My life at Notre Dame began in the fall of 1962. My parents and
I were met by an upperclassman who pointed out a few sites, described
what ND was like and explained the undergraduate tradition of
not ascending the front steps of the administration building until
after graduation. Although it was thoroughly discouraged by the
administration, the penalty for being caught on those steps was
to be thrown into Saint Mary's Lake by the rest of the student
body. I embraced the tradition immediately. As far as I know,
I was the last member of my class to climb those steps.
In 1962, the Cold War was on. Students had been dealing with
simulated air raids and fallout shelters since grade school. Yet
we were still naïve. The nation, jolted by Sputnik, had rejected
Nixon and elected its first Catholic president in 1960. The mood
was upbeat. The White House was Camelot. We were going to the
moon.
It wasn't long before serious events began to mar our innocence.
In October 1962, Pope John XXIII decided to open the windows at
the Roman Curia and let in the fresh air of Vatican II. That October
also brought the Cuban missile crisis. I remember students commenting,
"If the world's going to end, I hope it comes before Tuesday night's
physics test." In 1963, the pope died of natural causes (some
of us bought into the pool in Zahm hall trying to predict when
this beloved prelate would take his last breath), and Kennedy
was assassinated (John Sawyer and I were studying the humidity
section of Chemical Process Principles in Walsh Hall
when an architecture major named Steve told us the president had
been shot). In 1964, the Beatles invaded America. America invaded
Vietnam. The world has never been the same.
I was never the same either. After two years toughing it out
in Chemical Engineering, I began to doubt that I was suited to
that kind of lifestyle. I was drinking too much, sleeping too
late and missing too many classes. I survived junior year but
was put on academic probation after failing three courses. I was
sure I didn't want to become a chemical engineer, so I stopped
going to classes. My plan was to change majors from engineering
to music, where I wouldn't need any of those engineering credits.
Music was always my great love. I inherited my singing ability
from my mother, whose voice was clear and perfect. She could harmonize
with any song, and often did so as she listened to the radio while
doing kitchen chores. Our family sometimes spent whole evenings
with friends singing barbershop numbers or old standards.
Dear old girl, the robin sings above you.
Dear old girl, it speaks of how I love you.
Mom had given up a professional career to marry and raise a family,
but during her melancholy times, I believe she may have harbored
some regrets. I wanted to dispel those regrets from my own future.
I would study music and dedicate my career to my mother, thus
repaying her for giving her life to her family.
But I procrastinated. By the time I contacted the engineering
dean about changing majors, the semester was over. I had missed
most of my finals.
"It's okay," I told him. "I won't need any of these courses as
a music major."
"That may be true," the dean responded, "but before you can change
majors, you will flunk out."
"Oh," I said, suddenly stunned by my own ignorance. Grabbing
at the only straw handy, I said, "What if I see my professors
and try to get out of this mess?"
"You've got about 3 days until grades are due," said the dean.
So began some of the most frenetic days of my life. The first
professor I visited threw me out of his office. Deep down I knew
it was what I deserved. Nevertheless, I pressed on, and eventually
met the rest of my professors individually. I told each of them
the truth and asked that I be allowed to make up my finals. For
the most part, they said yes, forcing me to cram a whole semester
of work into the next few days and nights. Incredibly, I managed
to pass 11 of 19 credits with 3 Cs and a B. In spite of my heroic
effort, I was dismissed from the University in January 1966. I
felt like a fool, but it was worse than that. I had squandered
my talent and deliberately chosen to throw away the hard-won resources
my family had provided for my education. Completely spent, I called
my dad to have him come and pick me up.
When I look back on that intense period of begging and cramming
and praying, I see it as one of my greatest accomplishments. At
the time, of course, I had to face the fact that my last-ditch
effort had failed. I also had to face my dad. He didn't say much
during the four hour ride home, knowing instinctively that I had
already been beaten pretty badly. For once, I didn't empathize
with the older brother in the parable; I had become the prodigal
son.
The University reinstated me a few days later, but I dropped
out of school anyway. I would take the last semester of my senior
year off, earn some money and return in the fall. Or so I thought.
I got a job working construction and wrote the draft board to
tell them of my plan to return to school. In spite of my letter,
or perhaps because of it, I was drafted into the Army
in June. To avoid or postpone that trip to sunny Southeast Asia,
I signed up for an extra year's duty in order to get a long course
in electronics. This allowed me to spend most of the next year
in Fort Monmouth, New Jersey.
While at Fort Monmouth, I spent my weekends in New York City,
where I met a pretty, bubbly girl named Liz at Cardinal Spellman's
Servicemen's Club. We dated through most of 1967, as I learned
about cipher equipment in top-secret, caged-in classrooms during
the week, and commuted to the Soldiers, Sailors, and Airmen's
Club in Manhattan on weekends. In October, when I received orders
for Germany, I was hospitalized with what must have been the most
serious case of mononucleosis ever recorded. When I recovered
weeks later, my orders had been changed to Vietnam. I was given
30 days leave and a ticket from my home in Milwaukee to San Francisco,
where I would be flown to the Far East.
