I just walked through my kitchen. The wallpaper is gone. So is the little TV. The highchair is missing, too — the little man who was sitting in it 18-years ago is now a sophomore in college. Kids who were born on that horrific day are now eligible to serve in the military.
A generation has now fought in the war on terror.
Our innocence died on that day as we watched in horror as men and women died right before our eyes. Their crimes? They just went to work.
How I remember it all so well.
Amy and I watched it in our kitchen. We had been squabbling over something stupid and as I turned around, I noticed black smoke billowing out of the World Trade Center. I told her to come over and look. Right as she did, the second hijacked plane plowed into the other tower. I looked over at our one-year-old son and wondered what kind of f’ed up world he’d now grow up in. We watched as papers floated surreally to the ground. Soon people jumped behind them. Suicide by splattering on the pavement was preferable to burning to death — all on live TV.
Eventually I pulled myself from the little TV and headed downtown to the Clarion-Ledger. We had a few old-style TVs around the newsroom and a group of us watched in horror as the second tower collapsed into a billowing cloud of toxic dust. Then as the second tower fell, I drew my cartoon of the Statue of Liberty. As I was drawing, the Pentagon was hit. Then Flight 93 became the first battle where we fought back. Let’s roll!
We didn’t know what was next.
The cartoon I drew immediately after 2nd tower fell.
I remember driving home that day. As airplanes were landing, people were driving 50 mph on the interstate (they don’t do that if there is snow) . Gas was $1.35 a gallon at Pump-In-Save where the Volkswagen dealership is now. I still have my American Flag magnet that was on the back of Amy’s van. I have a yellowed copy of the flag that The Clarion-Ledger printed. My “United We Stand” eagle head cartoon (my favorite all-time cartoon) seems like an antique now.
A couple of years ago, we were on the ferry riding out to the Statue of Liberty. As the boat pulled up next to the dock, I looked at the statue and realized it was the same exact view as my cartoon from 9/11. Memories of that day flooded back to me. Later in the day, we went to the 9/11 Memorial Museum.
My sons looked around at the crumpled artifacts (two of my three kids were born after 9/11). There was the crushed firetruck. They saw the steel beam cross that survived. The stairwell where a group of people survived the collapse. Your heart sank as you went down into the museum. I looked around at possessions of some of the thousands of victims. It was a child’s toy that triggered me — it looked like the one my youngest son had just flown with on our flight to New York.
Tears streamed down my face as I openly wept.
What I had tried to avoid for so many years finally came crashing down on me. The people who died that horrible day now had a face and a name.
I thought of them as I walked through the kitchen tonight. It’s where I first got to know them.
All I can say is this: Bless them and their families. Bless all the first responders. Bless our country.
It was a hot, clear September day with temperatures hovering in the upper 90’s — a rarity in Knoxville, Tennessee. Dad smiled as we drove toward the University of Tennessee, his alma matter. He was from nearby Maryville and had graduated from UT in 1959. The man’s blood ran orange. My blood was about to boil from the heat.
Dad maneuvered our 1963 Pontiac Catalina, Big Red as we called it, to the Ag Campus. That’s where we’d park and take the shuttle to the stadium. At least that was our plan. We saw the hoard of people and looked back at our car. We joined the herd and headed to where you picked up the shuttle.
We were all in now.
It was my first UT football game. Neyland Stadium had just been enclosed and now sat 98,000 orange-clad fans. I’m not sure anyone was ready for the resulting crush of fans because shuttles were few and far between. One pregnant lady said she was going to fake labor to get a ride quicker. My dad said he was going to use me to get on a bus.
“I’m 12, dad. It won’t work.”
“Well fall down and pretend to pass out.”
We pushed like salmon swimming upstream toward the stadium. When we finally made it, we watched as the Georgia Bulldogs and the Tennessee Volunteers warmed up. (Considering it was 98 degrees, they should have been plenty warm.) I looked around at the stadium with awe. Neyland soars 14 stories into the sky. The noises, the sights and the smells lit up my senses. By the end of the first quarter, they had run out of Coke. By halftime, there was no ice. By the third quarter, the Vols led the Bulldogs. It was very, very hot.
