Waiting: One Wife's Year of the Vietnam War

Chapter 12

{Chapter 12} The three of us women on Collins Street took turns making the trek downstairs to the garage mail slot, usually more than once a day because our postman was as unpredictable in his delivery time as was our mail supply. Susan and I awaited airmail envelopes from Vietnam; Mrs. Sheldon looked for hers from Tehran. Spotting the red and blue stripes in the box meant someone in the house would be rewarded for her patience—or impatience, as the case might be. Tom’s legal-size envelopes were always thick, and I finally decided it was because he was a writer with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in journalism . Susan routinely disappeared into the bedroom for a long period each time one arrived. The thicker the letter, the brighter the blaze in her eyes when she reappeared. Really big letters brought an aftermath of door slamming and muttered profanities. Though Susan never said, I suspected those tomes were dissertations on rice growing and agricultural aspects of Vietnam, which intrigued Tom and irritated Susan. Envelopes for Mrs. Sheldon were identifiable even from their back sides because they were clean and crisp, despite the fact that they had traveled from farther away. She would pop her reading glasses atop the end of her nose and chuckle as she read while sitting at the kitchen table. “Oh, Sus, listen to this,” she would say with a laugh and then relay the news item, stopping to fill me in on backgrounds and thus provide more fascinating stories about far away places and sometimes incorrigible characters. The three of us could easily convert one of her letters into a full day’s conversation. Mail from Lee most often arrived in letter-size envelopes that were distinguishable by their muddy smears on both sides. I usually retreated to [90] chapter 12 a chair in the living room to read, translate, and savor them. Whereas before I had been able to estimate the length based solely on thickness, I honed my skills by assessing the state of the envelope. The dirtier it was, the shorter the letter would be. “I hope this is mud, not blood,” Mrs. Sheldon said one morning during the first week of July as she handed me a heavily smudged letter. I felt the grit on my fingers as I opened the thin envelope, trying to concentrate on my relief at hearing from Lee instead of disappointment at the brevity of his communication. The single page, torn from a small tablet, was so caked with red clay that I had trouble focusing on the words. But this particular little miserable-looking message proved that big surprises really could come in small packages. Lee wrote that he would go back to the brigade main base for seven days, starting on June 28, to act as company executive officer. I was ecstatic. Seven whole days without worry, I calculated. By now threeofthesevenwerealreadygone—well,actually,withthedatechange, closer to four. But that did not matter. I might even get to enjoy the Fourth of July. Yes, I could celebrate, too. I went running for the kitchen. “Lee’s out of the field for seven days!” I shouted, waving the reddened page. A flash of horror at the sight of the crusted letter crossed Mrs. Sheldon ’s face before she caught herself. “It’s okay,” I reassured her. “He may be muddy, but he’s alive. And no one is shooting at him until after the weekend.” Mrs. Sheldon looked at me as though I had lost my mind. When life is good, life is grand. That afternoon I got a call from Cheryl Hightower,myfriendfromBraggandBenning.Iwasthrilledtohearfrom her and delighted when she said that she and Steve were in San Francisco, though my heart skipped a beat when I realized why. “When?” I asked cryptically. “We have a few more days,” Cheryl answered haltingly. Then she cleared her throat and forced her normal voice. “We’d like to take you and your roommate to dinner at the Presidio Officers’ Club tomorrow night. Are you free?” Was I free? She had no idea. The only things on my life’s calendar were July 1969 [91] 2 December 1969: Baby due, and 18 April, 1970: Lee comes home. In between, I was completely available. That night as Susan and I sat talking, facing each other across our twin beds that were aligned foot-to-foot...