I remember vividly the words my mother spoke to me in late December
just before I boarded the plane at Billy Mitchell field. "Merry
Christmas, happy birthday," she said; her eyes misty as she remembered
the Christmas Eve, 24 years earlier, that she had spent bringing
me into the world. I kissed my mom and dad goodbye and boarded
the plane for the West Coast, where I would be greeted by my grandparents,
and my aunt and uncle, whom I hadn't seen in over 10 years. We
saw some of the sites of San Francisco and caught up on the years
we'd lost by living so far apart. After I was processed, I said
goodbye again and boarded the World Airways jet for the 18-hour
flight to Saigon by way of Anchorage and Tokyo.
The descent into Tan Son Nhut airport was steep and scary. Instead
of gradually reducing its altitude as it approached the city,
as normal flights do, this flight stayed at 40,000 feet until
directly over Saigon and then glided down in a tight spiral to
the airport. On the tarmac, the heat was oppressive, causing me
to doubt I could stand it for more than a day, let alone a year,
the length of my assignment. After processing, a guy named Paul
and I were assigned to a signal corps unit at the airport and
driven to our quarters in Cho Lon. I was put on the 12-hour night
shift; Paul was put on days. The next day, on his way to breakfast,
Paul was hit by a homemade grenade thrown from a pedobike. He
lived. But yeah, they were playing for keeps out there.
My job in Vietnam was superfluous. Whenever the Army had a serious
problem, it brought in civilian engineers. The real point of having
all of us stationed at Saigon airport was to have a ready group
of trained technicians to send up country to places like Hue and
Phu Bai. Before I was sent into the real war, the Tet offensive
came. We were pinned down at our Cho Lon quarters with little
to do but drink beer and smoke pot. After one particularly long
and stuporous night watching helicopter gunships fire their rockets,
I went to bed late, only to be awakened by the company clerk.
Something about the Red Cross wanting to talk to me. I staggered
downstairs and put the phone to my ear. "Are you sitting down?"
asked the voice. I sat down. "Your mother is very sick and has
only three weeks to live."
For 34 years that's almost all I have remembered from that conversation.
The CO told me to pack my bags; I was leaving the next day. An
armed guard accompanied me on a fast Jeep ride through the back
streets to the airport. I boarded a C130 transport and strapped
myself into the rope webbing on the side wall with a few other
GIs. We didn't speak. I spent the trip back quietly sobbing.
Mom didn't die in three weeks. Stricken with cancer of the colon,
she held on over twice that long, finally succumbing on July 28,
1968. We have a picture of her during her last days, sitting in
her flower-printed housecoat, smiling through the pain, looking
gaunt and ready to be taken. She died at home, with family and
friends close at hand. Why did it have to happen? The only explanation
I can muster is that this simple woman of faith had to die young
in order to save my life. Would that it had been the other way.
The Army gave me a compassionate reassignment to Fort Sheridan,
Illinois, just close enough to my home in Wisconsin to allow me
to live off base with my father, two brothers and 11-year-old
sister. The Democratic convention was held in Chicago to the tune
of rock & roll & riots. I got a hardship discharge and
started working at Schlitz brewery. In the middle of a January
blizzard, my pretty New York girl, Liz, and I were married. We
honeymooned in Chicago and took a side trip to Notre Dame. I once
again visited my old professors. Dr. Banchero, then head of the
Chemical Engineering department, said I was about two semesters
short of a degree. I introduced him to my wife and told him we'd
be back in the fall.
Liz and I saved our money, signed up for the GI Bill, took out
a loan and moved to South Bend in September 1969. I grew a beard
and studied philosophy, theology and chemistry with vigor and
purpose. On Sundays, I thanked God for having brought me back
home.
The war wasn't over yet. Nor were the demonstrations, the riots,
the killing. Just before graduation, on May 4, 1970, four students
were killed at Kent State. Notre Dame had its own demonstration
that day, and Father Hesburgh spoke on the main quad. As I listened,
I wondered if I was right for having served when I was called.
Sometimes I'm still not sure.
The administration canceled our finals that year. I didn't stay
for my graduation. I didn't walk up the steps of the Main building
either. Liz and I packed up our meager belongings and headed for
New York to start our life together. Over the next 30 years, we
raised four children and sent three of them to Notre Dame.
Along the way, we have made many trips back to the campus: moving
our kids in and out, football games, junior-parent weekends. Sometimes
we'd just stop in if we were passing by on the Interstate.
I finally climbed the steps to the Main Building after my oldest
son's graduation in 1993. I snuck away when nobody was looking.
No big deal. I simply thought about the events that brought me
there and wondered at the complexity and richness of it all. Sometimes,
inexplicably, God holds us in his hand and keeps us well in spite
of ourselves. Soren Kierkegaard once said that life can only be
understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards. So it is
with me.
