Tradition

“Never once did I flinch.” The old man killed the beer he was nursing and looked around for another. “A weaker man might have, but I stood my ground.”

I sat in the rocking chair beside old “Fish” on his front porch. When the long days of summer rolled around, and I didn’t have school, I was able to get my chores done early and go listen to him tell me about his life. He had such an interesting life.

“There were Viet-cong all over the place, and there were men getting cut down on my left and right, but I wasn’t moving.” He stopped suddenly and looked over at me. “Boy don’t you ever repeat to your momma what I’m about to say to you, but there was a lieutenant beside me who got his gut blown open by a grenade, and his insides fell out all over my back.”

My face contorted and I tried to look disgusted and sickened. I had heard the story well over a hundred times before, but I always tried to look terrified when he got to that part.

“But that didn’t stop me. I kept on hammering away into the jungle with my M60, your uncle steadily pouring oil on the barrel to keep it from just melting away.”

“Were you a good shot with the M60?” I would always ask. I knew what his answer would be, but it was tradition, I always asked the same questions. Fish said that tradition was very important.

“Well you didn’t aim a gun like that, it was meant to “mow” into the jungle and hit anything that got in it’s way. But I couldn’t keep it up forever. Everyone was dead except for your uncle and me, and I was running low on ammo.”

“That’s when the helicopters showed up right?”

“That’s right. A couple of Huey’s dropped down in a clearing behind us and we knew right then we had to make a run for it. I left the M60 right there and started running, and your uncle wasn’t far behind me. I turned around to see what was going on and that’s when I noticed Charlie was making a charge at us. There wasn’t any way in hell we were going to make it to the chopper before they got close enough to gun us down.”

“I wish I was there with you Fish. I wouldn’t let no Viet-cong take me down!”

He would always laugh when I said that. “Boy, they would eat your lunch, let me tell you.”

I was still young back then, and I couldn’t quite figure out what Charlie wanted my lunch for, but I just knew in my heart that I could have ran fast enough to get to the helicopters.

“Well just when I felt my heart start sinking, when I knew that there was no way I was going to make it out of there alive, your uncle grabbed me and threw me towards those choppers. I knew what he was going to do, and I wanted to stop him, but a helicopter crewman had jumped out of the plane and grabbed me. I was being pulled in against my will.”

“Uncle John was going back to hold off Charlie wasn’t he?”

Fish would always stop talking for a while when I got to that question. I had gotten used to the long wait. Sometimes he would just stare out at his front yard for fifteen whole minutes when I got to that question.

“Boy, let me tell you something right now.” He had gotten teary eyed while he reminisced. “Your uncle was the best man I have ever known in my life. Don’t you ever let anyone tell you different boy. Never has God put so good a man on this earth, and you’d be a fine man if you grow up to be half of what he was.”

“And my dad too right?” Small boys are always fiercely loyal to their fathers.

“Your dad fought in that hell too, and you’d do well to grow up like him too. But why don’t you ask him some time what he thinks of your Uncle John.”

“I asked him last week.”

“Oh?” Fish looked at me with is misty blue eyes. This was new. It wasn’t part of our traditional story. “What did he tell you?”

“He didn’t answer me, he just walked away, but I was spying on him after that and I saw him looking at an old picture of Uncle John in the garage and he was crying.”

“John was a hero to a lot of folks in this town.”

“And you were the last one to see him alive, ain’t that right?”

“It sure is boy. When the choppers finally took off I looked down at him as they carried me away. The M60 was out of ammo, Charlie was in close, and he was holding three of them off with nothing but his bayonet.”

“Fish, when I grow up I want to be a Marine just like you and dad and Uncle John.”

“Like hell you do boy.”

He got up and walked into the house. I think he was mad because I broke the tradition and asked a different question. Fish always said tradition was important.

My daddy was a marine, my uncle was a marine, and dad always said grandpa used to be a marine. I made up my mind on his front porch. Fish said I didn’t want to be a marine, but he also said that tradition was important.

To this day I believe in tradition.

Word Count - 941