slatten49 Loc: Lake Whitney, Texas

I will be posting, for a few days, as a tribute to all military field medical personnel, a series of stories by a Vietnam combat nurse, Ann Watts. All of these stories are taken from VVA Veteran's Magazine...VVA representing Vietnam Veterans of America.
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'Anger, compassion and grief.'

Ten-year-old Ha was traveling to market with her mother when the rickety bus hit a mind. BA was the only survivor of the carnage. Passers-by spotted the half-dead child and took her to the local hospital in Qui Nhon.

It was several days before Ba realized she had lost both of her legs at the buttocks. A few days later, she was t***sferred to our convalescent center for post-operative nursing and as much tender loving care as was humanly possible.

How do you heal a child who has lost everything? Father, mother, brother, sisters, legs. All gone in an instant, just like that.

As days turned to weeks, this little girl's character and personality began to emerge. Even with the pain and shock, she couldn't suppress a mischievous nature that kept us all on our toes. As her wounds healed and her condition became more bearable, she became the leaders of a gang of pranksters.

At that time, there was only one limb-fitting center in South Vietnam. Based in Saigon, the facility was basic and inundated with maimed servicemen. Somehow an appointment was made for Ba. The 360-kilometer journey south was accomplished by hitching rides on military aircraft. It took several stages in C130s or helicopters, hopping fro Qui Nhon to Nha Trang, and on to Saigon. The military did its best to accommodate civilian personnel involved in humanitarian work.

After her final fitting, Ba and I traveled back to Qui Nhon. Her new legs were ugly, heavy, cumbersome contraptions. Ba h**ed them and flatly refused to wear them, so we traveled with them strapped to the side of my weekend bag while I, as usual, carried the child perched on my hip. Her pretty dress was always arranged carefully to conceal the fact that she had only half a body.

We took a taxi to Tan So Nhut and began the long wait to hitch a ride back to Qui Nhon. We slept fitfully through the tropical night and were eventually called and given a seat on a U.S. Air Force hospital plane t***sporting wounded men to Clark Air Base in the Philippines. It was scheduled to stop at Qui Nhn and take on more casualties from the 67th Evac Hospital.

I strapped myself in, Ba on my knee as always, her dress carefully arranged. I watch the nurses with professional admiration as they quickly and efficiently tended each soldier with a quip and a ready smile.

Our seat was alongside a litter on which lay a very badly injured soldier. His name and date of birth were on a label tied to a button on his blue hospital shirt. His eyes, sunk in his ashen face, seemed decades older than his twenty-one years. I watch the blood drip slowly through the tubing inserted into his neck and saw that his right arm ended abruptly in a bloodied, bandaged stump jut below his elbow. His left hand was heavily bandaged and consisted of a lobster claw formed by a thumb and forefinger only.

He was shivering, and focusing hard on trying to pick up a cigarette that lay on the blanket that covered his chest. Ba watched him carefully, seeming to realize the importance of allowing him the dignity of trying to pick it up himself. She smiled at him. There was no way you could ignore Ba's smile. The soldier tried to smile back, and Ba picked up the cigarette, lit it, expertly took a couple of puffs, and placed it gently between his lips. The look of peace and contentment that came with his first draw made me wonder why I had never taken up the habit.

A few minutes later, he turned his head slowly and spoke to Ba.

"Hi, kid. Speak English?"

Ba nodded, and asked, "You sick?"

He sighed. "No, tired. I'm going home." He looked at me with a puzzled expression. I explained I was a British nurse caring for wounded children in Qui Nhon.

"Can I hold her, ma'am? Please? Hey, kid, you're jut like my little sister, you know that?"

I panicked for a second. I didn't want him to know about her legs. I wasn't sure how he would react, maybe he was too ill to notice. But I placed her gently on his thighs, hoping he wouldn't notice how a******lly light she was. It was, then, in a moment of blinding pain and anger, that I realized he had no thighs; He too had lost his legs. His blanket had hidden from view what I should have seen.

The breath stopped in my throat. Ba knew. I felt her torso stiffen, but her expression didn't change. She smiled and stroked his face, and he spoke to her softly of his folks, his brothers, and his sister back home in Oklahoma. How he would see them soon. He spoke of his girl and how he wished he had had time to buy her a gift. He face bloodless, his breath ragged, his eye dulled with pain. Ba just kept smiling and softly, sweetly, sang her song for him.

I couldn't utter a word. I was possessed by a complicated mixture of anger, compassion, and grief. We three had been brought together in a macabre drama, written by politicians in a comfortable universe far, far away.

Quakerwidow Loc: Chestertown, MD

Thank you for posting.

kankune Loc: Iowa

Such a wonderful post. Thank you Slat.

pafret Loc: Northeast

I didn't comment on your first post because it was too painful. This one is more so, but these must be read. I will forward all of your posts to my circle of friends. This message must go out.

PoppaGringo Loc: Muslim City, Mexifornia, B.R.

teabag09

Dang you man! You are ruining my eyes with so many tears. Mike

slatten49 Loc: Lake Whitney, Texas

Then, Mike, you might want to avoid reading earlier ones I posted...'Letter From Home,' and 'The Yellow Ribbon.'

teabag09

Already have and I thank you for them. Was there, saw the devastation to all sides thus the tears. Mike

slatten49 Loc: Lake Whitney, Texas

Understood.