Authors: Mark Schultz
Letters from War (19 page)
The words of the psalm that greeted her this morning are brighter than the sun above, more vibrant than the colors starting to work their way onto the trees, more real than that tiny hand in hers.
She thinks of Psalm 107 and knows that she could
live off that alone. So much encouragement and wisdom.
Those who are wise will take all this to heart; they will see in our history the faithful love of the Lord.
In clear moments on days like this, with her one grandson at her side, Beth knows that God is near. These moments are what help her get through the sunsets, when the melancholy moon hangs above, her grandson's hand no longer there to hold on to, and the psalmist begins to lament the dark night to come.
“Grandma?”
The voice sings to her.
“You okay?” she asks Richie.
“Uh-huh.”
“What is it? Are you hungry?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Me too. Let's make the biggest peanut butter sandwich you've ever seen.”
“Big?”
“No.
This
big.”
On the drive home from babysitting Richie, Beth decides to make the phone call. Despite her misgivings.
Someone answers on the second ring.
“You win,” Beth says.
“Hey. I was just thinking of you.”
Emily doesn't sound distant or busy. She sounds as if she might be sitting across from her on the couch watching HGTV.
“I couldn't,” Beth says.
“You couldn't what?”
“I couldn't last a week.”
Emily laughs. “It's fine.”
The important things in life are the normal things. Not vacations to the Grand Canyon or the Grand Cayman Islands. Not buying a new car or birthday presents or a graduation gift. It's not the big moments that count but the small. The big moments are the exclamation points on the sentences that have come before them.
“How are things going?”
“I shaved my head and got a couple of tattoos.”
“Very funny.”
“MomâI haven't been gone long enough to know how things are going.”
“Okay.”
“Waitâoh, is that my cue to ask you how things are going on your end?”
“I was just thinking today that we should've done more this summer. Perhaps I should've gone to that concert you went to.”
“You said you hated that music.”
“Well, like I said, you're right,” Beth states. “You win.”
“Did we bet anything? Like maybe an iPad?”
“Not exactly.”
“Mom, I'm not trying to win anything.”
Beth pauses for a moment. “I'm sorry.”
“About what?”
“About this summer. About the way I handled things.”
“It's okay,” Emily says.
“I've been thinkingâthis whole weekâthat maybe it's time.”
“Time for what?”
She knows Emily understands.
“Mom⦔
“I think you've been right. You've been right all along.”
“Mom, pleaseâ”
“I just think it's time. I'm ready to move on. Ready to stop putting my life on hold.”
“Is he?”
“I think James would have wanted me to move on long before now.”
“Mom, don't.”
“Don't what?”
“Don't give up. Just wait.”
Beth sighs.
First Josie, now Emily. Everybody wants me to keep hope alive, even those who have questioned it.
“I don't understand. You're contradicting yourself,” Beth responds.
“I'm a college student,” Emily says. “I'm allowed to do that.”
“I still don't understand.”
“I think it's easier being able to think the way I do knowing you believe that James is still out there. I feel like if
you
stop believing and hoping and praying, then he really will be gone.”
Beth sighs. “So what's that mean?”
“I don't know. I guess it means I'm tired of trying to think about what it means. Sometimes I start thinking about him and then I just⦔ Emily lets out a groan. “I can't. I can't do this drama, not tonight.”
“But you were just telling meâ”
“I know. But you just need to do what you need to do.”
“Em?”
“I have to go.”
“Did I say something?”
“No. I did. And I probably said way too much.”
There is something precious about a toddler falling to sleep while being read to. Tonight Grandma got Richie to bed by reading several of his favorite books. Just
short ones with lots of colors and definitions, ones Beth reads over and over again.
When she comes back into the family room, Beth is surprised by a question from Britt.
“Do you think James knew he wasn't going to come back?”
“Why?”
“Sometimes I think he knew. Maybe it's just me. Maybe it's what any couple goes throughâdoubts and fears and everything.”
“Did something happen?”
Britt shakes her head. “I never showed you the letter he sent me right before he left for Afghanistan. It wasn't his last letter, but in some ways it might have been.”
“What did it say?”
Britt stands up and leaves the kitchen, then comes back carrying an envelope. The light sounds of instrumental music fill the still evening surrounding them.
“I've thought about this so much. After everything we were talking aboutâI still don't know if it would be right or wrong to move on. Butâwell, read the letter.”
Beth opens it and finds the familiar scrawl she loves.
February 28, 2009
Dear Britt:
I'm sorry about last night. I don't know why it's so easy for me to do some things in life and so hard to do other things. I can stand in front of an enemy and, without fear or hesitation, shoot and kill him. Yet I can't stand before my own expecting wife and share with her my thoughts and feelings. It's just always been easier for me to write them.
When we were at Olive Garden and then afterward at the movieâbefore when we were just sitting there and then on the ride homeâall that time I wanted to say this.
If something ever happens to me, I understand that you need to go on. I not only understand it, but I demand that things go on. Not just for you but for our child. I don't want you putting your life on hold any more than you already have. I don't want you to wait, Britt. I don't want you to be stuck in a pool of grief. I don't want you hanging on last words and broken promises and pictures from yesterday.
I learned after my father passed away that you can't live in yesterday. You can't live in tomorrow, either. But you can plan for tomorrow by living in today. By living in the now.
The thought of leaving the two of you alone⦠I just
can't talk about it. There's something about saying things out loud that makes them seem so much more concrete and real.
