We were a close-knit family. La famila was very important. My grandfather and grandmother lived next door to our house, and since my grandparents lived alone, I spent most of my spare time with my grandfather. I enjoyed hanging out with my grandfather. He was very articulate, and he took the time to talk to people in the community.
He knew what was happening in local affairs as well as county and state. I recall every evening after supper, he would read the newspaper page by page to the end. He was always encouraging me to do well and was always praising me for doing it. As I entered high school, I moved in with my grandparents since my older sister who lived with them had left the house. I was my grandfather’s chauffeur, and he was my mentor. Although I didn’t have a driver’s license, I was allowed to drive, provided an adult sibling was present. Once in high school, I took driver’s education, and I got my license.
Although my time was well occupied during the day, I still had time to participate and join the Cub Scouts. Our meeting were held in the late evenings. After being a Cub Scout, I later moved up the ranks to Boy Scout, and finally Explorer Scout. Our scout meetings were held in the evenings, so I was able to participate. I recall my grandfather taking me to Taos, New Mexico, to JCPenney, and he bought me my Boy Scout uniform, and I was so thankful and appreciative. That meant the world to me. During the time I was a member of the Boy Scouts of America, we participated in several Boy Scout camperies at the county and state level. In one particular State Boy Scout campery, our Troop 512 took the state championship in Cuba, New Mexico. We competed with Boy Scouts from all over the state. We had all our merit badges to be Eagle Scouts. We knew the practical as well as the theory of scouting. We were survivors at an early stage in life.
After my brother graduated from high school, the herd of sheep was reduced to just a few, and cattle replaced the sheep. I was in charge of attending to sixty plus cattle during spring break and after school and in the winter months. I had to make sure they were fed every day before going to school and after school in the evening. Never a dull moment, and our morals and value were high.
My father had all the farm implements that go along with the farm to be self-sufficient. We would cut and bale hay for people in the neighborhood. I learned to drive a tractor at an early age, along with all the implements. We would cut and gather timothy hay in the fall, along with other crops, and store them for the winter months.
Every day before going to school and after school, I had to make sure all the animals got fed. Being raised in a farm in Northern New Mexico, we had different farm animals as well as different crops.
Attending Penasco High School until graduation in 1968, I was a C average student; and when evaluation came around, the majority of the schoolteachers stated that I was not college material. It seemed to me at the time that the only students that were encouraged to attend college were the sons and daughters of schoolteachers. I was not encouraged to attend college, and perhaps the mines would be the best choice. There was only one schoolteacher, Mr. Elias Fidel, that suggested that college was the best way to go. He had been in a previous war himself and had gotten an education through the GI Bill and had hope for all students to attend college.
The spring after I graduated, I had the opportunity to go work in Lake Tahoe, California, for an outfit called Champion Construction Co. The company did trailblazing and refurbishing old forest service trails. It was labor work, and jobs were scarce at the time. I worked through the summer and saved enough money to pay tuition for a semester in college, so in September, I registered at NMHU, Las Vegas, New Mexico. I successfully completed the first semester. Although I was considered not to be college material, I took the same classes that my classmates from Penasco High School were taking as freshmen, and I had the same grade they did, even though they were A and B students. I came home for Christmas vacation, and during the break, I didn’t know if I was going back to college. I couldn’t afford to pay for college, so I decided to join the US Marine Corps and hopefully continue the pursuit of a college degree after I had done my duty to God and my county and to protect freedom.
Enlistment in the United States Marine Corps
It was January 13, 1969, that I joined the US Marine Corps along with four other friends from the nearby communities. This is a story that is brutally open and honest. Vietnam is the secret world, the inner sanctum of a warrior, a place unknown to most, a hidden world seldom spoken of to the uninitiated, yet a time-honored world in which we live every moment of every year. War after war, there will always be warriors, and all warriors share the same battleground, and we are caught in two very different and conflicting worlds. As we became Marines, each of us left behind the comforts and safety of our country to travel halfway around the world to experience the horrors of war, and yet within it, we found the true meaning of trust, honor, friendship, and loss. As our tours of duty ended, we returned back to the world only to find our torment continuing with the painful memories of how life once was, and yet could never be the same again. Due to my own military background, I have kept my primary focus on learning how to deal with post-traumatic stress and have learned that we all combat Vietnam veterans have one thing in common. This story recounts many of my own experiences, beginning as a Marine combat rifleman with India Company, Third Battalion, Fifth Marines in and around An Hoa, South Vietnam. As I got in country, I had to quickly learn first to survive combat and, for fifty years, have learned to survive life. To accept dishonor, accept the fact that my valor was stolen by my company commander. Where necessary, I use harsh language, which was common among us in Southeast Asia.
For those of you who have love ones and friends, I hope that you have taken the time to understand what we have gone through and understand that we have come back to the “world” from war forever changed. A new day out in the “bush” was a blessing and never knowing what the rest of the day brought forth. Each day, I never knew if I was going to die or perhaps, at best, be severely wounded. This is what we live through each day that we were in a combat operation.
We truly want to feel normal. We want to be like we were and what most people would like us to be again, but it is impossible. We have changed forever.
For a combat Vietnam veteran walking off the battlefield, the journey of life becomes very lonely, very painful. All of us ask only for someone to care, to understand our pain, and to love us as we are, who gave all we had to protect what we hold sacred, our country, our home, and our loved ones—la famila, la tierra, y la patria. We loved those we left behind, more than they will ever know. I ask of you to open your hearts to us, to allow us to be a part of your world that we would willingly die to protect. We will never be like we were as much as we try to. Accept us for who we have become, for what we have sacrificed for you and this great nation.
Joining the Marine Corps
It was the morning of January 13, 1969, that my parents learned that I was joining the corps. It was my decision and my decision only, and I didn’t want anybody interfering. I had decided to join the Marine Corps for two years and continue my education. My mother had no idea that I was joining the service; she couldn’t understand why I was making this decision. She knew that the Selective Service was drafting teenagers if they didn’t have a school deferment. I told her I was not going to wait to get drafted and that I was volunteering. My father didn’t say much; he acknowledged my decision. Yet after my return from the war, he mentioned to me that I was a fool for enlisting. My response was, had I not joined by my own free will and gone against my will, we probably would not be having this conversation.
The war was not an issue for me, until I entered the Marine Corps in 1969. Three years of carnage and a personal vulnerability to the draft at the very height of the war had made little impression on me. I doubted I even knew where Vietnam was. Nor did I much care. After all, I recall, I was eighteen years old, fresh out of high school, and having a good time. The draft was something you always thought of, but I never thought of Vietnam. All I saw was a little bit