My dad asked me if I was having fun. I nodded. Hell yeah I was having fun! Tennessee had the game in hand until Vince Dooley put in a freshman running back named Herschel Walker — who promptly ran over Bill Bates.
Georgia won the game and then went on to win the National Championship. But the loss didn’t discourage me. My blood was turning orange.
I leaned over and told Dad, “I am going to school here.” Six years later, I did.
That was September 6, 1980 — 39 years ago to the day I will be receiving an UT Alumni Professional Achievement Award a few hundred yards away in the student center.
Most days I can’t remember where my car keys are, but I know exactly where our two seats are. I found them the last time I went to a UT game. This Saturday, I’ll be taking my 12 year old to the game. But we’ll be sitting in much more posh seats. We’ll be sitting in the skyboxes, not where Dad and I sat nearly four decades ago.
It will be fun to watch my youngest son’s reaction to everything. I know he’ll catch every detail – The band, the team, the cheerleaders and the crowd. And if he looks closely enough this Saturday, he might see his late grandfather’s spirit sitting next to us.
The stars twinkled above me but I didn’t see them. The asphalt was uneven and I didn’t feel like scraping the skin off my face. So I plodded along, looking at my feet and trying desperately not to trip. I was grateful for the darkness — I could creep along clumsily in relative anonymity. No one would see me and say, “That poor man is dying.”
No one would ever confuse me with an athlete.
Music pumped through my headphones, their lyrics lifting my soul up toward the heavens. My knee hurt a little — I didn’t stretch well and all my car time lately has made my back tight. At my age, I need to be stretching nearly as long as I run. The clocked ticked past 5 a.m. as I talked to my maker. Yesterday I had talked to hundreds of bright students about dreams, resilience and making a difference in peoples’ lives. I prayed that I could live up to my words. Then I prayed a prayer of thanks that I had the opportunity to have another day. It’s that blank canvas that we’re given every single morning. Our effort is the brush strokes. Our attitude is the color palate we use. What we do with our art is how we can chance someone’s life for the better.
A car came up from behind so I quickly moved out of the way. I never turn the music up so loud that I can’t hear traffic. Also, headlights give me a little warning. Other than nearly being run over by the paper delivery person (and then cussed out by her) a couple years ago, I don’t have much problem running in my neighborhood at 5 a.m.
I ran straight ahead, past obstacles and my own natural inclination to call it a day. Then I looked at my watch and headed home. I pushed myself up the final hill as I tried to meet God halfway. I know He’s with me the whole way, but the whole faith without works thing rattled in my sleepy brain. Pushing through fatigue is the toughest thing for me. My breathing was labored but strong. My pulse sat at 160 as I finished.
Running is a time for me to think, reflect and express gratitude. It strengthens my heart and my soul. A lone dog barked off in the distance while an alligator slipped beneath the surface of a nearby creek. The sun began to win its daily battle with the dark. I made it home tired but grateful.
My mileage was logged. My daily run was complete. All is good.
Six people died in this scene in Pass Christian, Mississippi. Where the white truck is (a battered Ford Ranger), two people who stayed for the storm drowned. Behind that house, four others drowned. I still go back and visit this site. It is sacred ground.
“I hope we get some rain,” I thought as looked at the National Hurricane Center’s evening forecast. Katrina had grown into a monster storm, nearly the size of Texas, but it was heading to the east of us. Orange Beach, Alabama was in the Cone of Uncertainity’s crosshairs. “We’ll be on the dry side.” I thought.
I was so damned naive about tropical systems back then.
Then I saw Jim Cantore pointing at the Treasure Bay pirate ship casino and the coast and saying, “Look around, this will never look the same again.”
Jim was right.
As you know, Katrina went further west. It clipped Louisiana before slamming into Mississippi. The entire length of the Coast was obliterated by the storm’s 30ft. surge. New Orleans sank beneath the water pouring through compromised levees. Here in Jackson, well, we had high winds and rain for nearly 12 hours.
I was in the newsroom when I heard that there was water on the second floor of the Beau Rivage casino. That was around 10 a.m. — and that was the moment I knew the Mississippi Gulf Coast would never be the same again. The storm’s eye and huge wind field battered Hattiesburg and Laurel as it headed toward Jackson. It turned right and passed just to our east. I drove home around noon and a trip that should have taken 25 minutes took and hour and a half. I had an interstate sign fly off its posts and toward my car. Two trees nearly crushed my car. Thankfully I had a full tank of gasoline — that would come in handy down the road.
