Dear Soldier

Charles Glenn Estes

Description

A marines' reply to a young girl's Christmas letter written 54 years earlier.
This is a short story replying to a Christmas letter that I received from a young girl walking through a chow line on Christmas Day 1967 at Con Thien, Vietnam, 850 meters from the border with North Viet Nam.

Sujets

• Histoire
• Vietnam
• Military
• Viêt Nam
• Marines
• History
• Combat

Informations

• Publié par: LifeRich Publishing
• Date de parution: 02 novembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781489744845
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

Dear Soldier
 
A Marine rifleman’s reply to a Christmas letter received from a young girl 54 years earlier. Christmas 1967 on the DMZ in Vietnam
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CHARLES GLENN ESTES
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
Copyright © 2022 Charles Glenn Estes.
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
 
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LifeRich Publishing
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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
 
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ISBN: 978-1-4897-4479-1 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-4897-4484-5 (e)
 
 
 
LifeRich Publishing rev. date:   10/27/2022

 
C athy ,
Hi, I hope my letter finds you well. I want to wish you and yours a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and it is with Warmest Regards. You do not know me, but I know you. I am the “Dear Soldier” you sent a letter to, handwritten in schoolgirl cursive, just before Christmas 1967. I want to reach out and thank you for your letter.
Cathy, after thinking more and more about responding to you, and what started as a simple reply to your letter, turned into a story about a Marine’s life in 1967 when your letter came at Christmas.
This is a short story, dedicated to you, that I wrote late at night or during early morning, after waking up, hours before daylight. Some of it was probably written after drinking a rum and coke, or two, or three. Some of it could have been written when I was listening to loud music and suddenly discovering my daughter, staring at me, after she had walked through my front door when I didn’t return her daily phone call or text messages.
Cathy, I am the “Dear Soldier”, that you wrote to while I was fighting in Vietnam. I have attached a copy of the letter you wrote. I hope you remember writing it, but maybe not. You were just a young schoolgirl when you wrote your letter to a “Dear Soldier”. So, I will refresh your memory. You said, at the end of your letter, “I am going to ask you one question, please write back”. Well, I am writing back. I am just a little late. Fifty-four years late, to be exact. War, for whatever reason, just has a way of taking its toll, and sometimes, it takes a while to work things out before you can write back and express your true thoughts to a young schoolgirl, like you. It is important for me to tell you about receiving your letter and what it meant to me. I am hoping those fifty-four years, between your letter and mine, have been good to you, and everyone you love, just as mine have been good to me, and all the ones that I love.
I want to share a little about my life in 1967 , I want you to realize how important and what it meant to receive your schoolgirl letter, on Christmas Day, addressed to a “Dear Soldier.” Your letter contained everything important. It was a letter written on the type of paper I had used in grade school and it so reminded me of my childhood and my family when I was reading it by candlelight on Christmas night.
I am not a soldier Cathy; I am a Marine Rifleman. It does not matter how you addressed your letter, we were Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, Airman, Coast Guard, and your letter was addressed to all of us, and your letter was well intentioned. We were all risking our lives for this country. It was a time when you were too young to realize what combat, and the struggle to stay alive was all about. You said on your folded cover page, “fight hard for us please”. And we did. Fifty-eight thousand guys would die in Vietnam, for this country, when you were young and had no responsibility for any of it. Forty thousand of those guys, from what I have read, were twenty-two or younger. That age range of twenty-two or younger so describes my rifle squad, when your letter came on Christmas Day. Most of my squad was just out of high school, and two of us had one year of college. Vietnam was a young man’s war. Young men who were given only limited training and equipment. Somehow, we were the ones being blamed, back home, for the war. For those people back home, in their stupidity, it was as if soldiers under 22 had gotten together and made a war so we could be killed, maimed, and lose years out of our lives. So, this is for you, your family, and your teachers who were supporting us when a lot of Americans did not. As for your first sentence, “I am very sorry that I did not get you anything”. Cathy, you could not be more wrong. Your letter was a tremendous gift. Your letter, handwritten by a young girl, brought a moment of reflection of my life and what I was fighting for. Your letter only reinforced my determination for being a combat Marine and fighting for someone like you…...when I was twenty-one and twenty-two!!!
I remember grade school and being in class and being assigned a class project, maybe something like writing letters to soldiers in a faraway war at Christmas time. And I know you literally had no connection to the horrors we were facing. But I could read between the lines in your letter. You were a young girl, struggling to understand, and struggling to do your absolute best. I can just surmise that your letter was a class project, from a caring teacher. A class project that came with some quiet time. Time when you were asked to write down your real thoughts about what you would say to American soldiers fighting a war you did not understand. I hope, maybe, that the quiet time you experienced and your true thoughts, were at the end of the school day, before going home from school to a supper table, surrounded by your family.
You mentioned that you had two cats, and a brother, who had been a soldier, and a sister that had just turned sixteen. Your letter said, “by the way, you probably want to know my name.” I did, so, I wondered, who is this schoolgirl, 10,000 miles away, probably a fourth or fifth grader, a schoolgirl who was bold and bright, a schoolgirl who wanted me to know who she was, when she was writing to a “Dear Soldier”? I could almost imagine, had I been your age, of being on the same playground with you, playing tag, laughing together, and chasing you around a swing set or a merry go round.
Your letter said a lot. It told me your life revolved around your family, and like you, so did mine. It was the America I fought for and risked all for. I am so very ok with kids not knowing about the horrors of war. I would not have it any other way.

Cathy’s letter on Christmas Day 1967 to a “Dear Sol dier”
I grew up in a very loving family, protected, free, and secure. And like you, I have a brother, who was a soldier before Vietnam, and two sisters. We did not have a lot of money, we sometimes struggled, but I really did not know. I was loved and wanted. I can remember, when being about your age, walking home from school knowing I was going to be hugged and kissed by my mother, as soon as I walked through the front door. I was always happy to be home. My bed was always made, my clothes washed, and supper was always on the stove, ready for the table, just waiting for my dad to get home from work. My Mother lived to be 104. She was a hard rock Baptist, who knew how to say her prayers. She made every patrol in Vietnam that I made, she was always there, and I am convinced that she, and her prayers, are the reason I survived and came home alive.
Thanks to my sister, I know what I put my mother through. I found out, that when I was in Vietnam, that there were days and days, when my mother would sit in her rocking chair, wearing her house dress, and neglect the house and supper for my father. It was so unlike her, but she had other things to do, perhaps praying, and worrying about me, her youngest child fighting a war 10,000 miles away. After coming home, and talking to my sister, I know that her war was much tougher than mine. Ultimately, I knew how much she loved me, and how much she wanted me to come home. War, I know now, is not always about soldiers. It is deeply personal, especially when it comes to soldiers’ families. Families left wondering at home, not knowing, not living, existing, just waiting, and praying.
My sister told me a story that I will pass on to you. When my mother was alone and washing dishes, after my father had gone to work, she would look out the window above the sink in our kitchen and look at whatever a mother looks at, when the child she has raised, is at war. Somehow, one day, she noticed a small branch, in a tree near our house that had a small bird setting on it. For whatever reason, that bird, and that small branch, gave her hope, thinking about me, her child. So, every day when she washed dishes, she would look out the window, at that small branch. A branch that gave her hope and joy and confidence. Then one day, for whatever reason, mother-nature maybe, the branch was gone. I don’t know all the details. I know she ran out searching for it, but never finding it. And I know my mother never lost hope, she never stopped staring out the kitchen window and thinking