thedrifter
05-03-07, 09:11 AM
05/03/2007
Two-front war
By BONNIE LANGSTON , Freeman staff
A memoir by New Paltz Vietnam War veteran Larry Winters has elicited a ticker-tape parade of sorts, a celebration neither he nor his comrades in the war experienced decades ago upon their return home.
The belated parade is a quiet one - a stream of readers perusing his "The Making and Un-Making of a Marine: One Man's Struggle for Forgiveness," the first published work by the New Paltz Millrock Writers Collective.
At least 200 copies of the 1,000-run have been sold in the book's first month, and responses to it have been filled with warmth and respect, according to Winters.
"It is a salve I desperately needed," he said.
So far, at least, accolades have come mostly from an unexpected source - women.
"My fear was the book would be seen as one for veterans and men, and no one else would want to go near it," Winters said. "I was afraid it would be pigeon-holed."
The title, to some readers, might imply a narrow topic, but the book's content is broad. Winters' life in the Marines from 1969 to 1970 as a helicopter door-gunner is found within its pages, but so, too, are early family por-traits, familial elements that contributed to the "making of a Marine." Vignettes of the intervening years that were dominated by Winters' struggle with internal demons that led to drug abuse, a divorce and a life generally in "chaos," also inhabit the book.
Winters chronicles, too, his return to Vietnam more than a decade ago as a mental health professional seeking knowledge about post-traumatic stress disor-der in that country's population. The trip was a significant step toward healing, as well, he said. The writing of his book was additional movement forward, not only for himself but, he hopes, for others.
"It's important to tell the story," he said. "If the story isn't told about what war is like, then we can continue to do it."
Winters uses the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as a case in point. He said citizens can largely ignore the carnage and other horrors because the media filters out much of it. Also, com-pared to the previous world wars and the Vietnam War, relatively few troops are involved.
"It doesn't affect our daily lives," he said. "The gas prices go up. That's how it affects us. It's not perme-ated enough. We don't have enough next-door neighbors being killed (to make an emotional impact on a large segment of the population).
The impact on Winters is great, however. He has stopped watching television with its war reports and images of soldiers who have died.
"I just cannot do it," he said.
Then, too, he is gravely concerned about the wars' affect on the troops when they return home, many of them after extended tours of duty.
"What's going to happen to our culture as a result of what we're doing right now is going to be even more outrageous than the Vietnam War," he said. "The level of post-traumatic stress disorder, I've heard, is as much as three out of five."
Winters said he wants soldiers returning from war to know there are safe places they can go to work through their trauma. The first step, he said, is acknowledgment of the need for help.
"There are people willing to help soldiers," he said. "There are people who understand."
A prime source for returning vets, he added, is a program called "A Soldier's Heart," a project of the International Humanities Center. Foun-der Ed Tick, author of "War and the Soul," Winters said, leads salutary groups for military personnel who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.
Vietnam veterans' groups are also known for reach-ing out. Taking part in another's healing also can help them heal themselves, he said.
"More than 100,000 Vietnam veterans have committed suicide," Winters said. "That's twice as many as the number killed in the war."
Winters comes in contact with suicidal people regularly, including veterans, through his work as a counselor at Four Winds Hospital in Katonah, where he runs therapy groups.
"I'm not afraid to step into the arena with you," he said, "because I've lived there."
His continuing effort to heal, Winters added, was a major motive in the writing of his memoir. In it he tells readers he expected the life he toughed out in his family of origin would prepare him for the Marines. He found out differently. It did not prepare him, for instance, to confront the Marine in command during target practice on a Vietnamese beach, when he and fellow soldiers were ordered to fire upon fishing boats.
After yelling "Stop," which earned him a screaming threat of court-martial, he fired into the sand while other shooters aimed at the boat. He heard screams, although he could not determine if any-one was killed. What remained unmistakably alive was the unrelenting shame he felt for allowing the shooting.
