Peace Activist while loving soldiers and vets!(WAR FOLLOWS EVERY SOLDIER HOME)

Yes, you can share anything. War is tragic, and although I don't see it ending anytime soon, I still cannot wrap my brain around all those who are

without conscience or empathy to the point of wiping out so many. And just for the record, many parents of military children are forgotten. If soldiers die or are injured, the spouse and children are in the spotlight...as they should be. They have been shown to exhibit much anxiety and PTSD too. Parents however, fade into the back round, and believe me, we also have PTSD. When I knew my son was in a war zone, it's like I held my breath for a full year. After the first couple tours, he stopped telling me about his life and became evasive. To this day, he remains so, and as per the military, I get info on a *needs to know* basis, and really, doesn't look like I *needs to know* much of anything
anymore. He was VERY angry with me when I was a peace activist...thanks to Bush who determined that we had to support the war to support the troops. You know that's BUSH-IT as I call it, but may of the troops bought into it. My son thought I was one of those people who protested at military funerals. He was so brainwashed. cry emoticon We still are
not close, and that pains me so much. He was the nicest kid and get this...a classical guitar prodigy who played by ear. He picked up my guitar one day and just went for it. I had to beg the best teacher I could find to take him on because he was just a young teen. After less than 2 yrs., this teacher told me he could do no more...that my son was a one of a kind prodigy and that we should get him a scholarship to study in Europe with a master. He said my son was a once in a lifetime kind of prodigy, like a Mozart or something. I used to LOVE listening to him play... And then he dropped it because he didn't think he could earn a living...teen thinking I guess. He got into girls, cars and then the military and totally abandoned the guitar. Well, we don't own our kids, nor can we make decisions for them. I guess the military would have been my LAST guess as to what kind of work that particular child would choose. Hands and heart so artistic went from lovingly holding his guitar to holding a weapon that killed. I don't know that I'll ever understand that... He was also a Senior Jumpmaster...started his career with the 82nd Airborne in Fort Bragg, NC. His body got wrecked up with all those jumps, and I think he only does it occasionally now, though he was stationed in Italy for 5 years because it was one of a couple European places where they jumped. Really Ron, it's such a sad story for me as his mom. He cannot look me in the eye, because he knows I can see everything. Moms are like that. So he avoids me. I think he understands my peace activism now and understands that I worked and still work with veterans, though the little boy I raised (as a single mom for the most part) and the man he is now seem like 2 totally different people. It's been rough cry emoticon I feel like I've lost both my boys, and it's taken a toll. I've done my best to get on with life and be happy...it's better than any other alternative, if you know what I'm saying. Hugs xoxox

Debbie's original letter:

 



Thanks Ron...I'm going to order it My son has spent 4 yrs. of his life on 4 tours, 2 in Iraq and 2 in Afghanistan. He's a Warrant Officer 2 in the Army and still IN the Army, even after a Purple Heart and Bronze Star. Of course he, nor anyone else will tell me much about the injuries he got with the Purple Heart, but the basic story is that he was with some guys and going to retrieve a downed Humvee. They'd all just gotten out of their vehicle when an IED hit. My son was unconscious, and when he came to, he gathered up his guys (and some were dead and in pieces and parts), put them in their vehicle and drove back to base. I heard he had head trauma and was transferred to a hospital for several months. I also heard he has very bad PTSD. WHY he's still in the Army, I don't know. I saw him in July 2013 when he came home for my other son's funeral. Yeah, I unexpectedly lost the child I never thought I would, and that son's death was suspicious. He was a peace officer, but was off work when he died. Anyway, my son who died received a 21 gun salute at his funeral, and my military son almost fainted dead away at the noise. Just crazy awful. My own dad was at Nagasaki after they dropped the bomb, and he had night terrors and would wake up screaming. They did not call that PTSD then. He dropped dead at 35. I found out the bomb was plutonium and affects muscle, and the heart is a muscle. Many others suffered ongoing heart attacks or died young of heart attacks or heart problems besides the cancer. My military son's father and uncle were both Vietnam veterans and they both killed themselves. Yeah...I've pretty much been surrounded by the darker side of war and why, in my first public speech at a peace rally, my most famous line (I guess, since it ended up on NPR radio) was that WAR FOLLOWS EVERY SOLDIER HOME. It does Ron, believe me, it does. Hugs friend xoxoxo
Ron:

Ah, "Peace Activist" without withholding love and support from soldiers and vets. Debbie, you are an answer from God to me!

Ron: I understand my own Mom a lot more now - as you will see from my video (digital story) and agree completely with you about Bush (although he was a puppet to Cheney in my mind!

