SongWriting

The following stories are about three different soldiers who fought in three different wars, decades apart. What they have in common is music and war. And it is those things that hold them unique. We wanted to honor all soldiers, both living and dead, who sacrificed life as they had always known it to fight for the preservation of an entire people. These stories are true. The names are changed. ~ Shawna Ortega

They refer to themselves as warriors, and they are deserving of that title. They are the United States Special Forces. Jon G., in his early 40s, has been training for this role his entire life. As one of the elite, he has served several tours in Afghanistan. During the last one, 24 men in his unit went over, and only 16 made it home. Despite those numbers, Jon G. is looking forward to his next deployment. He explained to me that this is "the sort of work that calls to me and guys like me. We don't really enjoy it, it's just what we have to do."

Every life has a soundtrack. Whether or not you are consciously aware of it, you have one, too. The sound of the doctors and nurses at the very moment you arrive on Planet Earth, the voice of your mother squawking “No!” every time you attempt to down some tasty-looking dirt clod, the infuriatingly obnoxious laugh of Woody Woodpecker… and on it goes.

Somewhere in there music is introduced into your senses. Maybe it was “Kids International Sings the Top 20 Gangsta Jams.” Maybe it was crazy old Aunt Maxine warbling Metallica on a Mr. Microphone. The point is, suddenly your soundtrack included music.

Musical soundtracks are as individual as lives. No two are the same.

For this Memorial Day 2009, we’d like you to know about another sort of soundtrack. One that begins with Social Distortion wailing “Death or glory is just another story!” and ends too many times with the notes of Taps played near a flag-draped casket.

Taps has been described as haunting, mournful, and chilling. For the uninitiated who have yet to experience the notes emanating from a bagpipe, those descriptive three words are like dipping your big toe into a freezing lake; it’s a fleeting knowledge of what you’ll feel when you’re totally immersed. Goosebumps are a guaranteed accompaniment. As history tells us, Union General Daniel Butterfield composed the tune by ear, in the midst of the Civil War, as an addition to a nightly trumpet call (or “tattoo”) signaling his soldiers that it was time to quit the day’s drinking and go to sleep. (http://www.west-point.org/taps/Taps.html) Since 1891 Taps has been a mandatory tradition at military funerals. The name of the original call? “Extinguish Lights.”

It is the soundtrack of Jon G.’s war.

Deep behind enemy lines, Jon and his fellow warriors ready themselves for a journey into a landscape choked with dark threat. Along with full body armor, machine guns and ammo, Jon carries his “war playlist” in an MP3 player rigged into his helmet. “Every soldier’s got a war playlist,” he says. His includes AC/DC’s “Long Way to the Top,” Disturbed’s “Sons of Plunder,” Filter’s “Hey Man Nice Shot,” and “Bad Religion” by Godsmack. Aside from the intense training and the superior technology with which they are equipped, the playlist is what helps them feel ten feet tall and bulletproof going into combat.

“Your first thought is of God, whether you’re religious or not. Your second thought is, ‘Am I going home?’ Then you blink out, the training takes over… and you go to work.” ~ Jon G.

But playlist or no playlist, as soon as that first bullet is fired, they morph from immortal to human in the space of a light trail.

Jon G. is a shadow warrior, one of the elite group of Special Forces whose job it is to gain the trust of the enemy in exquisitely dangerous games of cat and mouse. “We don’t live in the big built up bases like the rest of the Army,” explains Jon. “We don’t have security forces like MPs that pull guard. We have only 24 guys stationed deep inside hostile territory. We are way out of range of any fire support (like artillery) to help us out when we get shot at. We live in and amongst the indigenous people, and unfortunately not all of them are our friends.”

Jon G.’s War Playlist 1. Death or Glory – Social Distortion 2. Long way to the top – AC/DC 3. Thunder Kiss ‘65 – Rob Zombie 4. Hey Man Nice Shot – Filter 5. Sons of Plunder – Disturbed 6. Bad Religion – Godsmack 7. Machinehead – Bush 8. Song 2 – Blur 9. Points of Authority – Lincoln Park 10. Flow Heat – 3rd Strike 11. Pump it up – Black Eyed Peas 12. Reach for the Sky – Social Distortion 13. Wake Me Up When September Ends – Green Day

His ready smile is well tempered by the anguish resident in his eyes. Jon G. has survived horrors that bend the corners of the imagination. He has seen more war-ravaged life than should be allowed, and has stood graveside listening to Taps 21 times this year alone while grieving for a fallen brother. It is inherent in a soldier’s life that whether or not they make it home, they will always carry with them the dense reality of having played a part in a startling documentary that most of us will never really see.

Small wonder, then, that when talking about the war, Jon G. prefers to share the laughter he cherishes in memories of the men at his side who leaned headfirst into the danger. He’d much rather remember the smiles of his brothers than anything else.

Of course, when you’re telling war stories, it’s simply not possible to leave out the flying bullets. “They crack and hiss like a whip,” Jon says. “When you hear the crack, you know you’re good, because that bullet is already past you.”

Randy R. never heard the crack.