My house was spared except for a little minor damage. Many of my friends weren’t so lucky. And God knows the people on the Coast suffered. First from the storm and its immediate after effects. Then it was from being pretty much ignored by the national media as the man-made tragedy in New Orleans horrifically unfolded on live TV. Katrina was an equalizer — poor, rich and middle class all wandered around like zombies as casino barges and rotting chicken sat where their homes once were. At one point when I was down at Camp Coast Care working, 50% of the people who came in were in shock — and this was in DECEMBER!
Today, there are people on the Coast who are still struggling with long-term trauma caused by Katrina. While I contend the folks on the Coast are among the most resilient around, it is also important to realize how much long-term damage Katrina actually did. PTSD comes in many shapes and sizes — and I am sure there are people self-medicating their way through each day because of what they lost.
I used to go to Sunday school a lot as a kid but I’ve never seen the Good Book come to life any better than I did after that storm. People of all faiths came to Mississippi to help the recovery process. I always said that organizations who had a plan didn’t after that day. No one could prepare for the scale of the destruction. But volunteers came in and filled in the gaps.
After one trip to the Coast, my priest and I stopped at a convenience store north of Wiggins. I looked at the knick knacks for sale at the counter and spied a snow globe that was the same as one I had seen half buried in the muck. While I like my stuff, it was at that moment I was reminded that it is just that — stuff. Standing where six people had drowned also reminded me of what truly is important in life.
The response to Katrina was when I understood what is special about the people of Mississippi. The giving spirit of so many served as a balm for all Katrina took away. I’ll leave with this one story. I asked one home owner about an old truck that laid battered and rusted in a yard. “Was that one of your old antique trucks,” I asked him. He shook his head and said, “No, the best we can tell, Hurricane Camille sucked it out to sea in 1969 and Katrina brought it back.”
P.S. We got rain although I don’t know if my grass ever got wet. The rain that did fall blew sideways. My trees did the hula and I pray to God I never see another storm like Katrina again.
The Mayans said the world would end on December 21, 2012. Well they sure blew that one. But the world has changed rapidly. Everything just seems out of synch.
This is a time of great disruption.
Think about how much our lives have changed in a relatively short amount of time. My grandmother was born in 1905. When she was a little girl, she watched men string electric lines to her town. She saw men go from riding horses to walking on the moon. When she died in 2000, the internet had started disrupting everything.
I am convinced that sociologists will look back at now like they do the Industrial Revolution. Industries and institutions have been completely wiped out by the internet. Digital data and its transmission have collapsed borders and shrunk the world. How we consume news, music and movies has changed. And in terms of jobs and society, it has been both beautiful and bloody. The Mayans said the world would end in 2012. I think 2007 might be a better year.
Why 2007? That’s when the iPhone was introduced and right behind it: social media.
Like gas poured on a fire in a fireworks stand, social media has caused change to occur even faster. Then a year later, the Great Recession exploded our economy. We worked harder for less (if we were working at all) Then the very institutions that were there to provide stability failed us. By 2009, the only thing we had to cheer for was when a plane crashed in the Hudson and no one died. Finally someone in charge didn’t screw up. Nice work, Sulley.
I was talking to a friend today about this. There is so much depression, anxiety, suicide and addiction today. I started to wonder why. It might be because we live our lives connected to a screen (like right this second). Humans can’t evolve quickly enough to keep up with the rapid changes being thrust upon them. Our brains aren’t like microchips that are tied to Moore’s law (the principle that the speed and capability of computers can be expected to double every two years, as a result of increases in the number of transistors a microchip can contain.) We can’t keep up physically and mentally. My guess is that because of that, people are in a state of perpetual unease.
That unease is caused by being in constant fight or flight mode. The tiger is always trying to kill us now. The cortisol pumping through our bodies is wearing us out. And we are self-medicating. We are addicted to opioids, food, drugs, sex, shopping, alcohol, gambling — all because we’re constantly chasing a dopamine fix.
