Poppies for Young Men
While walking into the local Kmart, a tattered man approached us with a long, narrow can jingling with change and a miniature bouquet of delicate red flowers. He was the saddest person I ever saw. “Here Sweetie, a pretty flower for you.”
He offered me one of his pretty little flowers while my mom anxiously rummaged through her bulging purse for some change which she pressed into my hand and encouraged me to place it into his can. I wanted to hug him but was too afraid to do so, I would surely be scolded if I did. I was completely perplexed by the interchange and interrogated my mom regarding it on the way home.
Why did this man give me a flower? He was selling them. How did my mom know to give him money for it? She had seen veterans selling flowers before. Does he fix animals? No, that is a veterinarian, he fought in the war. I thought the idea of random flower sellers in parking lots was delightful and every bit a worthy occupation as fixing animals. A veteran like Uncle M? Yes. Does Uncle M sell flowers? No. Why was my mom afraid of that man? He was a stranger. But he was selling flowers! She wasn’t afraid of cashiers!
I had over reached my question and comment quota for the day and was told to hush in some dismissive way that told me that my questions, thoughts and ideas were dumb. But I had plenty of new concepts to chew on for awhile as I retreated into the silence with my pretty paper poppy, which suddenly made me feel sad. Thinking of my uncle made my heart sad. Perhaps if my Uncle and the men and women who served our country in that war had been given the opportunity to come home and grow, use, and sell the flowers that would have healed them, and benefited the aging and ill in their communities, years of needless suffering could have been avoided. Instead they were punished for being addicted to an addictive substance that he had to take in order to get treatment from his doctors. While the government he served in the name of freedom waged a war against a plant and his freedom to heal and free himself from pain and PTSD. Our Veterans deserve a better life than this.
I knew my mom was telling me a fib. I heard all the things my dad said about my uncle, his condemnation of my uncle’s looks and behavior “since he got back” the accusations of his worthlessness which were all based on his own ridiculous jealousy. I understand now she was afraid of the man in the parking lot because she assumed he was a drug addict and also, we were so poor that buying poppies could mean that there would not be enough money for my siblings to have milk at school that week. All her extra change had to go into the collection plate at church on Sunday to buy our self-righteousness.
For several years I knew one of my uncles by name only, sometimes I thought he must be dead like the one who died next to my dad in a car crash. He was a ghost I couldn’t find at family gatherings, or the pictures that captured them which my mom carefully placed into albums for my review. This was a favorite pass time, always asking the names of all the people I did not recognize from family dinner parties. One day I discovered a crisp black and white photo of a handsome young man leaning on the back of a car. He looked like James Dean playing a hippy and his eyes were bright, and intense and he had a sweet smile. I thought he was a movie star, I was astonished to find out he was actually my father’s missing little brother.
The picture was taken before he was deployed to Vietnam. I didn’t remember that uncle though my parents assured me I met him. He stayed with my grandparents between tours. For a period of time, his little family was there when we would visit my grandparents. I played with his son, who was slightly older, but was a patient and chivalrous companion. I was quite fond of him and thought his mother was an angel. She had a magical name I’ve never heard since, and was gorgeous with long sleek hair and wide sad eyes, though her face was always kind and bright when she spoke to me. She wore cute little dresses and always looked like the beautiful women on television. She would hold me on her lap and carry me about like a cherished china baby doll, combing my hair and dabbing my lips with flavored gloss and my wrists with her soft perfume. I was mesmerized by her love, and it would tear a bit of my heart out whenever they had to pry my chubby fingers from around her neck when it was time to leave. Both my mother and grandmother were jealous of the magic bond she weaved between our souls and shamed us for being so attached.
Eventually, my uncle got back from Vietnam, I was nervous and excited to meet the handsome man in the picture, but instead, a motorcycle gang of shredded denim and leather, head bands, and helmets covering long shaggy curls with mirrored lenses where eyes might be arrived in our front yard one weekend. I recognized some of them as older cousins from family get togethers, but one of them should have been my handsome uncle, who was no where to be seen. And my magic lady was gone. I was heartbroken. I wanted so badly to hug my uncle and welcome him home but I was terrified because he was missing and no one noticed he was gone but me.
I was eventually brave enough to whisper my concerns about the absence of my Uncle and his magic woman to my mother who laughed uproariously at my faux pas.
