Dad -Vietnam at Christmas

One time my mom came in the room and said -I saw a clip of Dad getting on a helicopter

in Vietnam -it was filmed by Viet Cong -and one of the Viet Cong said should we shoot him and the other answered -No, they will just send another…

I was very surprised and asked what she was watching and she said just this short thing on tv.  I wondered, did she really see this or was it something else, maybe an old memory, something he told her about then, back in the day, 1970 or something?  And then she saw something on tv that got her thinking about it? And maybe confusing it into a story seems a kind of Irish thing, at least to me.

But it was upsetting to me.  Was she telling me we almost lost your dad then, and I had known nothing of it.  That would have shattered me for sure, completely.  It would have been unthinkable, ever...

I guess this time of the year is when you think of these things…Was my mom telling me a story?  I simply don't know.

But now I remember my dad coming in the basement once and saying -Son, I may write you when I am there, and if I do write, it will be in code.  I've forgotten the the code for now, but I remember how impressed I was then…and I was frightened too, who was he afraid of, the Viet Cong?…or us, the government?…the military?…the CIA?  I asked him and he said nothing, no I am just going to do it that way...

I was tense that entire trip then…and I was glad when he was home again.  It's funny, the only other time I've thought of this was when I called the FBI after my paintings were stolen and they spit on me.  I remembered how whenever our phone would ring then, the connection was always bad, you could hear the FBI, sometimes really hear them, a few words back and forth as they worked on getting a better connection, but back then I always thought they were my friends.

But this is years later, and now I should simply -Call the police.  I guess, but I remember when you were our friend.