Sunday, December 8, 2024
D+33
2008 Governor Rod Blagojevich was arrested by federal officials for attempting to sell the United States Senate seat being vacated by President-elect Barack Obama
2014 CIA Torture Report was released, detailing the CIA's use of torture on detainees between 2001-2006
2019 US officials "deliberately misled" the public on the progress of the Afghanistan war, hid that it was a lost cause, according to The WaPo analysis of the "Afghanistan Papers"
In bed by 9:00, awake and up at 4:55.
Prednisone, day 208, 7.5 mg., day 23. Prednisone a 5:00. Morning meds at 8:40.
Another mystery about my father. Since I started working on my memoir 15 years ago or more, I have thought that my father was discharged from the Marine Corps shortly before Thanksgiving Day 1945. I assumed that he was home with my mother, my sister Kitty and me, and with his parents and his sister Monica for Thanksgiving dinner and a homecoming welcome after their separation for one year and 10 months, from his conscription into the Marine Corps on February 18, 1944 until his discharge in time for Thanksgiving at home. Today, I looked at his Honorable Discharge and Certificate of Service in World War II and saw that he was discharged from the Naval Base at Great Lakes, north of Chicago on November 26, 1945, 4 days after Thanksgiving. There could be a simple administrative, bureaucratic explanation for this. Perhaps he was in fact released before Thanksgiving which was on November 22 that year but the discharge for some reason was dated November 26th. I suspect though that he was not released until the date of his discharge and that there was no Happy Homecoming on Thanksgiving. I think this for 2 reasons. First, because though he very rarely spoke of his service during the war or of the bloodbath on Iwo Jima, he told me one day when I was visiting him in Florida, that 'they' didn't want to release him from the Marines because he wasn't ready, or words to that effect, to return to civilian life. I now wonder whether he was in fact assigned to the Great Lakes Naval Hospital after the war was over in August of that year. Once the war was won, there was no reason for the government to keep this young married father of two children, one of whom he had never seen, on active duty for another three months. He didn't explain to me
why 'they' didn't want to release him other than that they thought 'he wasn't ready' and I out of respect didn't ask.
The second possible reason I addressed in the memoir in much greater length and depth than the excerpts I include here:
Since I started this writing project, I have learned that my father was jealous of my mother, that sexual intimacy was painful for my mother, that my father worked in a war industry and could have, but did not, request a draft deferment, and that my mother wrote to him very seldom while he was away. These perhaps unrelated facts hardly lead inexorably to any conclusion about their marriage, but they support – though inconclusively – a hypothesis that the marriage was strained before my father left for the Marines in early 1944.
In fact, my father told Geri that my mother never wrote to him during his time in service.
. . . .
My father’s job at Johnson & Johnson was making sanitary dressings for combat wounds; he was employed in a war industry. He had one small child and, after November 1943, another on the way. When I asked him recently why he didn’t apply for a draft deferment, occupational or hardship or both, he just shrugged. Was his passivity prompted by patriotism or something else? It may have been patriotism, of course; there was of lot of it afoot during the war and there is no reason to think that he was any less patriotic than the next guy. It may have been pride and a fear of being considered a ‘shirker,’ one who failed, as the Irish would have said, to “do his bit” while others were fighting and dying. It also may have been, however, at least in part, a desire to get away, to escape the responsibilities of married life and fatherhood. He had just turned 23 when Kitty was conceived and he was to be the father of two by age 24. Did he want to get away, to live among other young men, with no wife or children about? It certainly would not have been an unusual desire for one who had married and become a parent at so young an age. If he didn’t desire to be drafted, for whatever reason or reasons, why did he not seek an occupational or hardship deferment, like hundreds of thousands of other draft age men? Did he and my mother discuss the possibility of deferment, especially when she became pregnant with Kitty? As it was, when he was drafted, she was left at age 22 with me 2½ years old and Kitty on the way and precious few resources to rely on. Could either patriotism or pride make up for the difficult situation she was in? Was he using the draft as a way to run away from responsibilities, rather like walking away from the responsibilities of high school to make a few bucks as an unskilled worker? If so, each decision represented seizing on a short term solution to an immediate frustration, with long term negative consequences. Though I am only guessing on the basis of very inadequate evidence, and perhaps projecting, my best guess is that that was what was going on between my parents in 1944.
My guess about my father’s draft status is supported by the knowledge, based on my father’s statement to Geri that my mother seldom [never] wrote him during his service. Neither my father nor my mother was a letter writer, but that would not explain long periods of silence from her. She was too responsible and loyal to everybody close to her for her to ignore her husband once he was gone unless perhaps she believed herself to have been abandoned by him, left in the lurch with a toddler and a baby on the way by an immature and selfish husband. Perhaps it is only my loyalty to my mother that causes me to put this ‘spin’ on the scant evidence available to me, but I don’t think so. All of her actions after the war and for the rest of her life demonstrated beyond question what kind of person she was; there was no way she would have ignored her husband after he was drafted unless she believed that he had walked out on her, with the local draft board providing the cover. (Another possibility, of course, is that my father overstates the lack of mail issue but, whatever his faults and weaknesses, I have never known him to be anything other than truthful and I take him at his word.)
