As a Viet Nam veteran, I’m relieved how attitudes about Viet Nam veterans, have improved since my discharged from the Marine Corps in the summer of 1969.

In 1967 and 1968, I served in Viet Nam. I recall how the U. S. military indulged in censorship to keep negative news from back home, reaching the troops. When my tour of duty was up, in the summer of 1968, I was sent home for a long deserved four, or was it six-week leave?

During the thirteen months I served in Viet Nam, I had no clue how widespread the negative feelings about the war in Viet Nam was back in the U.S. All I knew was, I was hungry to go home.

I soon learned how serious those feelings were. I had no driver’s license so my first day home, ounce I had changed into civilian clothing. I had to ask my mother if she would drop me off at a local mall. When she dropped me off she said she had other errands to run and would I need a ride home? I thanked her and told her no, that I would hitch a ride home because I wanted to enjoy my brief freedom and hanging out for a while.

I was eager to wade through crowds of civilians and imagine I was one of them. After a bit of window shopping and poking around for a while, the only thing I bought was a carton of Marlborough cigarettes. I walked across the parking lot and up to the street to hitch a ride home.

As cars rushed by me, I stopped to light a cigarette. Then I kept walking backwards facing traffic with my cigarette in my left hand and my right thumb stuck out. I wasn’t paying attention to the cars as they flew by. I was looking at things like, houses and yards and dreaming about owning my own home someday. Every so often I’d glance behind me to be sure where I was going.

A car went by and I could hear it pulling over snapping me from my daydream. I spun around and trotted up to the car door, opened it and hopped in. “Thank you,” I said before the driver had a chance to say a word.

“Where ya headed kid?” the middle-aged man said.

“Straight up a little ways,” I said nodding toward the windshield. “Just past Howard’s produce stand”.  

“Hot one today,” the man said, his head out the window checking for oncoming traffic as he pulled back onto the road.

“Yeah, it sure is,” I said placing my right elbow out the open window.

“I hate this shit, don’t you kid?” the guy said.

“I don't know, I’m sort of use to it” I replied.

“Ya are ha” he said with a smirk.

“Yeah, I just got back from Viet Nam. It’s hot as hell over there” I said.

“What!” the man said in a raised tone of voice.

“I’m in the Marine Corps; I just got back from a thirteen-month tour over there.”

I thought a dog ran out in front of us, the way he braked and swerved to the side of the road.

A large cloud of dust went from the rear of the car and drifted past the frontend of the car as he hollered at me. “Get out!”

“What’s wrong?” I said, completely puzzled. The guy was really upset.

“I don’t want no goddamn baby killer in this car. Now get out… now!”

I got out and the guy spun his tires, pelting me with gravel and leaving me standing in a cloud of dust. I couldn’t believe what had just happened, I was in my own hometown.

I don’t know where that guy heard that kind of crap, but the few enemy I got when I was in country, were at the age of consent and had notches carved in their rifle butts.

I guess that’s just another costs for freedom.

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