How Far Would You Go to Experience the Journey?
By Jeannie Anderson
My hand was shaking as I hung up the phone, but I wasn’t sure if it was out of excitement or fear. I’d hardly been out of the south before, let alone ever seriously considered obtaining a passport to leave the country. Even more so, I had no idea of how to tell my husband and my children that I was going. But in six short weeks I was going…to the other side of the world…to Vietnam.
It would be a 16 day military historical tour for those who had gone some 30 years before to fight a war, only this time no camouflage, no weapons, no survival training would be needed. This time these retired soldiers carried cameras, water bottles and snacks of trail mix. For myself, it wouldn’t be about the recollection of good and bad times gone by, but instead it was about a journey of revelation and connection, for and with a man I had never known – my biological father.
You see, I was adopted at birth, and as most adoptees I had lots of questions, and few answers. I wasn’t sure what answers I’d find in the jungles of Vietnam if any yet I was unexplainably drawn to go.
The time flew by, with lists being made and remade. Packing and repacking, just what do you take to the other side of the world? When your world has for the most part consisted of a few surrounding states and the only language barrier being the degrees in thickness of a southern drawl, the thought of being completely submersed in a different culture is just a bit daunting to say the least.
But here it was six weeks later and as the tears rolled down my cheeks I kissed and hugged my children and husband telling them “good bye, and that I’d be home soon”. It had occurred to me while repacking two nights prior, that as I now prepared to leave my family not knowing what to expect, of just how my father must have felt, being all of 19 years of age preparing to leave his family in much the same way I was preparing to leave mine. Only he prepared with the understanding and reality as to what “good bye” could and did hold for him. I wondered if he said the words, “I’ll be home soon”. Just what makes a young boy leave his home, board a plane for a country thousands of miles away, not knowing how long it would before he could return or if he would return. I wondered if it might be his courage, his tenacity, his spirit that moved me forward, that made me say, “I must go.”
Stepping off the plane into old Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, some 24 hours later, a wave of hot humid air hit my face as if to welcome me. As we began traveling into the heart of the city a sense of awe filled me as I looked around at my surroundings. From one moment to the next, from street to street the scenery was constantly changing and intermingling, going from impoverished to imperial with no sense of boundaries or guidelines to follow. Yet it didn’t seem to matter to any one of the millions (literally) of people passing by whether from which they came, everyone seemed happy and offered welcoming friendly smiles. Sometimes I felt as though my mind would explode from overload with the sights, the sounds, the smells, as every sensory came to life, and every emotion was touched. I found myself wondering what he would have thought about it all, what he had fought for…what he had died for.
I have been told throughout my whole life “You have your father’s eyes” but for the first time I felt as though I was looking through them. Mid-way through the trip while standing on the airstrip where my father had been stationed it occurred to me that I had to travel to the other side of the world to stand on a spot where he had once stood. Many times while there I felt his presence and just knew he was walking beside me. So strong was the feeling a couple of times that I was certain I would turn and see him standing there smiling, blue eyes twinkling, as if to say, “see this was my journey, my path that I had to follow, and only in doing so was yours created for you to follow”. We now shared a common place, a common bond, a common thread of understanding each other woven throughout the years. More profoundly, I realized that the journey was not all about discovering who my father was but that it took the process of doing so that I discovered so much about myself, who I was and what I was made of. I found answers far beyond the questions I had come with.
Since my return, I’ve been asked countless times “so what would possess you to take such a trip?” My answer soon became, “It was just part of a journey, a step along my path that began a lifetime ago”.
There’s a journey for each of us, a path of which we’re to follow in life, have you discovered yours yet? For most it will not be as far as the other side of the world, it may be just outside your door, or maybe a phone call or letter away. For some, it may be so far as to look within your own self. The real question and challenge is not where it begins but instead, “How far will you go to experience your journey?”
This was written as a tribute with great honor and a debt of gratitude for my Biological father, John Anderson, Vietnam Helicopter Scout Pilot KIA 7-21-1969, for my Adoptive father, Jim Fleming, who served from 1964-1966, for my Stepfather, Ray Broome, who served in WWII and Korea, all my C Troop 1/9 Cav. Vietnam Veteran “uncles” and for our military men and women of today. As we celebrate this Veteran’s Day, may all of us embrace what price they and their families have paid so that we may claim to be “the land of the free”…and without a doubt “the home of the brave”!
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