Gentle reader, Red has had a tough year. Her mother died last spring and a couple of weeks ago we got a call from her sister-in-law, Johann, telling us that if we wanted to say goodbye to her brother, David, we needed to come right away. I put snow tires on Red's car. The Blue Mountains in winter time had me concerned. David and Johann lived in Port Angles, on the northern tip of Washington State, on a narrow strip of land crowded my mountains and trees on one side and open water on the other. The locals were a mix of retirees and coastal Indians. The Indians traditionally carved the native straight grain Red Cedar trees into fine totem poles. Johann said that David slept most of the time and the VA had given up on him and turned him over to Hospice. Red was sure that David had leukemia because of his time in Vietnam. David was a medic in the war and he rode those choppers into hot LZs and carried out the boys that were shot, bleeding and dying. While we were there I wandered into his office and saw his Bronze Star for valor. In all these years David had never told me that he had earned the Bronze Star. David was bed ridden and he was no longer eating anything, but he was still sharp. I went in alone to say good bye. We talked of serious things. David knew he was just days away from standing before Father God. David was resigned and ready to go. I was impressed. In time our talk turned to our youth. We used to go up to Fiddletown, in David's jeep, to clear his land that he hoped to retire on. We usually went into town for lunch, drank too many beers and got into mischief. David had a little, very old camp trailer where we stayed. I was a student and he was a butcher for one of the stores in Sacramento. He ended marrying one of those Fiddletown girls, for a while. As we told stories we both laughed out loud. We spent more time cracking up than serious. The last thing David told me was that he would see me on the other side. Johann is having David's ceremony in March down in Monterey, not far from where he was born and raised. David has gone full circle. Life is good.
