The Beginning of the End

The following passages are excerpted from the chapter.

". . .I thought I would look up the names of men I knew who died in Vietnam. Then I discovered my error -- it seemed I had forgotten all the names. I could remember Mauerman, but he didn't die. And I could recall several others from that time who didn't die there -- or probably didn't. But I couldn't remember the names of those I saw dead, and I couldn't imagine their faces. I could see them, I could almost smell them, but their faces were blank -- their features had been erased.

It was early in the day, and I had nothing else to do. Surely I would remember some of the names if I read them. The names on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial are arranged in columns in the order in which the men and women died. So I read the names -- all the names. I walked down the path to the center of the wall. Column after column, I slowly read the names on the wall. From the center of the wall up the ramp to the right. Then I went back to the other end and continued left to right. Back to where I had started in the center of the wall.

As I progressed through the lists of names, I felt increasingly burdened in some deeply emotional sense. And feelings of anguish and sadness seemed to take on physical mass, straining me in a tangible way.

I had read all the names on the wall, and I still could not remember any of those I had served with who had died there. Oblivious to those around me, my chest heaved in a way I could not control, and I cried in a way I had never done before."