My uncle teased me a bit for not recognizing him, but as far as I can put time together, I was only 4 at this point, I think he knew it was unlikely that I would recognize him, we had only seen each other a few hours in my entire life, but I think that he was also surprised that I would want to. The edge of a smile at the corners of his mouth was not completely obscured by his short and shaggy beard and ‘stash. It’s presence eased my fear and beckoned me forward, as he called me to his side to face him. He removed his sunglasses and looked into my face with his ocean blue eyes under storm clouds, deep and dark and sad, but that moment looking at me, I could see the crinkle of laughter around the edge, like in the picture. He was tall, lean and strong, under his bulky leather vest and t- shirt. He pouted that I was taking so long to confirm his identity and through some negotiation I was eventually seduced by his gentle voice and charismatic grin and we agreed that I would vouch for his identity if he would take me for a ride on his motorcycle. Somehow, that this act would satisfy my doubt made him laugh, deep soft and musical I could see the happy sweet young man in the picture beneath the costume that hid the tattered remains of his bright, warm soul. I danced away grinning and twinkling my fingers in delight while the room echoed with hearty guffaws from my cousins, giving their consent to my innocent and wicked act of traitorous rebellion against both of my parents.
My mother was mortified by this development. My dad told her if I wanted to ride, she ought to let me.
That was the day I fell hopelessly in love with motorcycles and the sorts of boys who ride them.
It was a few years before I would see my Uncle again. He arrived at my grandparents’ house for a holiday dinner wearing a fatigue jacket that strained to contain him, his shoulders sloped low and his long shaggy head was kept bowed in silence, his low, sweet, voice barely escaping his lips which were completely gown over by the mass of tangly facial hair that covered his chest. I studied him from a distance across the nicotine clouded room as he chain smoked cigarettes while waiting for dinner. He didn’t take the time to acknowledge me. I rarely ever saw him for many years after that. He was a sad quiet shell of a man and his woman was a long haired skinny owl that didn’t say a word. She had a daughter my age who rarely attended family functions, I don’t blame them their silent rebellion.
I overheard my father gossiping and bitching about my uncle my whole life. He was a man who thought that it was his duty to take the shine off of anything he thought a person might admire or get some pleasure from. It’s a disgusting habit that insecure and jealous bullies use to shame the people who are intelligent, open minded and loving because they fear loosing power over those they manipulate to feed their bloated ego. He liked to bait me because he knew I would defend my uncle. He came by this nasty behavior naturally, his mother ruled their family with this convoluted set of rules and was known to pronounce whether a human was worth investing any care in when they were still new born babies. They got together regularly to verbally assassinate anyone who was out of hearing range, then act astonished when that person would get defensive.
My heart ached when I would see my uncle through those next ten years. When I only had a photograph, I would watch the news and MASH, wondering if I would see him there, terrified I would see him there. I saw him everywhere. I had a chilling idea of what happened to men in war by age four. My dad had no sympathy. He said because he wouldn’t talk about what happened to him he was faking his injuries. I knew my dad was wrong. My uncle was a hero, he dedicated his life to serve this country he believed in. He let our country turn him into a weapon of destruction, and they didn’t bother to fix him afterward they left him to self destruct. They gave him poppies, to make him forget what he saw, and what he had to do to obey and survive.
I understand now so completely how he could not share his injuries without looking weak to others and just how terrifying and humiliating that can be. People who are insensitive and have not suffered trauma refuse to acknowledge the deep wounds of remorse and sorrow etched in a survivor’s soul. The stigmata of a sea of scarlet paper poppies can never return the haunted lives of so many beautiful wounded men as their grievous wounds go unattended, hidden by armor they had to fashion on the run from the trash society has thrown at them.
My generation shook our heads and wagged our fingers that our veterans were treated poorly. Countless Gen X kids lost their fathers and families to the mental illness that ingrained deep scars of domestic violence in their homes. The adults pointed their fingers in every direction like it was someone else’s responsibility to help soldiers reintegrate with society. Humans had already decided that it was someone else’s responsibility to love.
