Falling through Time and Blood

Have you ever just had a day that was perfect? Where the sky couldn’t be more beautiful the sun was the perfect temperature to make you feel safe and happy. I feel the heat on my face, the perfect green grass on my feet. There are wildflowers growing right around the edge of my cabin up to the stairs. It’s impossible to find a place this untouched and peaceful but I had found it and found a way to raise my family in a safe turmoil free environment. As I raise my face toward the sun just to take in the warmth and light that surrounded me. As I slowly begin to slip completely into relaxation of the nirvana I have created around me.

 I hear a strange sound coming towards me. Bum, bum, budada bum bum, several drums beat on, then some other instrument. Was I going crazy or did I hear music playing.  Then I hear gunshots. Strange gunshots, yelling, what is going on? I open my eyes and look deep in the woods in the direction of the noise and pray my family stays inside and hides. Who would know if June 25^th would really go down in history as the day a battle broke out on my land or if I was going to be taken to the spend the rest of my life in a straight jacket. Someone comes running towards me dressed in a blue jacket yelling for me to run, take cover.  Just as my eyes see the red coats coming out of the woods behind him I see a ball bouncing toward me. It looked like a strangely colored, perfectly round ball. “Why is it traveling so fast?” I thought, as my eyes became more focused in on the fast moving object that was closing in on me. Before I could run I felt the cold hard metal smash into my stomach sending me backwards off my feet and into the air. I felt the heat once again on my face but this time my feet and legs found only air. There was nothing to reach for or scream for. There was no air. No way to save myself from my inevitable demise that was closing in quickly as well as the ground and the pain I was feeling from the cannon balls blow.

Thud. That was the only sound my body made as it slammed into a wheel barrowand maybe and “oof” from the wind being knocked out of me. I couldn’t move, just lay there and look around, but all I see are bodies. There is an awful smell in there air making it hard not to move. The men in uniforms are laughing, smoking sweet cigars, and pointing to a stack of bodies, if they can be called that. More like frozen bones tightly wrapped in skin. Screams erupt somewhere behind me, people running, gun shots. Is it someone to save me? Are we safe now. I see a truck drive by with a big star on the back. Once the vehicle squeaks to a stop the soldiers begin ushering out the passengers in the back. Cold, crying women and children crawl out and one man badly shot in his knee. The soldiers will make an example out of him, but how? Where am I? How did I go from my beautiful field to this dark grey place? There is no grass. No sun, just cold. Ash floats in the air all around me making it hard to breathe, hard to think, to plan, to escape. The man was brought forth and tied to a nearby gate.

One man with a funny looking moustache, it seemed as though he may have taken off to much on the sides, started yelling in a language I didn’t know. Another solder came forward and began beating the poor, skin and bones man tied to the fence, with a shovel he had used earlier that day to, ironically, dig his own grave. After about 20 lashes, I lost count when I had to shut my eyes so I would not cry, they untied him from the fence and dragged his body over to where I was still playing dead. I feel my barrow start to move then a large weight put on top of me. They put the bloody beaten man on top of me, and I could feel his bones stabbing into me, the warmth of him draining out. They tip us up and as he slides down off of me I feel the heat as it returned to my face, was it all just a bad dream? Was I still at home?

 My eyes fly open as soon as the thought of home entered my mind but instead of my beautiful field and fresh grass all I see is ash. A huge fire coming from a large metal container is roaring. I see the man burning, I discover what that smell was, flesh. My eyes catch a sign that say Hannover but it was the last thing I saw I could feel my hair start to burn and sweat started rolling down and pooling by my lower back where the hot metal was against bare skin. I couldn’t think of any way to escape before I was tipped up even further and I feel the heaviness of my body sliding out  and down toward the inferno that only could be described as an opening to hell. As I began to slide down further I started to scream that I didn’t belong there but then my felt my feet touch ground.

The heat was gone again. I’m standing in sand, sinking, more like it. The sand slowly begins to swallow my feet and ankles the night sky over me offers a cool relief that quickly begins to turn cooler and colder as time ticks by. I hear someone screaming at me, but see no one. “Get away from there, run, grab onto something, just get out!” the shadow tells me. I want to listen but how can I listen to a shadow? I pull my foot up only to have the other sink deeper, the more I tried to free myself the worse I seemed to make things for myself. As the shadow approached, my exhausted eyes tried to focus in on a face, a uniform, anything to help me see how to identify if this shadow was my friend. As the uniform became more clear and I began to recognize some friendly colors I see a little black box in the sand. Before I can call out a warning to the mysterious shadow I see the wall of sand explode between us. I am showered in sand and debris and a warm red liquid that only makes me shut my eyes and scream for help. I feel everything raining down on me with nothing I can do. A slight crash right next to me got my attention enough I opened my eyes to see dog tags laying next to me. Upon reading the address I see where this young person was from and realize that the shadow was a Friend.

This person lost their life because they were trying to save me. I fought harder to push my way out, or dig until I figured out a way to make it. My friend’s accident had blown enough sand out of the pit that it was now the way for me to crawl out of my hole and toward the others I could hear. My friend had saved my life anyway. I grab the dog tags and slide into my pocket to make sure that when I get home I can give back to my shadow friend’s family.

