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April 11, 2005
High Blood Pressure Can Save your Life
My Uncle Matthew went to Vietnam before I was born. After being seriously injured, he was brought home and left to convalesce in San Antonio. He was in a coma for a little while but came out of it in time to stand as my godfather in my baptism. I never knew my uncle before the war so I'm not really sure how it may have affected him. Though he had a slight limp and a blacked-out lens in his glasses, I never thought anything of it. He wasn't a Vietnam Vet, he was just Uncle Matthew and that's what Uncle Matthew looked like. I thought it was kind of neat. He had a scar that looked like a football I remember was pretty fascinating which I think came from an unrelated injury. It was all the same to me; very interesting. I was quite a bit older before I realized that his blacked out patch might be considered odd or different from the norm or that his limp might be uncomfortable or keep him from doing fun things like snow-skiing we all liked to do. I was even older when I recognized the danger and heartbreak of the Vietnam War.
I remember seeing a picture of my Dad once in a uniform and wondering if he went with Matthew to Vietnam. The response I remember had something to do with my Dad not going because he was in ROTC at home. I don't know what was actually told to me but that's what I remember. After talking with my mother last night, I've got the real story.
Before I was even born, my Dad's number came up. He wasn't married, he wasn't in college and so he would be drafted. My Dad had a history of High Blood Pressure and so he expected to not pass the physical. They took the test and it was fine. My Dad told them they better check it again, that he had HBP and that they should check it again. Perhaps it was the abject fear that he might be shipped off to fight that triggered it but sure enough, the second check came back as High Blood Pressure and he would not be drafted.
Without High Blood Pressure my father could easily have gone to a winless war in a vary dangerous role. Young, Mexican, and not in college; a perfect candidate to send off to the frontlines in those times. Thinking about the road less traveled is sometimes foolish, maybe often times foolish. Who really knows? I can't help thinking that without High Blood Pressure, I might never have been conceived, much less born. My father, instead of managing this ailment in his 50s, would have been spared the last 35 years of his life because he was deemed healthy.
And then I think of all of those men and women who are going off to war for 2nd and 3rd tours of duty today. What would the lives of those lost been like if lucky enough to have High Blood Pressure? It's disconcerting really.
War is serious business and very important. It shouldn't be taken lightly, and our troops should always be supported, but it also shouldn't be entered into lightly either and it should NEVER be based on a lie. Our troops aren't just pawns on a chess board or images in a video game and they aren't in the war, on the battlefield or an carriers to serve as rhetoric or a photo op either. What about all of those young American children the fallen would have had? What about all of the lives that should have been led? I can't help thinking that today's war is so much more damaging than anything we could possible gain. We've lost so much for the sake of a greedy President and a lack of knowledge and vision. It might be hard for Bush to understand that; given his privileged "I've never had to earn anything background" but I feel it. And I'm praying for all of those soldiers to develop high blood pressure.
Posted by mermu at April 11, 2005 03:46 PM
Comments
OOH. that is a good secret. So I suppose I was the result of a Lucy park celebration after he failed the physical?
Posted by: ME at April 12, 2005 12:38 AM
That football like scar on Matthew was a bed sore. It comes from being comotose and not being turned in your bed often. However, I do have a little secret for your entry. You were conceived when he had his draft physical...so, if not for the hbp, you might have grown up never knowing the father you had. It was Jenny and Danny's conception that was in jeopardy.
Posted by: Mom at April 11, 2005 10:49 PM
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