 

Yes he was. Cheney is a true psychopath with no conscience and no feelings. There are many others. The PNAC document laid out *the plan*, document laid out *the plan*, and I notice they changed the name of that, though I can't remember what it's called now. I do believe all of this has been going on since time began...these polarities of thought which give life (movement) to the Universe. The infinite balancing act of Natural Law, so my highest self does not place judgment, though my human self has a few opinions!

Let's just say I've always been *different*...born with many abilities activated, and I *download* or what some call *channel* many things. Who the heck writes SONNETS?????????? This just filled me up, and I wrote it without conscious thought. Well, wherever it came from, it does reflect what I have seen in many a soldier's heart xoxoxo

SONNET FOR THE PURPLE HEART

SONNET FOR THE PURPLE HEART

 

What call was that which drew me though the fog
And whispered soft of heroes sacrifice
Where scorched clean white and innocent of all
I signed, and felt the Purple Heart within
So new and born again, the beat too strong,
Too deaf to hear that voice which followed me
War's siren song of old, so evil sweet
Which shrewdly lured me to its revered hell
And held me hostage to its bloody chain
And gripped my heart while toasting victory
Until the day I dried and died with guilt...
I'd fed the beast, then wept.  War's hungry void
Now pulls me close, my soul to keep.  He smiles...
Who owns the heart no longer mine to feel 

Debbie Strandell-Johnson Dedicated to Nikko...my friend, and true hero...a soldier medic in Vietnam who refused to carry a weapon, who saved many lives and won many medals, who threw the medals away, who brought the war home and could never find peace, who died at his kitchen table one night, head on his hands, empty bottles giving voice to his pain. Alone. Finally at peace....I love you Nikko
John Wesley Fisher refused purple hearts though he could have had two of them - the other medals were a surprise ceremony at his departure. He replaced his military shirt with the medals as soon as he could, with an Hawaiian shirt.  A reporter was there to interview him, the "hero", and hid behind his friends at return home.

Debbie Strandell-Johnson I could tell you stories... I wrote this before Nikko died, and I never saw anyone try SO hard to pull the war out of his heart and put it someplace else. He died so full of alcohol, but I'm sure there was twice the amount of pain, if not more cry emoticon

 

Ron Alexander That is my job now - a Digital Story facilitator (or in training) - Yours sounds like a full-length movie though - I have already spoken with John Wesley Fisher about creating a screen-play - possibly we could all contribute????

Debbie Strandell-Johnson When people catch the same vibe, they RESONATE and somehow find each other xoxoxo ANYTHING I can do for you, just ask. I am on and off FB during the day and evening and sometimes more...in the winter anyway,
lol! It's cold here! In the summer, I'm lost in nature a good deal of the time, so spotty at best, though it's FB and coffee every morning for the most part. I have many things I could share, though I don't know what you may want. What I DO know for sure is that all of my speeches and many vids of the rallies and other
things are archived at University of Utah, Utah Valley (I think that's the name of it...just south of SLC) as part of a peace project one of the professors did. She was a friend of mine. I have all kinds of things...let me know, ok? I have that packet of everything that's archived around here somewhere! I let all that go and decided to HOLD the
vibration of peace in my heart...holding space for a more balanced planet. I think to myself that my grandchildren have lived in an era where there was always a war going on. WAY too 1984 for me. And before you ask, yes, I've read War is a Racket by Smedley Butler grin emoticon
Awwwwwwww....I'm so happy
to be of help in any way, Ron. Veterans are my heart emoticon and always will be. There are wars all over...wars with soldiers, wars in the home, in the schools, on the streets, in our hearts. So much healing needed to bring that peace to all, and I will do what I can to B4PEACE (my license plate for years heart emoticon ) xoxox

Devastated Mom, Barry was apple of her eye - Her anger from grief appeared to control her for rest of her long life and much of it taken out on me - the only surviving son of 5. Your words are helping me understand her better. BLESS HER HEART!

 

Debbie: A mother's grief is inexplicable. I read a science article where they found the DNA of a mother's son remained in her brain, sometimes for her entire life, and that it seemed to protect that mother from Alzheimer's Disease. Not all mothers will hold the DNA of her sons for a lifetime. It varied

within women. However, there seems to be some kind of bond between mothers and sons this way, as the DNA of daughters was not found. Her anger toward you was probably just her grief turned inside out. Maybe she wanted to distance from you in case she lost you too. Sometimes we cannot hold the pain, and anger is the

preferable emotion. Grief HURTS. I cannot fathom what it felt like for your mom to lose 4 of her 5 sons. I know what it felt to lose ONE child through death and another through the consciousness of war. I am sorry you got the crap end of it all. Must have been beyond rough for everyone. xoxoxo