Peace is Personal

[Guest guest]

Peace is Personal

 

I have gotten about 29 emails inviting me to participate in one or

another peace meditation this year. This New Year's Eve is our tenth

wedding anniversary. This year I even bought a new dress and we are

planning to have fun with one another! The best thing I ever did for

world peace is marry my husband Dan. That includes 1969, when I made

5000 black arm bands and helped plan the Moratorium March in the

northern part of San Diego County. I was working so hard for that, I

still don't remember getting my college homework done, and this may

have something to do with my waiting until a few years later to

pursue college in earnest.

 

I have been something of a pacifist, since, as a teenager I realized

they were going to load up my male friends and create cannon fodder

out of them. I grew up in San Diego County, California. There was

the Marine Corp Recruiting Depot, a huge Naval Base with a gigantic

fleet of Naval Ships, Camp Pendleton, the Naval Air Station at

Miramar and lots more. San Diego was " the military. " My high

school " donated " 27 boys lives to the Viet Nam war and countless

others lives were forever changed by their participation there.

 

There are 58,220 names on the Viet Nam Memorial wall, 5579 of them

from my home state. Here is one that I know.

 

WILLIAM LEROY FIX

WILLIAM LEROY FIX was born on May 19, 1949 and joined the Armed

Forces while in SAN DIEGO, CA.

 

He served as a 0356 in the Marines. In 1 year of service, he

attained the rank of PFC/E2. He began a tour of duty on February 24,

1968.

 

On April 26, 1968, at the age of 18, WILLIAM LEROY FIX perished in

the service of our country in South Vietnam, Quang Tri.

 

Courtesy of The Virtual Wall at

http://www1.thevirtualwall.org/index.asp

 

I don't know what a " 0356 " is. Bill was a guy I met at the Methodist

Church I attended who took me, in 1967, to see the movie Georgie

Girl. He was the boy I invited to the only formal dance I attended in

high school. I can still see him dancing in the decorated gym at

Clairemont High School. He was tall, blond gracious, funny, sharp as

a tack, witty, sweet and wonderful. I was completely Ga-Ga over

him. He beat me in an election for President of our Methodist Youth

Fellowship and I thereby became his Vice President. God I am glad he

won now! We caroled together at a convalescent home. In the midst

of a difficult childhood Bill made me feel special, pretty, smart. He

laughed at my jokes and was playful with me. When he held my hand in

the movie that was my first experience of intense sexual

electricity. I was absolutely magnetically drawn to him.

 

He died the next year--before I was to graduate from high school.

This is how I remember the Viet Nam War, in terms of personal loss.

I don't want to think of war in any other way, because it is in

separating ourselves from the true cost of war that we come to accept

it as a necessity. If we can allow ourselves to sit with sorrow

rather than avoid its experience, we would not unnecessarily cause

it. I cannot imagine still how his mother and father must have felt,

having loved him all his life. I cry today just to imagine it. I

cannot think of them and fail to cry.

 

Peace is an interior job, and my gratitude for my marital partner

brings me more peace than anything I did ABOUT peace. So, whenever

people ask me to participate in a peace meditation on New Year's Eve,

I tell them one, I pray for peace daily, and two, I have a permanent

party date that I committed to with my husband Dan a long time ago,

so I don't feel inclined to participate in any other " special "

events. It is my spiritual practice to persistently recognize that we

are all connected.

 

Of course, I believe that celebrating ones blessings does affect the

existence of peace. As do persistent, unending prayers for peace. I

have been praying for peace for all of these years. I believe my

prayers have become more powerful, but it is clear to me that it is

far too soon to stop. I have not allowed the persistence of war to

make me cynical or complacent. I still pray, I still have faith. I

expect to be persistent about this until it is time for me to go.

 

It is my belief that in being happy and celebrating with Dan, I honor

Bill's short but precious life, the possibilities held out in the

youthful experience of love we shared so many years ago, as innocent

teenagers not knowing what sorrow lay so close ahead of us. I cannot

and will not forget.

 

May this New Year find you peaceful and experiencing a new vigor and

enthusiasm for life. May you not flinch in the face of any difficulty

life presents to you, for within each experience there truly is the

heart of Peace.

 

With great love,

 

Susanne