What We Will Abide

In December of 2008, I interviewed my father about his experience in Vietnam. Just this past summer, I interviewed him again for What We Will Abide and it appears as Episode 16, “American Cynic.” But, back in 2008 I also interviewed my mother about how she experienced his time in the Army. After making that video recording, it sat for years, untouched. I never watched it.In the summer of 1966, my parents got married and my father got drafted. He was sent to Fort Riley in Junction City, Kansas, and expected to stay there, as an on-base dentist for the full 2 years. In the fall of 1967, he was given orders – he was being sent to Vietnam.I can sort of imagine what Junction City might have looked like in 1966, and I can definitely imagine how my mother, at age 21, having lived all her life in Flushing, Queens, would have seen it. It was so disagreeable that, by comparison, Manhattan, Kansas was nearly paradise. That year, and the year that followed, my mother spent as an army wife. In this inter