My Personal Relationship With The Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
Written: Mar 07 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: A place that will touch you like none other.
Cons: None
The Bottom Line: This memorial will stir emotions that you never can believe unless you visit. This is my story.
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| sweetsue_98's Full Review: Vietnam Veterans Memorial |
Of all the places in the world, The Vietnam Veterans Memorial brings more emotion than any I have experienced in any travels. My story about the wall goes back before it was ever even a concept, and the Vietnam War was still going strong.
We were a very young family living in the heartland of America. With two little boys, and one on the way, my life was constantly busy with the daily routine of a family. My husband was a Naval Officer and one of the unpleasant duties he had was to notify families of military personnel in case of injury or death. Most of the stories were very sad, those that were not death related were always a relief, but the one that I remember the most was on a hot summer day in Iowa. We were living in base quarters with no air conditioning, and on August 15th I was rushed to the hospital with a miscarriage. The next morning my husband received a phone call that a pilot had been shot down, and was missing in action, or MIA as it is commonly referred to.
That day was very difficult as not only had we lost a child, but also he had to tell a family that they had lost their eldest son and no one knew where he was. He drove with a fellow military member to locate the father of the lost pilot, and when he walked in the co-op where the father worked, in uniform of course, and the father never said a word. He just hit his fist on the desk, and ran out to his car. No words needed to be exchanged, as he knew why the two of them were there. After following the father to his home, the mother was also in shock. They spent considerable time there that day, and many more later as since this person was MIA, there was quite a bit of communications to determine his status.
Through all of this, we became quite close with this family. Not only did my husband visit them, but also so did I. Some years later when our daughter was born, the mother of this MIA hand crochet a yellow blanket as a gift. Out of such sadness, a new friendship was born. I have always reminded my grown daughter about the story of these people, their loss, and then their closeness to our children.
Although our personal story took place in the early 1970’s, the wall was not constructed until 1982, and dedicated on November 13, 1982 in what became a four-day tribute to veterans. Unlike most memorials, the Wall was built with totally private funds with donations exceeding $9,000,000. No government monies were required. Amazingly, the designer of this wall, and a quite controversial issue at the time, was planned by Maya Ling Lin, who was an undergraduate student at Yale at the time.
My first of two visits was seven years ago. I have since visited once more with my husband about four years ago. I took a cab to the site and it was a day filled with rain, mist, and almost seems as if the sky was crying, too. With the 58,226 names on the wall, I needed to find the name of the man that we had come so close to his family nearly ten years ago. There are people there to assist you in locating a person’s name. I went up, still with tears in my eyes, gave them the name, and I was directed to the a certain panel on the Wall.
Yes, there was the name of a person I had never met. John A. Pitzen, Captain, United States Navy. After all these years, the man that is still listed as missing in action, his life had touched ours and always will, is remembered forever.
So why do I write all of this information to you? Because that Wall, as moving as it is, and it does tear at the heart is more than just names. There are millions of stories associated with those names. This was just my personal relationship with the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
God bless him, and all of the others listed as well as their loved ones.
Recommended:
Yes
Best Time to Travel Here: Anytime
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sweetsue_98
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