“On my nineteenth birthday, December 4, 1967, my outlook on life, the way I lived life, changed to the day I killed myself.”
“We stumbled on a run-of-the-mill Vietnamese village—farmers in the fields, women washing clothes, and children frolicking. The army conditioned us to see them not as for what they were but what they could be. Old ladies cooking were bomb detonators, and men plowing in fields were disguised V.C. A tiny, influential voice-probably the same one that dared me to pull the fire alarm in seventh grade-told me it was self-preservation. Looking back, it was fear. They taught us to be afraid and spoon fed us that fear.
“We stormed the village, pointing guns at kids, women, old ladies; we didn’t care. I walked around under a spell, pointing my gun and yelling, ‘Get down’ for show, but in my head I thought of The Smothers Brothers, The Addams Family, and The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. They were snippets of home, mental home videos I played anytime I wanted, and no one could take them from me. The intensity of the present situation overshadowed those memories, but I could access them whenever I wanted. Unfortunately, the upcoming moments shattered those memories, taking over my mind in my dreams and in my daily life up to my last breath.
“Our squad leader clunked an old Vietnamese man with the butt of his rifle. I remember the whimpering cries of the children, and I remember McGuire’s face stiff in anger, dollops of spit flying from his mouth as he forced crying women on their knees.
“My heart worked double time, and I breathed like I was in a marathon. A phrase that played in my mind, what played in all our minds to some level, I bet, was ‘God, please make this stop. Please make it stop.’
“The children huddled about ten feet from their parents, but they might as well have been a half a world away. I don’t know why, but I felt like I had to protect them. I stood in vicinity of them, making it seem like I kept a close eye on them, but I knew they posed no more of a threat than the buffalo in the fields.
“McGuire took the first shot. I don’t know why; I didn’t see it. I’ll put money on someone twitching, and he panicked. The deafening succession of gunfire drowned out The Addams Family theme. Every direction I looked, light blazed from an M-16 barrel. Kids scattered, soldiers fired, and villagers thumped to the ground, and the whole situation was a line of falling dominos.
“A skinny kid—maybe four or five—fell, and all I could think was that he was someone’s kid, someone’s grandkid, and the two words hit me: ‘Help him.’
“My plan was to scoop him up and drop him off to any adult villager. He’d be safe from there.
“I remember him, not caring about stray bullets or getting hit. ‘Hit me! Put me out of my misery!’ I know I thought, but my focus was on the kid.
“He stood up, and just as I was about to scoop him up, the top of his head ripped open. His blood, and other matter, splattered on my face, and he slipped from my grip, succumbing to the gravity of death. The next thing I felt was a bite to the back of my knee. I fell, and the pain just kept occurring like a dog bit my knee and wouldn’t let up. I lay there, the tension melting around me, and the last thing I remember before waking up in the hospital was that dead boy’s vacant stare. Before I fell asleep, I saw that boy’s stare. Back in the world, at parades where kids sat on their parents’ shoulders, I saw that boy’s stare.
“The bullet shattered my knee, so the army discharged me. Kind of hard to be an effective soldier when you have a limp. Back in (town), neighbors thanked me and welcomed me back with open arms, but neighborhood children looked at me like an alien. I thought they knew, that in some way, they knew what we did over there like it was cologne I wore. People I once jammed with, smoked pot and dropped acid in the woods with, treated me like a stranger.
“My father paraded me in front of his drinking buddies, but when we got home, I was just a tenant in his house. His estrangement didn’t bother me. It wasn’t like we spent Saturday after Saturday going to carnivals and baseball games. For months after I came back, I asked myself why my father urged me to go halfway around the world to die. Some fathers sent their sons off to school. I heard a rumor in senior year that a kid who graduated a year before me, Eddie DeFlorio’s, father sent him to Canada. Mine sent me to Vietnam. I realized in my last days that it had nothing to do with love or hate, approval or disappointment. While other boys my age played in the mud, scraped their knees, or broke bones, I drew pictures of Looney Tune characters or landscapes. While my adolescent peers kissed girls and chased the prom queen, I sat in my room strumming my guitar. I disappointed my father at every checkpoint of my life, and Vietnam was his chance to get the son he always wanted. Through hell or high water, he was going to make me do something he wanted even if it meant the end of my life. Some father, huh? I couldn’t even tour Vietnam to his standards. I served there for six months and came home unfit for combat. I laugh at it—six months. If I went off to school like I wanted, I’d be writing term papers, marching in demonstrations, and getting laid. No, Harris Edwards had to send his son to Vietnam and use him as a patriotic trophy at his convenience.