I’m not sure what the answer is. Prayer, meditation, exercise and yoga all help. Medication helps to an extent. We can’t got back to the 1950’s or become luddites. But we have to figure out how to unplug and unwind. We need to reconnect with our core values and rebuild the institutions that are crumbling around us — not cheer their demise.
For no particular reason, I have been sitting here thinking about the 22 1/2 years I’ve lived in Mississippi. I find this place to be intriguing and thought I’d try to put my finger on why I feel like I do. I’ve had opportunities to leave and yet stayed. These are just the observation of an “outsider” who came here, made his career here, raised a family, has traveled to nearly every corner of the state and has chosen to stay. So here it goes:
You can’t understand Mississippi by just driving from your house to your office. You can’t understand it from social media or watching the news. Mississippi is the kind of place that requires you to travel, take backroads and slow down. You have to understand the regions, how they are different and how the people from there are influenced by where they grew up. It requires a bit of porch sitting and storytelling. You will soon learn what shapes us and makes us who we are.
Pockets of crushing poverty obviously shapes our people. So does education, religion and public policy. Race and our history with it does, too. So does our giving. This is a land of incredibly generosity. I’ve talked about Chainsaws and Casseroles before — when the tornado hits your house, there will be a church van full of people with chainsaws and casseroles in your front yard before you can even get out of the rubble. And before you can say help, they will cut the pine off your roof and feed you. Per capita, we rock the charts when it comes to charitable giving. That’s because there is so much need.
Mississippians are a resilient people. Our friends on the coast are living and breathing proof of that. We (unfortunately) are no strangers to natural disasters — but we’re also adept at recovery. We have problems that at times seem overwhelming. But we also have good people who devote so much of their lives to trying to help. While it may seem like they doing the work of Sisyphus, they actually are making this a better place — And are angels amongst us.
We are also talented. Very talented. Like the fertile soil in the Delta, we produce a bumper crop of talented writers, musicians, athletes, scholars and artists. Sadly many have to leave Mississippi to chase those dreams — but when they do make it, many give back. I’ve enjoyed being able to get to know many of Mississippi’s artists, musicians and writers. And have been changed for the better by knowing them all. The arts make us special.
Home isn’t your address in Mississippi — it’s where your mama lives. It’s the town where you grew up. I’ve seen many smart business people never quite figure that out.
I’ve been blessed to travel around to most of Mississippi. When I arrive to my destination, I am usually greeted by good friends. I’ve joked that there are two degrees of separation in Mississippi — and one if you know someone’s mama. This is a land full of colorful people who make where they live more interesting. (the loss of Ronzo Shapiro in Oxford is crushing for just this reason). We are a land of great stories and storytellers. We love food and family and mix in a healthy bit of faith. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it.
Yes, there is a dark side. There is pain, poverty, racism, hatred and at times just pure evil. Sure, those things are everywhere — but it has been such a part of our history it is hard to ignore it when it happens. It’s cruel and unforgiving. But the darkness acts like an irritant to an oyster — whether it is writing, the Blues or great art — the pain is healed by a beautiful pearl. It’s best not to ignore the bad things, though — they are part of our history. That history shapes us. Like most things painful, learning from it can make us better and stronger. Ignoring it can tear us apart.
Mississippi is a place that can challenge what you believe. If you open your eyes and observe it, it can make you a better person. If you close your eyes to it, you close your heart. Observing will allow you to make friendships that last a lifetime. So travel. Visit the Delta, Northeast Mississippi, The Pine Belt, the Jackson area, East Mississippi, The Coast and Southwest Mississippi. Pull up a chair on a bluff and watch the Mississippi flow past. Be humbled. Allow the swirling waters to shape you like it has this land. And allow it to remind you of your place in this world.
I have a deep love for Mississippi. And like every relationship, there are good and bad moments. Sometimes the bad moments are crushing — you wonder why you feel the way you do about our home and shake your fist at the sky. It might be a news story or the actions of some moron who brings shame to us all. Your heart just sinks because you know we are better than that.
But then there are the good moments, actually great ones. They are the people, things, events, stories, etc. that make our hearts swell in pride. They take the good things that we all know to be true and take them out on a national stage. It’s a chance for us to show off what we do really well. It’s our giving, our storytelling, our hospitality, our talent.
It’s that moment when we can show the world how great we truly are.