If the parting at the beginning of 1944 was beset with troubles, the reunion at the end of 1945 must have been even more so. My parents had been separated almost two years with little communication, my father was suffering from PTSD compounded undoubtedly by anger and resentment about the paucity of letters and further compounded by rampant alcoholism. The man who returned from the war was not the man who left and the family he left was not the family he came home to. At my age, I would have had virtually no memory of him from two years earlier and Kitty at 15 months of age had never seen him. He was a stranger to us and, especially in his condition, undoubtedly an unwelcome intruder into our home and our hitherto uncomplicated relationship with our mother.
Even without the PTSD, his relationship with my mother must have been terribly strained. With the PTSD and the drinking and the living in the basement shoebox, the situation must have been at times nearly intolerable. For him, the insecurity and jealousy problems must have been doubled and redoubled by the lengthy separation and lack of letters. For her, the challenges of raising two little kids with hardly any money were compounded by having an angry, resentful, sullen, withdrawn, beer-benumbed husband to deal with.
Researching, speculating, and writing this narrative was painful and difficult. It recalled miserable years after the war when my father was, as I wrote, "angry, resentful, sullen, withdrawn, [and] beer-benumbed' which I, in the memoir, attributed mainly to Iwo Jima and his PTSD, but perhaps the PTSD was only part of it. Today's discovery that he was discharged from the Marines only a short train ride from home the Monday after Thanksgiving in 1945 has raised the mystery once again.
[In the photograph of my Dad and his Marine buddies above, Dad, at age 23 or 24, is on the upper right. This photo surely was taken before the battle of Iwo Jima and after boot camp. I can't imagine those happy faces on Marines after Iwo. I wonder how many of the four Marines survived the battle and in what condition.]
From one war story to another. 59 years ago on this date, I took part in Operation Harvest Moon in South Vietnam. I'm struck by the description of it in my Marine Corps history book.
8-29 December OPERATION HARVEST MOON. Working with 3 ARVN battalions, 2/7, 3/3, and 2/1 sweep through an area between Chu Lai and DaNang. Marine air and artillery and 4 Air Force B-52 strikes provide fire support. At a cost of 51 Marine dead, 256 wounded, and one missing, the operation accounts for 407 Viet Cong killed and 33 capture
That last sentence sounds like it was written by a cost accountant. Words fail me. How many of us did they kill and how many of them did we kill. The infamous Vietnam body counts. How is it that we had 256 counted wounded but zero for the VC? Answer: First, the VC carry their wounded away when they withdraw, and (2) wounded VC easily become "kills" for the "body count" if they are 'dispatched.' KIAs are assets; WIAs and captures are liabilities because you have to deal with them and care for them. Also, the 407 dead VC is almost surely an inflated number. American Marines' and soldiers' counting skills suffered throughout the war since Saigon and Washington put a premium on body counts. It was also an inducement to convert enemy WIAs into KIAs.
Notre Dame was reopened today, 5 years after the devastating fire. I've visited there three times, once with Geri and Mike McChrystal, another time with Geri, and the last time alone. I flew to Paris alone on the Easter weekend in 1998. and was lucky to get a room at L'Hotel Rive Gauche, where Geri and I had stayed on our second trip. We stayed at L'Hotel du Dragon on the first trip with Mike. Geri opted not to join me for my Easter holiday because she knew I wanted to church-hop, which was virtually all I did. I also made notes, 88 pages of them including these partial notes about Notre Dame:[On Holy Saturday afternoon] I walked over to Notre Dame, resigned to wait in the line to get in, which I did. . . There was a scriptural reading & musical liturgy at noon. The 'fideles" who wanted to attend the service could sit in the nave . ; . the 'visiteurs' were shunted around the periphery. I started out with the 'visiteurs' but got admitted to 'les fedeles.'
I'm glad I made a point of getting inside. . . I had forgotten how very magnificent the structure is. What mainly captures the eye and the imagination is the stonework - the thick columns low [?] and graceful almost delicate looking columns and pilasters above, and of course the vaulted ceilling. The stained glass is striking -with a variety of colors, inccluding green, which I don't recall seeing in other places.
There is another beautfiul Pietà in the apse, . . . The Pietà is thought provoking. The mother is looking to Heaven with arms outstretched and a look on her face that is hardly the "Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Be it done unto me according to thy will" look. The look is angry, anguished, and accusatory. If I start writing on my thoughts on that look, I'll be here forever.
. . . My vocablulary is too poor to desribe the Triduum in Paris. The Easter Vigil at Notre Dame was no exception. Like Holy Thursday at St. Germain du Près, it was standing room only. but in a much larger space. A sizable line had formed before the doors were opened at 8:30, when I arrived. Every seat in the cathedral filled within minutes.
Cardinal Lustiger was the celebrant. He sarted the liturday at about 8:45, standing in front of the altar, speaking softly to the people. He spoke until 9, without notes, saying I know not what. After the opening prayer, the lights were extinquished - all of the lights, including the 10 francs candles, and the cathedral was black and silent.
