Tribute: For Memorial Day

I grew up with a real fondness for America's armed forces. In the years immediately following World War II, I met, for example, my parents' Pelham Manor neighbors, Captain and Mrs. James MacLean and their son Little Jimmy. When our family moved to Larchmont, they came to visit frequently, once bringing with them as a gift for me a new canvas Indian tee-pee, which little Jimmy and I set up in our backyard and then, dressed as Indians, slept in that night (without either of us in the dark having to creep with fright up the back stairs to sleep in regular beds).

This was still wartime, and every time the Navy launched a new U.S. warship from the Brooklyn Navy Yard (long since closed down now), we were sure to receive an invitation from Capt. MacLean to come down and watch some dignitary or other bash a bottle of champagne on its prow. (I think I remember the day Harry Truman's daughter Margaret tried her hand at it, but couldn't for the life of her break the bottle.) Many years later, my mother's Ohio college roommate Diane Moulton's two twin sons reached college age. Dick was admitted to West Point, while Jack was admitted to Annapolis. For four years the Nash family was about as close to home as these two boys would get. And so, on Fridays and the following weekends, we played host to the Moulton boys, even so far as getting them dates from among the neighborhood girls.

Both had been Eagle scouts, and, as graduating seniors from the academies, had been required to survive one week's camping in an ultra-primitive environment.

One Thanksgiving weekend, my father and I accompanied Dick and Jack and their Ohio girlfriends to Philadelphia for the traditional and hotly contested Army-Navy football game. That was, to my way of thinking, the high point of our May-December relationship. The next time I saw Jack was at my wedding reception on Long Island some twenty years later. He said he and Dick had become executives for General Electric, but I never saw Dick again. The two brothers remained my models of exemplary young adults for a long time.

After graduating from high school, I made a half-hearted attempt at college, but after my freshman year I decided to stop wasting my parents' money. There was still, in those days, a mandatory draft, so, after a minute's careful thought on the matter, I decided to join the Army, and thereby have two years to decide what I wanted to do with my life.

How well I remember the early morning train ride from New Rochelle into New York City the morning I was scheduled to enlist. There was a little ceremony on the New Rochelle train platform for us four inductees (It turned out I wasn't the only kid who thought to dump his young civilian responsibilities temporarily.) We all knew one another (I knew Harry Easton particularly well; we'd suffered through math together.), so we spent a few minutes jabbering excitedly about what we'd done since graduating from high school.

A uniformed Salvation Army worker then appeared from the station and presented each of us with a tiny olive-drab Bible -- barely thick enough to stop a .22 caliber bullet -- and a tiny spool of olive-drab thread and a `needle. He then led us in a brief prayer, wished us all well, and saw us aboard a local train that had just come in and was headed for the city.

When we got to lower Manhattan and found the correct building, we all had our medical exam. I found I had diabetes and a "heart murmur" -- whatever the heck that was. They gave me a slip marked 4-F, 15 cents for a subway token, and a polite but firm goodbye.

Suddenly, my whole immediate future was once again a blank slate.

Riding home on the train that afternoon, I had a sense of relief. The U.S. wasn't at war with anyone at the moment, and unless there arose a sudden state of national emergency, I wouldn't be called upon to pick up a rifle and point it at someone. I'd often wondered how I would react if, armed only with a thin little Bible, someone were shooting at me. Well, I wouldn't have to find out soon.

At the same time, I also had a sense of shame. Here were these three classmates of mine going into the armed forces to defend the country against some faceless, nameless enemy who might well be shooting at them with rifles that exceeded .22-caliber.

Then and there, I swore I'd make the most of the next two years that, I figured, had more or less been given to me, while Harry Easton and the two other kids were protecting me against vicious foreign invaders. The next day, I took the train to downtown Manhattan, to see about enrolling in Washington Square College of New York University, where my idol Thomas Wolfe (Look Homeward, Angel) had taught in the 1930's. By the end of the day, I was enrolled in NYU and ready to enter at the start of the next semester.

I wanted to stop fooling around with my life.

My next direct dealing with the military occurred during my honeymoon, when Ginny and I were staying at Cape Cod. Some time during our vacation, I wanted to visit the Boston Navy Yard to see the gallant, storied 18th-century American frigate U.S.S. Constitution -- "Old Ironsides" I'd read about this ship all my life. I'd even built a balsa model ship of her. So now I wanted to see her in the flesh, as it were.

I drove furiously along Boston's beltway (Boston's drivers had murder in their hearts) until suddenly a sign appeared directing us to the Navy Yard. I swerved to the right and suddenly found myself rocketing down a steep incline toward what appeared to be a deserted loading dock.

A uniformed serviceman carrying a rifle came rushing out of a small building and headed for me.

He had an expression of controlled panic.

"%#@**&^%," I said to Ginny, with as much restraint as I could muster.

I stopped, rolled down my window, and prepared to be insulted for breaking some unspecified rule.

"Don't get smart with me," he barked. "Wait for me."

He turned and walked briskly toward a small building, beside a gate, where he picked a phone from the wall and began speaking into it. As he was doing this, I thought to myself, "What do I call this guy? 'Private'? 'Lieutenant'? Captain?' 'Commander'? Maybe 'sir' would do. Yes, sir. That's what Little Jimmy always called his dad.

The soldier emerged from the building, and his voice was all different.

"Old Ironsides" would have to wait for another day.

That night, while I watched I Spy Ginny was reading the New York Times. She stopped to tell me that up and down the eastern seaboard, American military equipment was being loaded aboard U.S. ships and heading out for a place called Saigon, in Viet Nam.

Shortly thereafter, on the campus of the University of Minnesota, I knew we'd made the right choice. Across the state line lay our second choice, the University of Wisconsin, a political hotbed from which daily stories of riots and arrests reflected a place where seemingly very little learning could take place. Still, I felt I should take an honest stand on the escalating war in Viet Nam. When I thought of the war, I thought first of the liar Dick Nixon, who was sending thousands of American boys to murder the young of another country.

Then I thought of Little Jimmy and his dad, Capt. James MacLean; Dick and Jack Moulton, and the frightened young soldier only trying to do his duty at the Boston Navy Yard. All these were clearly honorable men.

That night, instead of painting a blood-red anti-war sign, I tuned on Carson and lay beside Ginny, who was already fast asleep.