The Mississippi Book Festival is one of those moments. Since it’s inception just a few years ago, it has grown exponentially, garnered national attention and praise and provided a vehicle for us to show off one of our gifts — our literary tradition. I’ve had the honor of participating most of the years both as an author and a moderator. It’s so good to be part of such a joyous celebration of Mississippi — one that is quickly turning into one of our Crown Jewels.
Here are a few moments from yesterday.
So I’m sitting in the Author’s Lounge eating a sweet roll, talking with Jesse Holland,Ralph Eubanks Richard Ford, Curtis Wilkie, Bill Dunlap, Beth Ann Fennelly and Margaret McMullan. The Author’s Lounge is like a big family reunion. Seeing the line stretching down the street for people wanting to see Sonia Sotomayor or Dev Pilkey (never thought I’d be using those two names in a sentence together). It’s sitting down in the Governor’s office interviewing Candice (Sex in the City) Bushnell — can’t say I ever thought THAT would happen. It’s seeing the line out of Lemuria Books’ tent and knowing they are having a standout day. It’s seeing parents carrying books they just bought for their kids. It’s seeing AmeriCorps kids help people find their way around the Capitol. It’s see people taking a guided tour of THEIR Capitol building. It’s having so many people come up to me and say how much they enjoy what I get to do for a living. It’s seeing people celebrate books and the people who write them.
You get my point.
I want to thank a few people. Thank you Holly Lange, Ellen Rogers and every wonderful volunteer and organizer who worked so hard to put together a great day — The event was world class and that’s a reflection on you. I want to thank my panel’s authors — Josh Foreman (Hidden History of the Mississippi Sound),Luke Lampton ( Images in Mississippi Medicine),Janice Branch Tracy (Mississippi Moonshine Politics)Kate Stewart (Parchman Farm: Mississippi’s State Penitentiary in the 1930s) — you were fabulous and kept our audience entertained. Thanks to Shirley Mixon and the team from MPB who helped me stumble and bumble through my interviews this week. Thanks for my coworkers at Mississippi Today who worked really hard representing yesterday. And I want to thank Mother Nature for keeping the temperature below 100.
When I got home, I hopped in a UHaul truck and moved my son to college. I got home last night after midnight and I’m up this morning briefly before heading back to sleep. But I am sitting here with a smile on my face. The place I love had a very, very good day yesterday.
The place I love had a very, very good day yesterday.
Guess what time it is?!? It’s Back-to-School time! The chaotic race to get your kids from bed to bus (or car) and off to school has begun. It’s a mini-D-day every day that can cause gnashing of teeth and tears. It’s a struggle — and a marathon, not a sprint. We at the Ramsey house have been doing this for nearly two decades and have discovered a few tips that make it easier or at least less chaotic. (And like you, we are struggling to get back into the routine.) 1. Do as much as you can the night before. (We struggle at this one). Make your lunches, lay out clothes, get breakfast prep (bowls, cereal) ready — make things as easy as you can in the morning. Caffeine doesn’t kick in fast enough for you to be on your A game and get all that done before 7 a.m. Trust me. 2. Go back to the future. Our kitchen is the hub of “Operation Get the Heck to School” and we have a wall clock that helps us stay on target. If you have one, too, set it ahead five minutes. It’s a Jedi Mind Trick that creates a sense of urgency. 3. Loose the Snooze. Parents, get up five minutes earlier (AKA don’t hit the snooze). It’s easier to find five minutes at the front end of the morning than when you are late heading out the door. 4. Put the phone down. Make a “no phone” policy until everyone is ready (I am looking at myself here). We used to have a TV that was on in the morning, but don’t do that anymore (we watched 9/11 live because of that. Now we’d have to wait on a push alert on our phone). 5. Avoid Sleep Creep. Every day of school, your kids will sleep one minute later. I call it sleep creep and it is a very real thing. You have to stay on target in the morning. Make sure they are up and moving — as much as we want our kids to be responsible, they are our offspring. They want to hit the snooze, too. Bonus: If kids continue to struggle getting out of bed, I recommend an air horn. It’s cruel but effective.
