the money we found in Vietnam?”

  My mouth was dry.

  “Well, yes, I guess I’ve thought about it over the years.”

  “Was that some day or what,” he laughed.

  “The firing and mortars went on well into the night. I thought I was a goner. I couldn’t get out of the hole as it had collapsed. The platoon was close to wiped out and everybody in the squad was either killed or wounded. Nobody knew I was in the hole. I finally got out sometime in the early morning. Everybody was gone. I couldn’t wait to find somebody and tell them about the money. Fortunately, I had my radio and when I got on it, the battalion could hardly believe I was still alive. They extracted me back to the hospital at Phu Bai and not the battalion. I didn’t have any wounds and they let me go. I was still wired and had to hitch a ride back to the rear. I saw Buddha. Our mess sergeant. Boy, was I lucky. Buddha and I had come to the Nam together in our first tour and were assigned to the same battalion. He went back to the States with me, but then volunteered to come back and I followed him by a couple of months later for my second tour. For the first few days, before I went up country, he put me up at Bien Hoa. We got to be great friends and he was always looking after me and my troops. I could call on him for anything. It was amazing that I had run into him. Everybody knew Buddha dealt in the black market because it was how we got this great chow. Remember the time we had lobsters in the field? He was so glad to see me and had heard I’d been killed and had actually come to Phu Bai looking for me. He could hardly believe that here he was looking and suddenly there I am. The back of his truck was filled with supplies of various sorts. He kept hugging me and saying, ‘Man, I can’t believe this.’ I immediately told him the story of how the platoon was hit; I didn’t know where they were or what had happened. Then I told him about the money. His eyes got as big as saucers.

  ‘How much do you think?’ he wanted to know.

  ‘Fuck if I know, it was stacke
d up higher than me.’

  Buddha was quiet. He knew a bar where we could have a beer. It was then that Buddha laid out his plan. ‘Let’s get the money and get it out of Vietnam.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Are you crazy? No way, even if we could, we’d get caught.’

  ‘Could you find where it was again?’

  ‘Of course, I have the coordinates.’

  Buddha made me promise to sit on the story for awhile till he could check out some things.”

  I could not believe my ears. My adrenalin was pumping and my blood pressure was maxed out. The only thing that might have been more was the advent of a good fire fight in Nam.

  Long pause.

  I had to sit on my hands to keep my asking questions. Finally, I said, “Sergeant Bowman?”

  It was one of those times when he was looking at me but not seeing me.

  “You know I am thinking of moving to the Mary Black apartments”, Tim said.

  I thought, he’s already at the Mary Black home. “Tim, you are already there.”

  “You know I think my son is stealing my money and somebody has taken my car. They say it is in the shop but I don’t believe them.”

  “Well, Tim, you don’t drive anyway.”

  Long pause.

  I was searching for something to say but suddenly there was no meaning in anything he said.

  “My secretary quit. She didn’t like the new janitor.”

  “What secretary?”

  “I think we’d better go as the roll call happens soon and if you are not in your room, a big black man chains you to the bed.”

  I had lost him. I didn’t know it then, but suddenly I was guilty of something that always happens with relatives and friends of Alzheimer’s patients. We keep trying to deal with the person as though they are normal. We asked them questions. We try to respond to them but it’s no use. They are not the person we have known. Invasion Of The Mind Snatchers.

  The mess tent was in the Artillery section. Bowman had sent me to the rear to get two new cherries who were being assigned to the squad. He told me to check in with Buddha and tell him that Bowman said he had better send his ration of Bourbon or he was coming in to kick his ass. “And, you better deliver the message exactly as I said it,” Sarge said.