"In terms of the war, that's the most difficult (part to include in the book) - the moral di-lemma that created for me."
Winters also had to come to terms with his changing attitude about the war. When he enlisted, he did so as an unsophisticated, small-town boy and former Boy Scout who wanted to do the honorable thing, he said, not to mention his great desire to escape what he called the often-unkind grip of his father. The reality of war quickly reared up its ugliness, though, an ugliness that included the shooting of un-armed people like the fishermen, and the dumping of napalm on villages just to dispose of it.
Winters soon became a member of a group of anti-war Marines who called themselves the Wild Kingdom, named after Marlin Perkins' television show about animals in the jungle. Eventually, military authorities dispersed group members, shipping them to different areas of the opera-tion. His life was like a pressure cooker, Winters said, a lonely existence that continued upon his return home.
"There was nobody you could talk to," he said. "Most veterans don't talk very much any-how."
But Winters' book, 15 years in the works, has allowed him a format to tell his story as well as opening discussion and healing for himself and others.
He has given interviews for print media and radio, and he is rounding up readings and signings. Winters, a published poet, said he is thinking about the future, too. In the book's second edition, he added, he wants to include more of his verse, which he said gets to the point quickly, as well as an epilogue - and a better photo of himself.
He also is looking forward to his first reading, Sunday afternoon at the Veterans of Foreign Wars on Route 208 in New Paltz. Winters himself is not a member, but his pal, Dave Deyo, president of the organiza-tion, is. Deyo signed up with Winters when he joined the Marines.
"Dave is in the book. For Dave and me, this is, in a sense, a coming out, becoming visible," Winters said.
"This is quite significant emotionally for me - the local boy speaking in his town many, many years later, so it is a big deal. It feels like completing the circle."
For more information about "The Making and Un-Making of a Ma-rine," visit millrockwriters.com or makingandunmaking.com, or write to Millrock Writers Collective, P.O. Box 563, New Paltz, N.Y. 12561-0563.
Ellie
Two-front war
By BONNIE LANGSTON , Freeman staff
A memoir by New Paltz Vietnam War veteran Larry Winters has elicited a ticker-tape parade of sorts, a celebration neither he nor his comrades in the war experienced decades ago upon their return home.
The belated parade is a quiet one - a stream of readers perusing his "The Making and Un-Making of a Marine: One Man's Struggle for Forgiveness," the first published work by the New Paltz Millrock Writers Collective.
At least 200 copies of the 1,000-run have been sold in the book's first month, and responses to it have been filled with warmth and respect, according to Winters.
"It is a salve I desperately needed," he said.
So far, at least, accolades have come mostly from an unexpected source - women.
"My fear was the book would be seen as one for veterans and men, and no one else would want to go near it," Winters said. "I was afraid it would be pigeon-holed."
The title, to some readers, might imply a narrow topic, but the book's content is broad. Winters' life in the Marines from 1969 to 1970 as a helicopter door-gunner is found within its pages, but so, too, are early family por-traits, familial elements that contributed to the "making of a Marine." Vignettes of the intervening years that were dominated by Winters' struggle with internal demons that led to drug abuse, a divorce and a life generally in "chaos," also inhabit the book.
Winters chronicles, too, his return to Vietnam more than a decade ago as a mental health professional seeking knowledge about post-traumatic stress disor-der in that country's population. The trip was a significant step toward healing, as well, he said. The writing of his book was additional movement forward, not only for himself but, he hopes, for others.
"It's important to tell the story," he said. "If the story isn't told about what war is like, then we can continue to do it."
Winters uses the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as a case in point. He said citizens can largely ignore the carnage and other horrors because the media filters out much of it. Also, com-pared to the previous world wars and the Vietnam War, relatively few troops are involved.
"It doesn't affect our daily lives," he said. "The gas prices go up. That's how it affects us. It's not perme-ated enough. We don't have enough next-door neighbors being killed (to make an emotional impact on a large segment of the population).
