THE BEACON
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Vol. I No* 9 8/s/50_
EDITORIAL
I'm just a guy who answers to Dick*
Twenty-three years ago Worn dressed my
name up in pink ribbons (just like she
did me) and wrote Richard Lawerenoe
Howard on the Birth Certificate; but the
fellas call me Dick* so that's it* Ity
last name could be Jones* Srensen* Doff*
Samuels* O'Brien* no matter* beoause my
story is the story of a thousand guys
just like me*
Ify philosophy is the kind that sticks
out at the elbows* but I learned that one
must hold to an ideal when life ie shorn
of meaning; vftien you bury your head into
the earth as mortar fire bursts around
you* home seems a million miles away and
all your hopes become meaningless dreams*
you must have an ideal to eling to—an
ideal that can't be violated* Ify test
oame during the last war and I found that
all the good in my life was immorta lised
in my little Irish mother*
Hell* I'm just one of the 2,000*000
men back in uni form* •• just one* an infaiv
tisimal part of the whole***but to Mom
I'm the whole damn.armyl
I'm a hulking sort of a guy* the bull**
in-the-china-oloset type* but around Mom
I feel kinda little* Gees* she can
oradle my head in her arme and call me
nBaty<f and I don't feel foolieh somehow*
but just manage to swallow the lump that
always stioks there in my throat*
I've sorta let Mom down* too* She had
great hopes for me* All the things the
soven older kids oouldn't master were
goinfe to be easy for me* If my capa
bilities werelimited* I was kept ignor
ant of the fact* I believe I oould have
built Rome in that impossible day* from
her viev'point* World tragedy crashed
down around us* upsetting all our plans*
I was jerked from sohool* but was in
wardly thrilled at this historical event
that had thrown me into the glamorous
role of a GI* Six ninths* then I went
over*
When I shipped, it was. to Guadaean&l#
Bitter, frustrating nightmare -of reality#
I grew x.p in those smelly fox holes of
the South Paoifio and went home after
peaoo was declared irreparably soarred,
atnormally matured# Old, spiritless,
beaton* siok# I still suffer from re
current malaria which I picked up while
in the Paoifio fighting zones# Ify future
was as blank as the snow-swept prairie#
Only one thing was as I had left it* my
little white-headed Mom# Bcoept for the
vail of Baddness behind the twinkle in
her eye, she was the samo—the same gay
spirit, the same ambition, the same verve
for living, the same faith in me#
(Next Column Please)
With courage drained from her oozt*
fidence, I went back to the University,
awkward and resentful* Without Mom's
horde of humor and comfort at my dis
posal, I would have failed in the read
justment to a fun-loving life free from
servility. •*a life that had become a
fantasy during the dark, oppressive war
daze from whioh I had been salvaged*
Somehow, as Mom's mild tenderness non*
malized my fuliginous prospective, I
subconsciously intertwined the threads
of possibility and ambition into a rope
of constructive accomplishment* I had
straight A's on my transcript, a trucking
job during summer vaoation, and, best of
all, a spontaneous laugh that didn't echo
with hypooritioal reverberations* Mom
had put her little workworn shoulder to
mine and with her strength, I was on my
way again! She artistically colored the
baokdrop of my life with reason and pun*
‘ pose, gave an aim to my struggle, and
effused personal pride in every obstacle
I overcame*
.Time passed*
A joy oame back into my life, a con
tentedness that I had been too young to
acknowledge before and too bitter to
realize since my return* But now I even
relished a sharp gratitude at the arrogant
tilt to Mom's ohin and the things we had
been able to do together* Everything was
'going our way'; I was elated* I had one
quarter left to finish my University work;
I was now manager of the Trucking line
for whioh I had begun as a driver; I had
saved a little money and had secured the
love of the one girl X wanted* Then, like
the expeoted but unwelcome cloudburst up
setting Sunday's pionio, I was called
baok into servioe!
I'm not the only guy it happened to,
or will happen to before this is over;
but, how oould I give up what 1 had worked
so hard to reolaimt How could I go back
into that orgy of blood and slaughter
the memory of whioh was just beginning to
fade***baok into that black oblivion from
whioh, if there should be a seoond re
demption, there oould be no second re
habilitation* HOW COULD I ANSWER MI
COUNTRY’S CALL?
That night, alone in my room, my heart
broke, I pried, not like the man I was,
but like^rSst, hopeless boy Mom consoled
twenty years ago, "Twice in one short life
time", I kept thinking. Then, like graoo
from God, solace flooded my full heart,
my future focused beyond the immediate as
I felt the loving pressure of a small,
wrinkled hand on my shoulder and knew that
Mom was there as she always had been in
the crises of my life, Ity suffering ap
peared selfish and puny in the overwhelm
ing presence of hers, I knew then that I
must go baok, and t COULD go back, Mom*s
little home must be hers forever; her
little ohuroh and rosary must never be
taken from her; her faith must never bo
destroyed! This Communistic scum must be
wiped off the face of the world so Demo
cracy can shino through!
mm mam we w ww mmm wm mmm mmm ' mam mam mm mam amm mam mam mam mam mam maaamm