 I stayed on my stomach and crawled across the desert like a snake, coarse sand tearing at my skin and getting into my clothes. The sounds of gun fire and explosions pull my ear and guide me towards the only civilization I can hope to find but I have no way of knowing what I will find when I get there. I pray its not the soldiers to take me back to the furnace. All I can do is hope is that whatever I find can help me find my way home. As I come over the hill I see a town before me. Not one I have ever seen before but there is sand everywhere, the houses are all dark its still night.

I did my best to stay down and quiet as I went to the town. All of the writing on the signs and houses were mixed between a language I could not understand and then I see some English writing that I could read. August 2^nd 1990, was what I saw on a table calendar on someone’s sun porch. Behind me I hear loud knocking on a door. I ducked down to hide and sneak around the house. Screams from inside erupt soon after the knock as two men are drug out into the street and shot execution style with no chance at all to even absolve their sins or say good bye to their wives who witness the whole thing. As more soldiers ran into more houses the same thing just kept happening at each one.

 Some of the men in unfamiliar uniforms with unfamiliar writing went back into the houses to shoot the women or worse. Children hid in the streets crying for their parents and so scared they don’t know what to do. I have to help. I don’t know what I will do to try to stop all of this but I have to do something. Explosions started going off around the houses and a tank quickly moves through the streets knocking everything out of its way including the children hiding for their lives. I started to run, to try to help them. While running down I felt the ground slipping out from underneath me. I lunged forward to grab for something other than sand to keep from falling into this sink hole that was developing right underneath me. I knew no one could help me they had to help themselves but I had nothing else I could do I was falling and as I fell I felt cold water surround me,  salty water filled my lungs, and burned all the cuts and burns I had gotten throughout this horrifying journey.

 I fought to reach the surface to break for air only to have a missile with a strange fin on it land in the water next to me and fly towards a large ship I see with lots of navy men. I saw the American flag flying proudly and the men running towards the airplanes firing their guns, not running away. I began to swim as hard as I could to get to the shore but gun spray from the loud low flying planes shoves me back under water. I saw lots of other people swimming as hard as they could in the water in different directions, others running on the shore and bodies scattered everywhere but they were not moving at all. The water was polluted with debris, oil, and blood. A fast moving Japanese bomber comes around and releases a bomb directly in my direction. The bomb read Tora, Tora, Tora and as it descended I dove down into the water as deep as I could to avoid being hit. The bomb entered the water above me and went directly into a ship that I did not know was right behind me. As the ship quickly was sinking I saw U.S.S. Arizona on the side, navy soldiers trying to escape and the ones who had escaped  fighting to try to get the others out. Fire broke out on top of the water due to the oil streaked all through the harbor.  I could not find a place to come up for air. The world started going dark around me, and I knew if I didn’t get air soon I was going to pass out and I would drown. My lungs began to burn, my mouth fighting to open and swallow in gallons of the tainted water just to try to get any air. There was no choice but for me to try to get through the fire and oil and blood if I was going to survive. I swam with all my might avoiding sinking bodies, weapons, and the sprays of bullets all going around me trapping me in one area making my options very limited to carry on and get back to my family.

My Family, as I think of those I love at home a new fire ignites inside of me and I paddle my arms and leg harder than I ever have and as my face came through the water despite all the dangers and the fire I had to go through to get there I knew it was what I had to do for my family. Instead of being burned by the fire I felt a familiar heat coursing on my skin. I open my eyes open very slowly, scared of what I shall see next or where I will end up, but I was home. I felt the beautiful sun warming my skin back up to a comfortable temperature. My clothes dry so fast it seems like they were never wet to begin with, the pain in my throat burns still and I taste the oil and blood in my mouth. I look in the direction of where I saw the strange metal ball that started my entire journey, where I saw the all those red coats before I see only my tree’s, instead of where the ground had been smashed from the force of the cannon I saw only my green grass, and where I saw the brave young boy who tried to warn me and save me I see my son.

 He is standing there in a clean, beautiful blue dress uniform and a smile so wide that his face looked like it must be in pain from smiling that much.  His pride beaming through his shiny buttons, the sun reflecting off his freshly cleaned boots, and despite the warmth inside I get seeing him so happy and feeling so proud of him, a dark chill comes over me, as I recall my journey and how it all started, Where is all started for all of us. He raises his hand up to a gentle salute of good bye and turns to walk towards his new journey. With each step he takes I see the blood trail forming behind him lined with ash, bullets, bombs, and lies.

Despite all of this, despite the history he knows and the past he has learned, his head is held high and he goes ready to do what it takes to fight for our freedom, for his country. I realized he fights for me like I fought for my family and how to get back to them and their safety. He stops and turns one last time, and I smile at him in pride thinking of all the brave boys that went before him to do what they too felt was right. They say you can learn from the past, I think that’s true, it just maybe isn’t the lesson that they all thought it was. Maybe the lesson is that despite everything we always managed to get back up and go into the next fight with no fear, no regret. The lesson is not to give up or walk away from our country but to keep fighting for it every day until it is once again the country we can be proud of and united in. I’m proud of my son everyday and never forget the journey I went on to understand the journey he must face to protect and serve all of us.  I walk inside my home to see the rest of my family and greet them all with a hug. As I hold my loved one’s tight, my daughter reaches in my pocket and pulls out a small metal necklace. She hold’s it up high “What’s this? Can I have it?” I take the dogtags into my hand, turning them over and over not believing they are real. I hug her and thank her for finding them and return outside to watch the sunset with my family and hear how their day went but keeping my shadow friends dog tags close to my heart until I could fulfill my promise of returning them to his family.