(We struggle at this one). Make your lunches, lay out clothes, get breakfast prep (bowls, cereal) ready — make things as easy as you can in the morning. Caffeine doesn’t kick in fast enough for you to be on your A game and get all that done before 7 a.m. Trust me. 2. Go back to the future. Our kitchen is the hub of “Operation Get the Heck to School” and we have a wall clock that helps us stay on target. If you have one, too, set it ahead five minutes. It’s a Jedi Mind Trick that creates a sense of urgency. 3. Loose the Snooze. Parents, get up five minutes earlier (AKA don’t hit the snooze). It’s easier to find five minutes at the front end of the morning than when you are late heading out the door. 4. Put the phone down. Make a “no phone” policy until everyone is ready (I am looking at myself here). We used to have a TV that was on in the morning, but don’t do that anymore (we watched 9/11 live because of that. Now we’d have to wait on a push alert on our phone). 5. Avoid Sleep Creep. Every day of school, your kids will sleep one minute later. I call it sleep creep and it is a very real thing. You have to stay on target in the morning. Make sure they are up and moving — as much as we want our kids to be responsible, they are our offspring. They want to hit the snooze, too. Bonus: If kids continue to struggle getting out of bed, I recommend an air horn. It’s cruel but effective.
It could have been any beach anywhere. There was sand, a stiff breeze and tourists soaking up the summer sun’s rays. Gulls floated playfully on the stiff sea breeze as whitecaps teased the shore. Waves crashed angrily as a distant storm pushed the sea into the land. A similar storm had also tormented this very shoreline 75 years ago. Today, though, a circle would be completed. The death of a body finally reconciled with the death of a soul. A lone man walked purposefully along the beach near Vierville-sur-Mer, France. That beach’s name is one that is etched in history books:
Omaha Beach — A place that once was an open fissure that led straight to Hell.
The man walking toward the English Channel carried a small container. He kept it close to his heart, as it was precious to him. In it contained the answer to a secret that had been kept from him up until recently. In it was the remains of a broken man.
Famed combat photographer Robert Capa took this image (one of the few that survived) of the first wave of American soldiers hitting Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944. Most of the first wave was either killed or wounded.
That man, Private John Riley O’Rouke, had been on the first wave to storm Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944. As he and his friends closed into the range of the German guns, vomit and sweat quickly turned into blood. Bullets ripped through the Higgins’ boat’s ramp, killing men O’Rouke had trained with, eaten with, marched with, drank with and been friends with. They were his brothers. His drinking buddies. A mortar shell exploded directly in the middle of the landing craft next his, sending body parts flying through the air. That’s the moment when O’Rouke discovered the human body is no match for burning razor-sharp steel. Then his best friend Sam Reynolds took a bullet to the head. His brains exploded on O’Rouke’s face.
O’Rouke prayed but God wasn’t there. No, this was strictly men facing Satan’s wrath.
As fire continued to rip through the boat, the Higgins’ boat’s coxswain panicked and let the gate down too far from the shore. Another round of machine gun fire erupting with another spray of bullets ripping through the men once again. But for some reason, O’Rouke wasn’t hit. He leapt over the side of the boat, shucking his gear so he wouldn’t drown. And he was one of the few who didn’t. Gasping and crying, he pulled himself past his drowned friends and onto the shore. There he hid behind an obstacle as fire rained down around him. Vomit trickled down his blood covered chin.
Seconds became hours. Hours became a lifetime. When the second wave came ashore, he composed himself just enough to push forward with them. Bullets whizzed past his head repeatedly but O’Rouke didn’t notice. As far as he cared, he was already dead. That evening, Private John Riley O’Rouke, covered in the blood of his friends, was one of the few from the first wave get off Omaha Beach alive and relatively unscathed. But while he wasn’t physically hurt, his soul died a grisly death.
J.R. O’Rouke had never known much about the man who had walked away from the family when he was just a little kid. According to his grandmother, he was the town drunk and had once tried to kill her while she slept. She said he was screaming something about Germans as he choked her before she managed to hit him with a candle stick and drive him off. He left and managed to go through a series of jobs that paid him just enough to pay for the alcohol that he used to drown his pain like his friends had drowned. J.R. had never known his grandfather had been on this beach on D-Day. The family, being good Church-going folks, didn’t talk about him. J.R. would see him wandering around town but he was too afraid to speak to him. He was a monster after all. Then in the summer of 1995, his grandfather disappeared once and for all. J.R. would never know the truth.