  I stood looking at this rotund man chewing out some GI. Damn, how did a man with that big belly get in the airborne? No wonder they call him Buddha. He must have read my thoughts as he glanced my way and said, ‘What the fuck are you looking at soldier?’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry motherfucker, be smart,’ he walked my way. ‘Want a cup of joe?’ It was as though the switch had turned off on nasty and he was kind and human. A good combination and not found often in the Nam. Later on I discovered that Buddha always looked at a soldier’s boots. If they were the boots of a grunt, there was nothing he wouldn’t do for him. If they were shined and like some REMF (rear echelon mother fucker), he wouldn’t give him the time of day. I gave him Tim’s message and without warning, he put me in this bear hug. I was kind of taken aback still when he handed me a big bag which obviously was the fifth of Jack Daniels…

  I couldn’t believe the last time I saw Bowman he was so alert. He remembered me, the money, and Buddha, so I continued to visit.

  Tim had more stories to tell about Buddha. Their second tour, Buddha talked Tim into going into Saigon before they went up North to the 101st. North always meant combat to Tim. In Saigon, they wandered around alleys, through little openings in various buildings. Suddenly, according to Tim, they were face to face with this unbelievable American western type saloon. All the Vietnamese wore western garb, several were dressed up like Tom Mix or Gene Autry or Roy Rogers. It was surreal. And, according to Tim, scantily clad females were everywhere.

  What always amazed him and me too was the music. The Vietnamese entertainers could sing American songs with perfect English. Hey Jude, I’m Leaving On A Jet Plane, anything, but could barely speak a little pidgin English.

  Buddha was like a king. His staff and most everyone else bowed to his every whim. Tim always suspected that there was more to it than Buddha let on. After all, Buddha was a dealmaker and Vietnam was his playground.

  Buddha laughed when Tim questioned him about it.

  “Good Sergeant, sometimes to know less than more is better. Look at that bar, would you believe that it is fashioned after a bar in Tombstone where Wyatt Earp once leaned on.”

  Bowman would often lower his voice and come out with a kind of reverence in defense of Buddha: “Buddha always felt guilty for his wrong doing.” Buddha had a soft spot for grunts because they were the guys living and dying over here. Who couldn’t agree with this?

  My mind was a jumble of “what ifs” and confusion as I headed down Hwy 95 toward the Mary Black home. I have to admit that I could not stop thinking about what Sergeant Bowman had told me. I had to quit calling him Sergeant Bowman, that was forty years ago, but he was still the Sarge to me.

  Even though I had read books and done research, I still understand little about Alzheimer’s. There was no way to feel good about it. To see someone like Bowman end up like this was so painful.

  Four and one half million Americans are estimated to have the disease. I can’t believe that we can’t do something about it. I didn’t want to feel so helpless about it, because I always over think things anyway or so people tell me. But, who could be happy about a disease that eats up the mind, decays it really? OK, I’m going to say it: Alzheimer’s is a disease that existentially eats up the self. I know it sounds so Californian, but it’s true.

  These thoughts were still hanging in my mind as I pulled into the Mary Black Center parking lot. That’s it, I’ll think of it as a Ship of Fools. I remembered the old allegory which describes the world and its human inhabitants as a vessel whose passengers neither know nor care where they are going.

  No way, these were all people, like Sergeant Bowman, who had lived productive lives, made contributions, and now were different people. This was more like Invasion of the Mind Snatchers.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, “Mr. Bowman is on a little outing with some of the other residents. We try to give them exercise other than what they often do which is walk back and forth. She seemed like such a kind person, about early forties, African American. I had read that caregivers only last a few months and the pay is abysmally low, which, in my opinion, is close to criminal. The working poor popped into my head.

  “Does Sergeant Bowman ever talk about Vietnam,” I asked her.

  “Never heard him mention it,” she said. “To be honest, he jabbers a lot, but usually it is a chorus along with others and so it’s hard to know.”

  I am thinking to myself that this job must be impossible. These folks have to be saints. Someone like Sergeant Bowman might get agitated and become recalcitrant and these underpaid committed workers, in a sense, have to be just that: caregivers.

  The Mary Black caregivers met the residents where they were in a particular moment, in their reality. The experts called this validation therapy. If they were in 1937 and survived the stock market crash then that was exactly where they were, 1937. I was astonished that these workers could do this. I wanted to learn more about how these people did it. They could teach the education and business world a few tricks.

  “No, Juanita, you can’t do that, that’s not your room. Come over and meet this nice man.”

