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This is a story that I wrote after the Run To The Wall 2001. This year I had the privlege of reading some of the names on the wall. It is a very tough thing to do. I never imagined how hard it would be to read the names off of the wall. I went in there thinking "Well this won't be tough at all. Hey, I didn't even know any of these guys. It won't affect me at all." Boy did I ever get a wake up call when I started reading the names. What a person doesn't realize is that you do know those people on the wall. Maybe not on a personal level (considering that most of them were probably killed even before I was thought of) but you know them through the stories of other veterans. You know them by knowing other veterans. You get an idea of the courage that they had to posess inorder to go into a war that they weren't made to go into. But that they went into on their own free will. I wrote this story from a Veterans perspective. At least I tried to get the feeling that they'd have. I hope you enjoy it.
Spider



One night, sitting infront of the north wall praying to my brother's who appear there, asking for guidence in my life I heard a shuffle behind me. I turned around to see who was there and there standing behind me was my captain. I turned pale and he told me not to be scared.

I said "Sir, is that you? That can't be you! I left you to die in 'Nam!"

My captain replied, "No you didn't, you did all you could do. You didn't know there was an ambush. You couldn't see what was coming.

I turned quiet and just sat staring at the wall. Then all of a sudden a tear fell. He reached for my face and wiped it away.

Before I could get up to walk away....get away....run away... again. He placed his hand on my shoulder. At first it was cold and I cringed. He told me to let out my feelings. I said, "No, I can't. You're my cap and I can't in front of you."

The more I denied my feelings, the warmer his hand got. The next thing I knew, I was crying. I couldn't believe it. I was actually crying in front of my captain. A half hour later, when my tears quit falling, I heard another shuffle. I looked beside me and my captain had slowly moved and sat beside me. Then I looked behind me, and there was all my buddies who had been slaughtered in that ambush back in 'Nam. I can't believe my eyes....I knew these guys had been killed, but yet here they stand with me.

My best buddy, the one that told me to run and get some help came up to me. He sat down beside me on my right, my captain on my left. He looked at me and told me that it wasn't my fault. He continued to say, "It was my fault, I was the one who told you to run. If I didn't tell you to run they never would've attacked."

I looked at him and said, "But I should be the one that's dead... not you."

Just then, he and my captain got up and went to the wall. I got up and followed them. When I got up there behind them, I saw them taking turns sliding their hand over a name with a star beside it. I couldn't see whose name it was, but I looked at my captain and asked, "What does the star mean?"

He turned and looked at me and he said, "It means MIA."

I asked, "Whose name are you rubbing?

They both moved their hands and.....it was mine.





I hope you enjoyed the story. If not. I'm sorry. But that's what my feelings were at the time.