In the midst of a roadside ambush, bullets raining sideways upon them, Jon, Randy, and their brothers were returning like for like, or better. Randy took a round to the chest that knocked him flat. With the clarity of thought that accompanies such situations, Jon was certain Randy had just been mortally wounded. No time to help. The focus had to be on the bad guys to prevent anyone else being shot.

In this scenario, Average Joe might have found his bowels dissolving. But these are no Average Joes. In fact, as Jon tells it, after what felt like hours but was probably literally just seconds, he glanced over at Randy expecting to see him lifeless. Instead, like a sand-bottomed Bozo, Randy popped off the ground with a huge grin and yelled, “HOLY F***ING SH*T! These vests really work!!”

Today, Memorial Day’s arms have expanded to encompass all soldiers – dead or alive – anyone who has or is currently serving in the military forces of the United States.

And then there’s the time when Gary H., not a horseman by any stretch, jumped on a pony without a clue how to make it move. The problem was compounded by the fact that the pony was as stubborn as it gets. Gary grabbed the reins and shook them. He started flailing his legs in a spasmodic attempt at a kick to the pony’s side. The pony just pinned its ears and remained still. Finally, Gary’s well-meaning buddy Andy offered a hand, and slapped the pony on the butt for some added inducement. Still stubborn, the pony took a small step forward and chewed on the bit. Andy slapped again a little harder. Pony was beginning to look aggravated. Then, right at the same moment, Gary flailed and Andy slapped, and the pony’d had enough. He took off kicking and bucking with Gary hanging onto his mane, sliding sideways, and finally landing with a hard thump as the pony ran away. Lucky for Gary, Jon G. had been timing the ride. Eight seconds. A qualifying rodeo ride.

Mark H. was born in 1937. He did two tours of Vietnam, and it was on the second tour he had the tiger incident. When he came home he climbed into a bottle in a futile attempt to outrun the demons of that war. He died when he was 55. "Joe" is his brother, who told me about Mark's 5-day period as a POW, wherein he watched 4 of his buddies be summarily executed in front of him, one per day. They were broken free by American soldiers on the very day Mark was up for execution.

He favored his father with his swarthy Clark Gable good looks, and charisma oozed from him in buckets. But somewhere deep in the jungles of Vietnam, it had ceased to matter. Out there, tigers eyed you like pork chops. Just as the one he was trading glances with this very moment. Soldier Mark H. and his company were silent on the trail; for any sound at all, no matter how slight, could bring the wrath of a thousand hells upon them.

Joe’s soundtrack for his brother 1. Blueberry Hill - Fats Domino 2. Sh-boom (Life Could Be A Dream) - Crew Cuts 3. Rock Around The Clock - Bill Haley and His Comets 4. Sixteen Tons - Tennessee Ernie Ford 5. The Great Pretender - The Platters

So he stayed perfectly still, and waited. The tiger advanced a few paces. A fine sheen of nervous sweat broke out on Mark’s forehead and mingled with the grime and sweat already there. He slowly reached for his radio and pushed the button. He didn’t so much speak as breathe into the microphone: “Sergeant, I have a tiger.” A split second later, the hissed response: “You’re not supposed to be on this radio.”

Deafening silence filled the jungle. The approaching tiger erased the space until it was close enough that Mark could count its teeth. He pushed the button again. “Sergeant, I have a tiger on my foot.” Urgently.

Nothing.

“Request permission to shoot it, Sergeant.”

“Keep quiet – keep still!” came the hissed reply.

Not uniquely qualified to handle such a situation, Mark knew one thing for certain: he didn’t come to Vietnam to be a chew toy. So it was shoot, or be eaten. Either way there was going to be noise, which would give away his position.

Finding the radio button one last time, he barked into it, “Sergeant, the tiger is eating my shoe.” With his foot still in it. Enough said - he opened fire.

Although Mark survived the war physically, like many veterans of war he never recovered emotionally. He made it home, but his brother says, “The devil rode piggyback.” The stories that Joe tells about his brother (like the one above), however, are the ones that make him smile. And the music that makes him remember his brother – his soundtrack – is exceptional in its memories of their childhood.

Bob died in April, 2009. A veteran of the Korean War, his nephew told me his story. It's one they always told at family gatherings, because it's one war memory that Bob could laugh at with them.

“Bob was a corn-fed country boy from South Dakota who thought that Korea was just someplace he could get away from his family to. And so he went. He was 22 years old when he enlisted, and some would say 50 when he got out. During his service he was known as ‘Fisherman.’ Turns out that the sergeant one night asked if anyone had a hankering to go fishin.’ Bob popped up, visions of trout dancing in his eyes, and said, ‘Hell, yeah!’ That was how he discovered what dragging a lake for bodies was all about. They would take scooped-out tree trunks to use as boats, float them into the dense swamps, and throw a hook tied to a rope into the waters and drag the bodies of American soldiers to shore for burial.” ~ Bob’s nephew

Bob’s family and friends always hoist a pint to him when they hear David Allan Coe’s “You Never Even Called Me By My Name.” It was their beer drinking song. And you can bet that this Memorial Day – the first since Bob passed away - will be a party in honor of Bob. And they will call him by his name: Fisherman.