RUTH'S VIEW

Ruth Lakkari's brother was killed in Vietnam. She and some others are authors of a wonderful coffee table book, The Names Behind The Faces. It tells the story of every soldier from MN killed in that useless war. A few comments from Ruth.

I had to run some errands today and while I was sitting in my car at a stop sign I noticed the truck in front of me was from Florida but had a Purple Heart on his license plate. I honked my horn at him a couple of times and he stuck his head out of his truck window. I yelled at him "Thank You For Being a Vietnam Vet!" He then waved me to pull over in the parking lot. He got out of his truck and walked over to me. He told me he appreciated my thank you. We got to talking and he told me he did two tours in Vietnam. He got shot in the leg and also shot in the back. He told me he was in terrible health and suffered from agent orange. He also had several other illnesses. He was wearing a hat that had Vietnam Veteran on it and when he was shopping he accidentally bumped into a lady with her son. He said he was sorry and hoped the little boy was okay. The lady looked at his hat and said "hummm...Vietnam Veteran....baby killer." I apologized for that lady's ignorance and there are many of us out there who are indebted for what he did for his country. He started telling me about the nightmares he has and how he has buried too many Vietnam veterans friends. He told me he was 67 years old and knew he didn't have much longer on this earth but he didn't care as he wanted out of this world as it has become so ugly. I told him about Tim and he told me he was sorry but that he was in a much better world. We both sat there talking and crying and feeling the affects of how ugly war really is. We talked about how no one cares about our troops over seas fighting a war we didn't need to be a part of. He gave me his business card and is the Post Adjutant of American Legion Post 255 but after talking some more he asked me for his business card back and wrote on the back of it his personal email address and gave it back to me. We ended our conversation with saying "Peace."
There are a ton of war veterans walking out there and the last talley of suicide from our soldiers fighting over in Iraq and Afganastan was in the year 2005 and the total was over 6000!! It is a sad world when it is more important to hear about Lindsey Lohan then it is to hear of our troops fighting over seas. Before you close you eyes at night please think of our troops fighting over seas and pray for them to come back unharmed and to be able to find peace in their minds and hearts so they may lead a normal life after war.
Thanks
Ruth