My angel faced uncle was blessed with his strong, quiet owl eyed woman who sat beside him faithfully watching his back. He loved my father enough to check up on him all his life even though my dad was always ready to find fault with him. He eventually found his voice again and found funny ways to keep my dad in check. I remember him strong and playful, still rough-clad in leather when I was in my early 20’s. I know he struggled with pain and addiction all his life, yet he always has love for me.
My uncle left an old car behind the tractor shed at my grandparents’ house. We rented that house when I was a teenager in the ‘80’s so I mowed and trimmed around it every Saturday and occasionally found refuge from my father’s venomous attacks inside it’s musty, creaky, carcass. He left his dog tags hanging from the rear view mirror and his old green military jacket had been laying in the backseat for more than a decade.
My father’s hateful words pried inside my head and made me wish I did not have to exist as much as he did not want me to exist. Wrapped in the thin canvas jacket that covered my father’s little brother in a foreign land long ago, as he fought for a country he believed in I cried out the war in my soul. I was exhausted and had a fat lip after going rounds with my dad because my mom told him I wanted combat boots for my birthday and he was on the rampage again because I wouldn’t make myself look like normal girls. I remembered my uncle and his silent rebellion as my dad made inappropriate jokes trying to gas light him and my mom sat by in silent, sanctimonious, judgement. I thought about my poppy and my mother and father’s disapproval of disheveled people, the way I was treated all those years when I all I had to wear was ill-fitting, unfashionable, and threadbare.
At this time in my life, I had experienced social popularity and rejected it preferring the company of long dead authors and writing poetry. My favorite book was Silas Marner, and my favorite author, Poe. I knew every line and breath that created The Wall, I screamed and stomped with the Sex Pistols, Billy Bragg had etched a river of understanding in my soul, I dove deep in Sting’s wisdom and Morrisey baptized me with the knowledge that humans tend to be indifferent to the thing they need the most: Love. I knew how drugs and alcohol numbed the pain of being alone, misunderstood, and unloved. I had read many, many stories, and watched movies of war. I knew what shell shock looked like. I had a deep understanding of the essence of the exchange of that poppy because I saw what war did to someone I loved. I was barely 15.
It suddenly occurred to me that I always knew my dad was wrong when he called him a disgrace, and therefore, he could be wrong about me as well. I decided to take on a silent rebellion of in honor of my hero uncle who should have never had to hang his head in shame. I ghosted my dad. I had little to loose, but fighting with him to get him to understand my point of view was going to get my teeth knocked out.
I put on the jacket that would be my dragon skin, and dog tags I took everywhere to remind me that one man’s opinion of me would not make or break me any more than it did my brave, strong uncle. He taught me how to be tough and I am forever thankful to the universe who placed his star to light my path. His example protected me, and saved my head and my soul from being devoured by my father’s misogyny.
I don’t think I could have found a better way to both piss my dad off, and shut his ugly mouth. I saw his lower jaw shoot sideways and his eyes narrow to slits when he saw me rise up strong, silent, and smiling in my new tattered togs. He first tried to tell me that Uncle M would be mad that I had stole his stuff, my mom quickly followed suit and tried to shame me for my thievery. I had considered this possibility, but felt pretty confident that my uncle would give me far more than that if he knew it was the life line keeping my little world intact.
Since he decided to again throw down the gauntlet, rather than accept he would not break me with his fear and hatred, I told him simply, we could call him now or I would ask the next time I saw him. My uncle was elusive at the time, struggling through life, trying to maintain a job and fight off addiction. My dad loved to highlight his failure and blame it on some inherent flaw in his character. The truth is, he was a brilliant man, and would have been an engineer, or architect but he couldn’t finish college because PTSD left his mind fractured and he didn’t have enough of a support system to heal. He had to do what he needed to do to survive while the police hunted him and threw him in jail for a medical condition over which he had little control.
The rumors got to him first, my dad’s family was like that. Every time he saw me after this, my beloved uncle would wrap me in his enormous bear hug and kiss me on the mouth, an intimacy I rarely share with anyone. When he was strong, he would pick me up and swing me around like the fairy princess my father never let me be, and when he was not so strong, he would cradle my head to his beautiful, faithful and resilient heart. I know they all thought it was weird, the quiet bond of unconditional love between us, but I believe all this time we both gained strength knowing there was someone else in the world who believed in our inherent goodness, worthiness, and lovability in spite of our brokenness.