“In spring of 68, I obsessed over death. I knew the only way to rid these thoughts in my head was to swipe the needle like on a record player.”
“When I saw you that one day, meandering down the street with that blank stare, I knew your next move. I knew this because I once wore that look. I once thought those thoughts.
“I knew exactly how I was going to kill myself, and I didn’t care about people finding me, traumatizing anyone, none of that. I figured once the lights went out my worries ceased.
“The date was April 8, 1968. I put on my military jacket and stuffed a picture of Theresa in my pocket. It was a picture I took of her two days after prom. We were on Rutherford Bridge with a bunch of friends. It was dusk, and while the others wrestled and twirled about fifty feet away from us, we leaned on the railing looking over the horizon of possibilities. She looked into the river, and the sun hovered over her head, turning her blonde hair into gold. She looked over to me and smiled. The sun hit half of her face, smooth like alabaster, so I pulled out my camera and took the picture. I remember every detail like I’m seeing it before me.
“On my way out the door, I glanced over my shoulder at my dad. He sat in his chair, dozed off, a bottle of bud dangling from his fingers, and a plate of half eaten spaghetti on his lap. The TV’s blue reflection glistened on him, and all I thought was ‘good riddance.’
“I walked a mile, and along the way I stuffed rocks, brick fragments, and pebbles in my coat pockets. I observed my warped reflection on car windows as I walked passed them, and the fact it was the last time I saw myself alive didn’t faze me.
“I reached my destination, and the setting sun turned the bridge into a dark purple. I shoveled all the rocks on the roadside that I could until my pocket felt tight. I spotted rocks by the quarry and dumped them into my backpack. If they didn’t weigh me down, I didn’t know what would.
“I stood at the railing in the very spot Theresa and I stood a year before, and I scanned the bridge, envisioning the others dancing, giving piggy back rides, spinning.
“I envisioned Theresa and her beautiful, sun blazed face. ‘We’ll go to San Francisco. We can change the world,’ she said.
“She took the bus out, and at the depot, she begged me to get a ticket. All I had to do was step on the bus, and the course of my life would’ve changed forever. She stared at me, those big, brown eyes like fishbowls, and I just wanted to kiss her. I chickened out. If I did, it would’ve changed the course of her life because she would’ve stayed, and I wouldn’t want her to see what I became. She got on the bus, and it was the last time I saw or heard from her.
“I climbed over the railing, and the stitches in my back pack and jacket tore. I stood at the edge of the bridge and looked down at criss crossing waves of the river below. One of the last things I remember thinking was whether or not we make our choices or are they made for us? I chose not to burn the draft card. I chose not to kiss Theresa or get on that bus. I chose to load my belongings in the back of my father’s Ford before he drove me to the airport. I chose to follow the platoon to the village. I chose not to stop McGuire from losing control of himself. I made those choices, didn’t I?
“In the river below, soaked leaves floated down stream, turning over then hitting rocks. I made those choices, didn’t I? It’s a question I still ask myself, and sometimes I say we make choices, and sometimes I say we don’t. I guess that’s a question we’ll never know the answer to, but I do know I chose to step off that bridge.
“Just before gravity gripped me, I wondered if I’d go to heaven or hell. ‘Hell?’ I thought, ‘I already went to hell. It’s called Vietnam.’
“The river rushed up above me, and that’s the last thing I remember before I died.”
