“PTSD? Vat in the Vorld is
that?,” the old man murmured as I started telling my story.
I understand, Dr. Freud,
they hadn't dreamed up the disease in those days, sir, but let me explain.
In the spring of 1944 the 95th Division was
wrapping up the war in Europe. We had taken Metz in a
brutal battle that had cost us 50% casualties. Our first sergeant, a fine man
from Indiana, was dead from a fatal wound to the stomach. Several of my close
friends had been killed in an ambush. Our regimental commander was sent back to
Paris for psychiatric treatment. Then there was a brush with The Bulge, another
trauma.
I was still a callow 19 year
old, shaken but not battered by these events. We ended up the war by crossing
the Rhine and taking Dortmund, a Cleveland-like steel town on the Ruhr, destroyed
by the battering of the final surge of the war.
We were the labeled “Victory
Divison.”
On VE day we celebrated
with the rest of them.
We took off our steel
helmets and simultaneously breathed in the fresh spring air. No guns, no
carbines, no M ones. The weight was off our shoulders.
It was like being reborn, Doctor.
You understand the feeling. I was alive, I had survived the war!
“Ya, ya,” he murmured,
showing absolutely no emotion.
I was ready to become a
human being again. I was a young buck ready to come home a hero to my beloved
girlfriend, who wrote me almost every day. To my grandmother, Goldie, my twin
sister and some adoring friends. I was joyous.
But there was a hitch. There
always is, Doctor.
Right?
Word somehow slipped out,
perhaps through WikiLeaks, that our unit would soon be moved to the port of
Hamburg and shipped back to the states to prepare for the invasion of Japan!
OMG, I screamed to myself...What
will I tell my mother?!
Compared to Japan, Europe
was a piece of cake, Doctor Freud. I was really anxious.
I tried to pretend this was
all a bad dream, Doctor.
Why me? Why the 95th? What
did we do to deserve this?!
We tried to kiss it off as
just a wild army-type rumor, as we climbed aboard the troop ship in late May
for the trip back to Boston and wherever destiny would take us. We were the
first combat division to go back.
Dr. Freud, Dr. Freud are you
asleep?
You dropped your pencil! I was
going to Japan, Doctor. Did you hear me?
lnvade. Japan. A terrible
place! I can't even speak the language.
The old man scowled, a bored
scowl.
He mumbled, “You're time is
up, son. I will write you a prescription for Valium. Take two before you go
bed. You'II feel better.”
But Doctor! Japan! Banzai! Kamikaze!
Unmoved, he murmured,
"Stay calm, call my secretary in two weeks. Maybe I can help.”
(To be continued)