For the vigil service, there are very few 'visiteurs' and seemingly thousands of faithful. And everyone is quiet - no talking, no whispering, no baby crying, no sound. And no light. After the dark prayer, our candles are lighted from the flame on the altar and with our individual candles we can read along with the lengthy scriptural readings - the creation myth, Abraham's call to sacrifice Isaac, the Hebrew's flight from Egypt, the prophets . . . The large cross that had been mounted behind the main altar during the day had been moved to a position behind the Pietà while the cathedral was closed. During Paul's letter to the Romans, it was illuminated - though not brightly - as was the Pietà , which appeared mostly in silouette. Thus, the Pietà appeared - with arms outstretched and face turned reproachfully and in anguish - at the foot of the cross. Paul's letter about dying to sin and living for God and Luke's gospel - "Why do you look for the living among the dead?" -are offered as answers to the anguish, suffering reproach of the Pietà . It was exceedingly dramatic and memrable. . .
The Mead 'Lil' Comp' notebook is a treasure of recorded memories. I'm thankful to have kept notes on this and other travels.
How do I feel about the enormous cost of restoring Notre Dame after the fire despite the 'give away all that you have' and 'the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head' stuff? How does it compare to Gesu Parish spending $10 million to refurbish the church in Milwaukee? It's more than I have the energy to think about this morning, but I'm glad Notre Dame has been saved As I type this, I recall a brief conversation I had with Father Niles Kaufman in St. Francis of Assisi church about the unimportance of church buildings compared to the communities they house.
St. Peter bonfire. My Facebook post on this date, 2017:
In 1996, Geri and I were vacationing in Rome on December 8th, which is Catholicism's Feast of the Immaculate Conception. Purely by serendipity, we happened upon an extraordinary torchlight procession, an 'ndociata,by residents of Italy's Molise region, from the Vatican's Via della Conciliazione to St. Peter's Square. Around 2,000 people, dressed in traditional regional garb often related to their occupations, marched to a huge gathering under the window of Pope John Paul II to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his priesthood. The procession was led by men in black riding black horses and carrying grand torches of fir and broomwood branches. Many sturdy marchers followed on foot, again carrying huge torches. Some had single torches, others had double, triple and even five torches, secured in strong belts like flagpole belts used military honor guards. Other marchers carried gifts for the Pope, farmers with baskets of grain, women with loaves of bread, even blacksmiths with small forges, and so on. We were lucky enough to come upon the scene shortly before sundown, as all the marchers were lined up along the Via, mostly standing and waiting, but many singing and dancing, eagerly awaiting the setting of the sun. Once the sun had disappeared and it was sufficiently dark, the smell of kerosene filled the air and the torches were ignited. Then the hundreds and hundreds of marchers proceeded to the area under the Pope's "angelus" window, where the torches were piled on the surface of the piazza, one on top of another, to create a massive bonfire illuminating most of St. Peter's Square. The marchers chanted "Papa, Papa, Papa" until at last the light went on in the Pope's window and John Paul appeared, to uproarious cheers, to speak to those who had gathered to honor him. It was, I am quite sure, the most joyous and truly spectacular celebration we have ever seen. And all by serendipity.
Nona's Star of the Show last night.
LTMW at 8:10 a.m., I saw two North Shore Fire Department Fire/Rescue trucks leaving Wakefield Court. A neighbor must have been in distress. Of course, I am curious. Is it a friend, or one we don't know? Our usual source of information about happenings in the 'hood is our next-door neighbor Debbie who somehow seems to have a pipeline on all neighborhood happenings. One of those trucks and its crew of EMTs was probably here at our house back in June when I fell in the TV room and couldn't get up. . . . We still have "No Parking" cones on Wakefield in front of our house from yesterday's baby shower at the Pandl's. Sally expected 72 guests and asked if some of them could park in our driveway and of course, Geri agreed. . . A gorgeous Hairy Woodpecker has perched atop the shepherd's crook holding the suet cakes. He's facing my window and I get a good long look at his white and black feathers. He dropped down to feed on one of the two suet cakes while on the sunflower/safflower tube two male house finches and two females feed. When the big woodpecker swoops away to one of our corner pine trees, his place is taken by a dainty, agile, ned-breasted nuthatch. Down below, a gray squirrel with pretty furry white ears sits up on her haunches as she works on the ground seeds I spread yesterday afternoon. The English sparrows show up at the seed tube and, as usual with them, there's a bit of a fight for position. Is their feistiness characteristic of all sparrows or just the English?
Visit from Caela and Dick Kinney, who came over bringing lunch. Dick is another Vietnam vet, Air Force. He was a loadmaster on C-130s and C-141s with 2 Purple Hearts. He served 2 tours, starting in 1968 and 1970. We enjoyed very spirited, interesting conversations about all sorts of things.
My journal entries on this date last year and two years ago (to me at least) are very interesting.
Anniversaries thoughts: If Donald Trump does what Rod Blagojevich did, he would be immune from prosecution thanks to John Roberts and his Republican confrères on the Supreme Court.
The American government tortures prisoners when it is in its interests. The American government lies to its citizens when it is in its interests. USA, USA, USA!!!!