“What happened after you died?” I ask because that’s where the second act starts.
[ part three starts] Simeon continues, “I came to on the rocks. When I woke up, it must have been dawn or sunset. I couldn’t tell which. The sky was navy blue, and the trees’ silhouettes were black. I thought it was a fluke, that I failed at attempting my own demise.
“I climbed the hill, heading for the bridge, and I realized my limp was gone. I bent my leg, and it was like I never shipped off to Vietnam. That was the first clue that I died.
“I got to the bridge and watched the stream crash the rocks. I didn’t know what to do or where to go. I wondered if my eternity would be spent on that bridge.
“In the corner of my eye, I saw a woman walk up to the bridge’s railing. She looked maybe 55 or 60. She had long, white hair like streams of pouring milk, and she wore all black. She stood there for a minute or so, gazing at the landscape before her, probably contemplating a major life decision or just detaching herself from her daily routine. I didn’t know. I didn’t care. My focus was figuring things out before me.
“She climbed onto the railing, her white hair flowing into the wind, and I knew what she was going to do. I discarded my carelessness and ran to her to stop. The concept of whether or not she heard me never entered my mind. By the time I reached the railing, her body was in mid-flight. When I looked down into the swirling water in the river, her body was completely gone. I found that unusual. I was dead, walking the bridge that I launched myself off of, and I found that unusual. I figured that she drifted under the bridge or that she hit the rocks. I surveyed the river, but all I saw were rocks.
“‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ a female voice said next to me.
“I looked over, and it was the same woman who jumped off the bridge.
“‘Yeah, mesmerizing,’ I said, taken aback that a minute ago she imitated a swan.
“‘You want an explanation, don’t you?’
“‘Would be nice,’ I replied, my mind still trying to figure out what the hell was going on.
“She walked toward the road and paced back and forth like a professor at a lecture hall. ‘First, my name is Trudy, and I know who you are, Simeon. I know all about you.’ A car entered the bridge while she continued her spiel. ‘I’ve seen you here many times. Most of them with your girlfriend, Theresa, other times gallivanting with your friends, and other times—’ The car passed through her, and she evaporated. She reappeared right next to me. ‘You looked over that landscape, hoping to find the answers to your problems.’ She climbed the railing and balanced herself as she walked across, strands of her cotton colored hair flowing across her face. ‘You loved it here, made it a staple of your life. It’s fitting that you should be here, now.’
“She wobbled, and her foot slipped. Before I knew it, her feet pointed to the sky, and she dropped like a bag of sand. I knew better than to run to the railing like I did the last time. Fool me once…you know how the saying goes.
“Within a minute, she appeared from thin air like the bridge was a curtain.”
“‘You should try it; it’s fun,’” she said through a cunning smile.
“‘I don’t think so,’ I said, ‘I tried it once, and look where it got me.’
“‘Fine, suit yourself,’ she said, ‘It’s the only rush you’ll get being here. It’s boring without it.’
“I looked at her, trying to figure out if she was joking. I then thought that this was a woman who jumped off the bridge two times since we met. She was serious in her own twisted way.
“‘So what’s your story?’ I asked. It seemed like the next logical question.
“‘You know all about me,’ she answered, ‘You, your friends, this whole town spoke about me after I died.’
“She looked at me with piercing, dark eyes, and it dawned on me. She said her name was Trudy, short for Gertrude.
“‘Gertrude Rutherford!’ I said like it was an answer to a question.”
“She smirked, confirming my guess.”
“‘So what happens now?’ I asked, ‘Do we just stand here waiting for the next passer by?’”
“‘This is your lucky day, Simeon,’ she replied.”
“She said I had two options: stay here and contribute to the town’s ongoing folklore or I could go with her and guide lost souls into the afterlife. I followed her, and here I am, guiding souls. Some more lost than others.”
“So who was the woman?” I ask, “Was she God? An Angel?”
“I don’t know, brother. I just went with the flow, happy that I got a second chance. When someone gives you a good deal, you don’t question it.”
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