  The attendant walked over to a very attractive 80 year old woman and gently nudged her out of a room. She walked down the hall.

  “She is a former Church Organist, a good musician. You should hear her play sometime. We have to keep our eyes on her all the time because she goes into others’ rooms, sometimes gets in other patients’ beds. We try to make sure that no one is in the same bed.” She smiled.

  “We have several ministers here and there are rumors that the musicians are involved with the ministers and so we have to be
careful.” I smiled.

  “You mean in the sense that the organist is sleeping with the minister?” We both laughed.

  Tim was out of it. Agitated and walking, he didn’t seem to want to give me the time of day, much less acknowledge that I had come to see him. He was pacing. “Looking for his wife,” said one of the attendants. I had heard the stories and the sad one of his being bereft with grief of his wife’s passing and like my father-in-law, in the next breath, asking who the funeral was for. This was a sad existence to me.

  I could only shake my head. I learned a lot hanging out at the Mary Black, hoping that Tim would float back into reality. It wasn’t just for the curiosity of our mutual experience in Vietnam, but the incredible sadness I felt for him. Inwardly, I constantly was shaking my head at the loss of reality for him and the others.

  “I don’t think you ought to think of it like that”, Elisa said.

  Elisa was a rather large black lady. As my Mom would have said, “big boned.” I had come to know and respect her enormously. She was so very good with Tim. His family had actually hired a private nurse to come in and sit with him; but, for some reason, in a lucid moment, Tim had dismissed her and had taken to Elisa.

  She was great and had a kind of “Zen” quality about her, even if she didn’t know it. Later on, I discovered she was a minister in the Church of God in Christ. Her ability to be in the moment was Zen through and through, based on what little I knew.

  Wherever her charges were or who they wanted to be, she was there for them. “So,” she told me, “just go with where Mr. Bowman is. If he’s in Vietnam, or at a business meeting, be there with him. You might find it relieves your sadness.” I didn’t know my feelings were so apparent.

  As a culture, we are incredibly uncomfortable with Alzheimer’s. No doubt about it. Memory is and was a big issue; and, to be honest, I’d never thought all that much about it.

  To be able to recount the wonderful memories of life is a wonderful gift. For Tim and me, those memories included Vietnam. It was a pivotal time in history and in my life. Hardly a day passed that I did not think about it. I had to feel that it was the same for Sergeant Bowman. He had been a soldier’s soldier, a natural leader. In my heart of hearts, I knew that I could have never been the leader he was.

  On most of my visits, Tim did not come back. More than likely, he came in, sat on his bed, and stared into space. He was still able to look after most of his personal hygiene-shower, shave- but other than that, his dementia had taken over.

  I was close to giving up. I’d come back on the several visits out of respect, but I could not help my friend anymore. God bless him.

  “Jake, what the fuck, boy. Am I glad to see you.” I almost fell over.

  Go with it, Elisa had said.

  “Sarge, great to see you.”

  I had to learn to play along with where he was. I’d watched the other residents who were more open about fading into their past lives: the professor, the opera singer, the church musician. But, here was my Sergeant, my squad leader, back for the moment.

  “Jake, how the hell are you, man?” Bowman bear hugged him.

  Suddenly, we were back in the Nam.

  “I could have used you to get those greenbacks out,” he lowered his voice. I could hardly believe it.

  “It took a conex container to unload them from that hole”, according to Buddha. I don’t know how he did it and got away with it. I think he got some help from the CIA or something, but after I got back to the States, he called and told me that I was to expect some trunks arriving from the Nam and I was to simply store them till I heard from him.

  I was scared shitless. I didn’t want anything to do with all that stuff, because somehow it had to be illegal. I could just see my ass holed up in Leavenworth for the rest of my life. Damn. Jake, where were you when I needed you? I thought you were dead. I’m so glad to be telling you this story. I’ve thought about you so much over the years. This has been miserable.”

  He half grinned and slapped me on the back.

  “Would you believe I didn’t touch those trunks for four or five years? My grandpa had a farm and I stored them out there in an old shed. I figured, ‘hell, I’ll just wait and see what happens.’ Those fucking trunks took over my life. I would have given anything if we hadn’t found that money.”

