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November 11, 2000
Inside the Officer’s Club at the old stone armory on
Lexington Avenue. The room is paneled with dark wood. It is decorated in old
photos, flags, and military memorabilia. Outside, it is cold and dark. Inside
the O Club it is warm and softly-lit. Men, mostly old, are drinking. I am
talking to one of them, a retired National Guard one-star named Ryan.
"The first time I can
remember being in this room was right after Father Duffy’s funeral,"
the general said.
"Did you ever meet Father Duffy?" I asked.
"No. But my old man did. He served with him in
France in World War I. Father Duffy was the chaplain here from 1915 until he
died in ’32. Pat O’Brien played him in the movie, The Fighting 69th."
"I never saw that one."
The general took a slow sip of his
beer.
"I remember the day of the
funeral pretty well. The whole city turned out for it. I remember coming back
to this room and warming myself by that fireplace."
"That fireplace right there?" I asked.
"That very one," he replied. As he spoke,
he slowly stood up from the bar stool and walked over to the hearth where the
flames were flickering a bright yellow. General Ryan paused to warm his hands
before he started talking again.
"I stood right here with my dad before I went
off to Korea. A lot of the guys from his day came to see me off."
"Every thing I’ve read about Korea sounds
horrible," I said respectfully.
General Ryan smiled. "It was. More than anything
else it was cold. It was the coldest place in the world. We were so bundled
up, you couldn’t even find your dick to piss. And when you did piss, it
would freeze before it even hit the ground. I was 10,000 miles from anything
warm and I remember thinking about this fireplace, wishing I were here and not
there."
"What did you do in Korea?" I asked.
"I was a 105mm recoilless rifle gunner. They
told us it would knock out the T-34 tanks that the gooks were using. One day,
during the Battle of the Twin Tunnels, I was riding in my jeep…just me and
my driver…and as we crested this hill, my driver spotted a T-34 on the next
hilltop. He was slowly traversing his turret towards us. So I fired off the
105 and watched it just bounce off the front slope of that tank. My driver
yelled "Sonabitch!", then he threw the jeep in reverse and we went
backwards down that hill at 40 miles an hour." He smiled as he
recalled the absurdity of the situation.
"A lot has changed since then," I said.
"It sure has. I certainly have. Less hair. More
skin. The only thing hard is my hearing."
We both smiled at that remark.
"But this room and this fireplace haven’t
changed one bit."
I followed his eyes around the room until they rested
again on the fire.
Broadway Jim Sosnicky
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