Or so he thought.
The first crack in the family’s Fort Knox-like story about his grandfather came with the release of the classic Spielberg war movie Saving Private Ryan. He remembered his grandmother crying when it was released. She told him not to go see it but of course, he went anyway. Walking out of the theater he thought, “how did those guys ever move on with their lives?”
He had no idea his grandfather was one of those guys.
Then while cleaning out his grandmother’s house, he found the next clue in a chest in her attic. In it were newspaper clippings from the war and a chest full of medals. Ernie Pyle, the Great War correspondent had mentioned his grandfather’s heroic action that day. How he had helped break the German defenses and taken out a pillbox with hand grenades. He picked up and held a Silver Star his grandfather had received for his heroism. But that couldn’t be true, could it? He had heard the stories and the whispers around town. His grandfather wasn’t a hero. He was a just a worthless drunk. Right? Right?!?
The waves crashed louder as the wind began to howl. Sand swirled around, stinging his face as he approached the water’s edge. J.R. took off his shoes and began to walk out into the water. He felt a riptide pull him toward the open sea. He clutched the container even tighter.
Like his grandfather 75 years ago, he had a mission to complete.
John Riley O’Rouke had died alone in a V.A. nursing home at the age of 95. Because J.R.’s name was the same as his grandfather’s, a kind nurse had broken protocol and located him. He wanted the old man, the one patient who had never had visitors, to have some dignity in death. J.R. remembered the phone call. “Are you related to John Riley O’Rouke? J.R. nearly dropped the phone. “He’s alive?” J.R. replied. He immediately called his dad and both men traveled to identify the body. John Riley O’Rouke was dead alright. But in reality, he had died on the morning of June 6, 1944. That’s when his soul drowned along with his friends in the English Channel. For the next 75 years, he walked through life totally broken. He could not put out the burning flames of survivor’s guilt. He could not shut down the images of the carnage. He was stuck reliving the sounds and smells of Hell itself.
Omaha Beach, July 2019
J.R. looked back at the shore. Why were all the beachgoers lying around like pasty beached Beluga Whales? Damn them. This beach is a shrine. How dare they have fun and live their lives? Yet, he knew that if men like his grandfather hadn’t sacrificed everything, these tourists wouldn’t have had the freedom to be working on their tans.
The waves grew in height as the winds nearly knocked him over. He prayed a prayer for his grandfather’s soul, seeking a God who had been absent in June of 1944. Then he unscrewed the little container and paused. His grandfather wasn’t a demon. He was just a man who was broken by demons and machine gun fire. J.R. finally understood. His grandfather was a proud man. And like most men of his generation, he swallowed his pain. That pain had metastasized and eaten at what was left of who he was. The Germans had killed him. It just took 75 years and several hundred gallons of cheap liquor to do it.
J.R. said, “Here’s to you Gramps,” and poured the ashes into the sea. He watched as the gray cloud floated down towards the water below.
When the ashes hit the surface, a strange thing happened: The sea calmed. The wind stilled. There was peace. And on that warm July day in Normandy, France, a tormented, broken soul finally healed and moved on.
In honor of the brave men who gave everything so we can have everything.
I went to a conference last week in Houston, Texas that helped me understand my job better to be able to serve the amazing journalists at Mississippi Today. It also gave me a chance to do some reflecting on my career and where I think it is going. I looked at the good, the bad and the ugly. While it was tempting to start pointing fingers away from me when I started looking at my problems, I just stopped in my tracks. Sure, pointing figures away from yourself is less painful and easier — it’s really time consuming. And fixing every problem in the world is exhausting and not a good use of your time. So I am doing something easier and more effective: I am turning my finger around and pointing at the true cause of my problems — me. It’s easier to find solutions that way, too — you have one person to change. I will begin by accepting responsibility for EVERYTHING — even if it doesn’t seem like it is my fault. It’s something we all need to do: OWN our life, our career, our relationships. I will be honest, I have absolutely sucked at this for a long, long time. I would look inward but for all the wrong reasons. I had a person close to me show me how destructive that is. It’s time to understand there is something bigger than myself and act accordingly. I need to hustle and work. I need to own it.
Now if you will excuse me, I need do just that. I have some growing to do today.