  There was a long pause and I silently prayed, “Please God, don’t let me lose him again when we are this close.” I decided to venture it. “What about Buddha?

  Pause.

  “Damn, you won’t believe this? I talked to Buddha on the phone and gave him a sitrep and I was to sit tight. He was going on R and R and he’d take care of it. Don’t talk, just wait. Nothing. I’m telling you, nothing. I went back to my old job at the mill and started trying to survive. Don’t you remember? I called you a couple of times.”

  I did remember someone calling me but didn’t know it was the Sarge as he didn’t leave his name. It was soon after Nam and I was out of it myself. Nobody wanted to hear us or talk about Vietnam and we buried it.

  The second time he called, I thought there was a familiarity on the machine but couldn’t be, the Sarge was dead. Then, it just got to be OBE (overcome by events) and more or less I forgot about it until that day on the TV. Damn.

  My squad leader, the good Sergeant Bowman was sitting in the chair beside his bed. I was sitting on the bed. He was shaking his head.

  “Damn, Jake, you wouldn’t believe it. When I didn’t hear from Buddha, I didn’t know what to do. I knew he was at Campbell or Bragg, but didn’t know shit. Finally, I remembered, Wichita, remember him? His Dad was retired military and lived in Hopkinsville just outside of Fort Campbell. I got the number and called his Dad. Wichita had gone off the deep end and hadn’t been heard from for months. His Dad told me Buddha was dead. I almost flipped out. He had been waiting for a chopper; and, when it came in, it lost powered, crashed on its side, knocking the blades loose. They were still rotating and chopped Buddha’s head off.”

  Damn. I was taken aback. It was one of those times when you’re hearing something but you’re not quite sure you are hearing it. I was stunned is the mild term. I waited for the rest of the story.

  Long Pause.

  I sat there for 20 minutes or so and Tim didn’t comment, only stared, lost in some far away galaxy. I was exhausted. This was so crazy, I had half of the story, but there were so many more pieces to it.

  Why did I want to know? I guess I wondered how it all came together, if all that money had made Tim’s life different. Well, sure it did, he was rich several times over and it had to be the money. Although now, what difference did it make. Nothing.

  How would the money have changed my life if he had shared it with me? After all, I did help find it. Finders keepers. No, hell, put that out of your mind.

  I came to see Tim a couple of more times. The last one I definitely came to say goodbye, hoping that just one more time, my squad leader would come back. I didn’t want to hear anymore about the money, but I wanted to say goodbye and say thanks for keeping me alive in the Nam.

  “He’s gone,” Elisa said.

  “It happens,” she says. “And, it is subtle or it’s quick. Suddenly, I have an opera singer who is warming up her voice every morning as she is waiting for the role of a lifetime. And, then,” Elisa’s eyes misted up, “you come in to wake her up and she’s gone--doesn’t want to get out of bed. More likely than not she’s had her final performance here on this earth." She paused and said, “Mr. Jacobson, your Mister Bowman has decided it is check out time. I’m so sorry.”

  I was sitting down beside Tim’s bed and stood. Tim was staring.

  “I’ll give you just a minute alone.”

  There have been a few times in my life when I felt more sadness, but I couldn’t remember when they were.

  “Sergeant Bowman, travel well.”

  Sergeant Bowman took my hand and pressed something into it.

  “What
is this, Tim?” He stared into space.

  I put the little note in my pocket. Walking to the car, I opened it:

  Swiss Credit Bank -Zurich  CH27 00568 002378944591

  Union Bank of Switzerland CH17 01832  000521981433

  Bank Leu (AG) - Zurich  CH55 02945 001173649282

  Swiss Bank Corporation -Basel  CH24 00524 048911290367

  Swiss Volksbank- Berne CH89 00928 002783442575

  Password—buddhajacobson

  Secret Questions:

  What was your unit in Vietnam?

  Answer: A company, 1/501st Airborne Infantry.

  Who is your favorite Native American?

  Geronimo