The impact on Winters is great, however. He has stopped watching television with its war reports and images of soldiers who have died.
"I just cannot do it," he said.
Then, too, he is gravely concerned about the wars' affect on the troops when they return home, many of them after extended tours of duty.
"What's going to happen to our culture as a result of what we're doing right now is going to be even more outrageous than the Vietnam War," he said. "The level of post-traumatic stress disorder, I've heard, is as much as three out of five."
Winters said he wants soldiers returning from war to know there are safe places they can go to work through their trauma. The first step, he said, is acknowledgment of the need for help.
"There are people willing to help soldiers," he said. "There are people who understand."
A prime source for returning vets, he added, is a program called "A Soldier's Heart," a project of the International Humanities Center. Foun-der Ed Tick, author of "War and the Soul," Winters said, leads salutary groups for military personnel who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.
Vietnam veterans' groups are also known for reach-ing out. Taking part in another's healing also can help them heal themselves, he said.
"More than 100,000 Vietnam veterans have committed suicide," Winters said. "That's twice as many as the number killed in the war."
Winters comes in contact with suicidal people regularly, including veterans, through his work as a counselor at Four Winds Hospital in Katonah, where he runs therapy groups.
"I'm not afraid to step into the arena with you," he said, "because I've lived there."
His continuing effort to heal, Winters added, was a major motive in the writing of his memoir. In it he tells readers he expected the life he toughed out in his family of origin would prepare him for the Marines. He found out differently. It did not prepare him, for instance, to confront the Marine in command during target practice on a Vietnamese beach, when he and fellow soldiers were ordered to fire upon fishing boats.
After yelling "Stop," which earned him a screaming threat of court-martial, he fired into the sand while other shooters aimed at the boat. He heard screams, although he could not determine if any-one was killed. What remained unmistakably alive was the unrelenting shame he felt for allowing the shooting.
"In terms of the war, that's the most difficult (part to include in the book) - the moral di-lemma that created for me."
Winters also had to come to terms with his changing attitude about the war. When he enlisted, he did so as an unsophisticated, small-town boy and former Boy Scout who wanted to do the honorable thing, he said, not to mention his great desire to escape what he called the often-unkind grip of his father. The reality of war quickly reared up its ugliness, though, an ugliness that included the shooting of un-armed people like the fishermen, and the dumping of napalm on villages just to dispose of it.
Winters soon became a member of a group of anti-war Marines who called themselves the Wild Kingdom, named after Marlin Perkins' television show about animals in the jungle. Eventually, military authorities dispersed group members, shipping them to different areas of the opera-tion. His life was like a pressure cooker, Winters said, a lonely existence that continued upon his return home.
"There was nobody you could talk to," he said. "Most veterans don't talk very much any-how."
But Winters' book, 15 years in the works, has allowed him a format to tell his story as well as opening discussion and healing for himself and others.
He has given interviews for print media and radio, and he is rounding up readings and signings. Winters, a published poet, said he is thinking about the future, too. In the book's second edition, he added, he wants to include more of his verse, which he said gets to the point quickly, as well as an epilogue - and a better photo of himself.
He also is looking forward to his first reading, Sunday afternoon at the Veterans of Foreign Wars on Route 208 in New Paltz. Winters himself is not a member, but his pal, Dave Deyo, president of the organiza-tion, is. Deyo signed up with Winters when he joined the Marines.
"Dave is in the book. For Dave and me, this is, in a sense, a coming out, becoming visible," Winters said.
"This is quite significant emotionally for me - the local boy speaking in his town many, many years later, so it is a big deal. It feels like completing the circle."
For more information about "The Making and Un-Making of a Ma-rine," visit millrockwriters.com or makingandunmaking.com, or write to Millrock Writers Collective, P.O. Box 563, New Paltz, N.Y. 12561-0563.
Ellie