I believe that if I die in duty, it's God's will. And I also believe that you will be able to allow someone else to fall for you the same way I fell for you. You are too precious not to be loved every moment of every day of the rest of your life. And all I askâthe very thing I wanted to ask of you last nightâis that you don't wait. Don't keep yourself from moving on.
I don't like wallowing in the fears and the maybes of life. That's why this is so hard. I don't like thinking this way. I like thinking of our grandchildren and us vacationing in Europe and what it's going to be like the next time I make love to you. I don't like thinking about good-byes.
But I say this because I have to. So if there's anything of mine you keep, if there are any words that you remember, remember these:
It's okay to move on.
It's not only okay. It's necessary.
I want you to promise me that you will remember this and do it if you have to.
And I promise you I will do my best to keep you from ever having to fulfill this promise.
I love you.
Talk soon.
James
Beth folds the letter and looks at her daughter-in-law. “What did you tell him?”
“I told him I would,” Britt says. “I promised. And all this time, I've been questioning whether or not I've been breaking that promise. Because I don't want to move on. I'm still not ready. Even on nights when Richie is unbearable and I feel like I can't do this by myself, I can't picture being with anybody else.”
“I know.”
“I'm afraid I'll never be ready. I don't know when it will happen, Beth. And that's the most terrifying thoughtâthat'll I'll always be like this. Always.”
For a moment, Beth lets the silence linger like a puff of smoke hanging in the room.
“You know who you're talking to, don't you?”
Britt looks at her, unsure what Beth is referring to.
“Some people have suggested that I âmove on.' Like it's as easy as changing addresses. And no, I'm not talking about with James. I'm talking about with my husband. With Richard.”
“What did they say?”
“I heard everything. Clichés like âThere are other fish in the sea.' Truths like âIt's okay to let go of his memory.' But the truth is thisâI've never wanted to find someone to replace him. There is no replacing a love like that. There have been men where I thought,
yes, sure, they might be a really good husband. But I've never allowed myself to go down that road.”
“Do you regret it?”
“No,” Beth says quickly. “Never.”
“I feel like that letter holds the last words I'll ever hear from James.”
“I can understand that. Richard left us all letters to read after he passed away.”
“What did yours say?”
“I don't know. I still haven't opened mine. I'm waiting for the right time.”
May 14, 2009
Dear Mom:
There are walking casualties, Mom, the kind the media seldom reports about, the kind few of us want to acknowledge.
I'm a newlywed in my marriage, but when it comes to the army, I feel like a veteran. I feel aged and toned and ready. I'm sad to say, however, that not all of my brothers end up this way.
Some go home from the war but never leave it behind. For some, the war wages on in their souls and soon takes them to their eternal home.
The doctors call it post-traumatic stress disorder. I call it something else: It's the enemy waging war on the home front. It's the devil wreaking havoc with men and their families and friends.
I'd be the same, Mom, without my faith. My faith provides crutches even though I still hobble around.
There was a guy I knew in Iraq. His name was Ted Seybert but everybody just called him Bert. He was a decent guy, levelheaded, not one known for violent outbursts. You fall in line and do what you're supposed to do. When your sergeant tells you to hit anything moving, you hit anything moving. You shout a loud “hoo-ah” and do what you're told. You don't hesitate and you don't think twice afterward.
But still, the mind remembers. Your heart can't forget. We're not wired to hurt and kill and when we do, we remember. That's why the nightmares come. That's why sometimes it feels like our unit in Iraq was a psychiatric ward with a bunch of guys being prescribed pocketfuls of antidepressants and sleeping pills.
Bert wasn't one of those guys needing the pills or the booze and pot to get by. But something happened on his way back to the States.
I saw him not long ago when I was back home.
Not long before he killed himself.
The things he'd seenâthe things we'd all seenâit's impossible not to be affected by them. But I also think different people are strong in different areas. It's not just my faith that's kept me grounded and out of harm's way emotionally. It's been my family too, and my ability to compartmentalize. And avoiding bad habits.
They slip up on you, the bad habits. For a while I'd get drunk with the guys and it felt so easy, Mom. I always thought, I'm not doing anything else wrong. I felt like I needed the alcohol because of what I was facing all the time. But then I realized it only made me weaker and more prone to trouble. Habits are hard to break. It's one thing to need to drink out there in the darkness, but it's another to need to do so when I'm with my own bride.
Britt knows all thisâwe talk about it. I can compartmentalize but she needs to know.
But Bert's deathâit's hard for me to fathom how the guy who stayed so levelheaded amid days of worrying about being blown to shreds could stick a gun in his mouth and fire away.
I'm glad that the news reports good things, because there are lots of good things to report.
But there are tragedies happening every day. And there are the walking wounded, the soldiers who are physically fine but mentally and emotionally gone.
I pray for them. I pray for their families.
I pray that I can do something for them.
I pray and thank God that I'm not one of them.
It's by His grace, Mom.
It's by His grace that I'm still here, that I'm still alive, that I'm walking only partially wounded.
Maybe Dad's death showed me that anything can happen, that I have to be able to keep going no matter what. He told me to take my sadness over his death and do something positive with it. And I tried to do that. Thinking about Bert, I'm still trying to do that, every day.
I not only value your prayers, Mom, but I need them. Along with the assurance of my faith, they are what keep me upright.
Thank you.
Talk soon. One day (and don't give me a hard time for this), we have to Skype each other. Though it does require turning on a computer, which I know can sometimes be a chore for you.
Love you,
James
