For Heroes Only
by David A. Yeagley
Originally published at FrontPageMagazine.com | June 7, 2001
Last week, I visited the Museum of the 45th Infantry Division of the United States Army, here in Oklahoma City. I walked away feeling like one small and unworthy man.
It was a fine museum, all about weapons, wars, and, in America’s case, winners. There were endless photographs, mannikin recreations, displays of numerous division uniforms, and badges from the days of the American Revolution to Desert Storm.
Walking through it was truly a heart-gripping experience. I never felt so strong a presence of the past. I felt as if I were walking on sacred ground, as if I hardly deserved to be there among those people.
I have always admired the military. I come from a family of veterans, on both sides. I have several first cousins who have served and are serving in U.S. military forces. My younger brother was in the Air Force for several years.
But not me. I have never worn a uniform. I have never seen war.
I was too young for Vietnam and too old for Desert Storm. More to the point, I have had serious health problems, since age 11, as described in my last column ("I Am Full of Fear", June 6, 2001).
One summer, I tried to enlist in the Air Force, the Navy, the Marines, the Army and even the Coast Guard. But the moment I took off my shirt, they saw the biopsy and surgical scars. And that was that.
With a track record like that, I don’t feel I have a lot to be proud of. I don’t feel directly hooked up with the great American cause.
I can’t be a hero. Yet I want to do more than just vote and pay taxes. What can I do? How can I be a patriot?
I don’t think I’m alone in my plight. I’m sure many Americans feel the same way. There isn’t room in the military for all of us. Yet, there must be some way to love and serve our country, without wearing the uniform.
What is it? How do you give your life, if not in blood? What wars can the non-combatant fight?
Perhaps the greatest is the war for honesty. Everyone has the opportunity to be honest. But few avail themselves of it. Truth always costs you something. Sometimes everything.
Maybe we should think of honesty as a weapon of patriots. Practicing it would quickly separate the men from the boys, or the mercenaries from the patriots.
How about love? Love of something bigger than the materialism of an individual life. Love of a larger group, a larger cause. If you’re alive at all, don’t you have the opportunity to show this kind of love?
Maybe it’s as simple as this: love other people. Love your neighbors. Show respect. Particularly and especially, love the people of your country. If we can’t depend on our leaders to demonstrate this sort of love, then we must practice it ourselves.
Love will cost you, just as honesty will cost you. I lost my old teaching job at Oklahoma State University – OKC because I loved too much. I loved my country so deeply that I designed a course in patriotism and tried to get the public schools to adopt it. My superiors said I was creating "bad PR" for OSU-OKC. And so I was fired.
My sacrifice was a small one compared to those of the 45th Infantry Division. Yet, it feels good to have made it. Maybe I can’t be a hero like those men of the 45th. But at least I can share one thing with them. I can be an American patriot.
Walking through that museum was a humbling experience. But, as an Indian, one thing I saw there made me proud. I saw many Indian signs and emblems used as military badges, insignias, and even names of units. The 45th itself uses the yellow thunderbird on the red diamond. There were eagles, arrows, arrowheads, chief’s heads and tomahawks all proudly displayed.
I could see, ever so plainly, just how deep runs the respect for the Indian in the American military. It is a veritable blood brotherhood. The Indian is seen as some kind of blessing or honor that the soldier carries with him into battle.
On the battlefield, defending our homeland, all fighting Americans become Indians. This is a bond that cannot be broken. The people of this land come from many places. But in the heart of a patriot, we are all one.
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