Freezing on the Beach Head
By Cheryl Hume
When was the last time you flipped through a musty box of your parent’s old photos? I recommend it. My Mom’s old black and white photos of her and friends wearing grass skirts raised a few questions. “Hey, Mom, were you in some musical or something?” Oh no. A GI friend sent me that grass skirt from the Pacific during the war.” Dad’s photo in his Marine uniform also fueled my hungry imagination. His hat is cocked to the perfect angle to enhance his Hollywood smile. It could take your breath away. As a teenager I had always been drawn to the times of the WWII era in America. The sound trac for these years were the Holly wood MGM musicals. The songs written for these extravaganzas are the most singable ever written. Today you can hear them while sipping a latte at Starbucks. Ageing rock stars have recorded them to breathe life into their careers. Simply put, they are the best songs ever. These sights and sounds created a longing in my teenaged heart for something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Compared to the turmoil in America during Viet Nam that we Boomers experienced, the WWII ethos resembled a faith community.
I recently returned home from a nine day road trip across the southeastern half of the United States with that same Marine with the Holly Wood smile. He is now 82. His dashing Marine hat has been replaced by a slightly soiled red baseball cap with the Marine Corp insignia on the front. It reads: Peleliu Survivor. It sets cocked on the back side of his long ago bald head. His smile no longer shows his teeth, but he does it more often. We traveled 2600 miles across 12 states with a survivor of Peleliu and Okinawa at the wheel. These two battles were the bloodiest and most unsung in the Pacific during World War II. In Senator John McCain’s book, Why Courage Matters, he states that courage is not the absence of fear but the capacity for action despite our fears. He states: “Courage on the scale manifested in Peleliu-hard held, impossibly enduring, selfless, true in all its bloodstained, filthy, aching grandeur, summoned every day for months-will almost surely never be known or needed by us personally. My Father never spoke of Peleliu until he started attending Marine reunions about twenty years ago. His parents never new what he went through on those islands. It needs to be said that real war has nothing to do with MGM musicals. Author Eugene Sledge remembered Pelelui as a “netherworld of horror.” Where “time had no meaning; life had no meaning. The fierce struggle made savages of us all.” We are the benefactors of the horror they faced.
My sister and I agreed to this trip thinking certainly we’d help with the driving. We were wrong. My Dad has flown planes, driven taxis, boats, tractors, combines, buses, cement trucks, and last but not least, amphibious tanks. These tanks were designed during the war for the specific purpose of transporting Marines from LST ships to the beach heads in the Pacific for battle. My Dad was the driver of these tanks for four of these horrific beach heads. Although 82, he isn’t ready to give up the wheel just yet. Many have questioned my sanity for going, but I would not trade this experience for anything. Much like childbirth, it’s wonderful after it’s over. The best part was the fact that my sister and I got to do some time travel. As we contorted our bodies to fit into the backseat of a 2001 red Oldsmobile which had zero visibility and less oxygen, it became our time machine. We chose to visit the summer of 1967, our last family vacation together. Once again we enjoyed side splitting laughter at our parents without them having a clue as to what was going on in the back seat. We also made fun of each other like old times. These are things adult sisters aren’t allowed to do. Just like teenagers, Dad would give us the keys to the car at night and we’d go find the nearest “Staubach’s” as Mom and Dad would call it. They believe the beloved quarterback has gone into the coffee business. But neither of us got to roll those rubber tires one quarter of an inch while our Marine Corp Veteran was in the car. I started to realize that not being able to see out of the back seat was probably a blessing while the octogenarian was at the wheel. I kissed the ground when I got home. Dad did the same thing when he got home from the War
One of our destinations was my Dad’s Marine Corp reunion in Evansville, Indiana. Approximately 40 survivors of the 1st Marine Division of the 3rd Armored, 6th AM Track of Company D showed up with their red caps on. I met other daughters whose Dad’s wouldn’t let them drive. These Veterans all had that tough yet vulnerable look. As Betty Davis said, “Ageing isn’t for sissies.” One wore an eye patch, another was still dying his hair, and they all wore hearing aids except for the more stubborn amongst them. We toured a restored LST ship with these Veterans. The ship now sits on the Ohio River in Evansville. These ships transported the teenaged soldiers to far away places in the vast Pacific. The tour of this restored ship created the opportunity to hear more of their experiences in these “far away” places. Dad related a story about his very first combat on Peleliu. As he got to the beach and flattened down to avoid the fire whizzing by, he froze. Then this giant of a man, a captain, marched by impervious to the bullets and told the newby soldiers to move their *#~*^! The captain did this to save their lives for they would surely have died if they remained there. Dad said they were fine after that.
These Veterans are amazing, tough men with humor and good will for one another. It was great to listen to them talk of the war and hear dialects from all regions of America. I was honored to get to meet them and my admiration for my own Dad has deepened. I hope this will be the year that many who have never thanked a Veteran will do so.
I became aware on the trip that “war motifs” kept showing up all around us. We visited the Civil War battle grounds at Vicksburg, Mississippi. We visited graves of our great-greats who had fought in the Revolutionary War. The excellent Ken Burns documentary entitled “The War” was on PBS every night and we all watched it. We learned from the documentary that “freezing” on the beach head was a common response in the young soldier’s first combat experience. On top of all of this, I was reading The Barbarian Way by Erwin McManus which is replete with war metaphors. My sister and I were having our own little war about our different paths in life and how to care for Mom and Dad. It was a mine field of either break through or alienation in our relationship. Only God knows what He was purposing through all of this, but I know what I took away.
It has been said that out of the billions of stars and planets in our universe, God created ours to silence His critics forever. The only wise God is somehow working His great plan through our lives on this beautiful little planet in our everyday lives. This made me realize: “The world is our beach head!” Our mission: Set the captives free!
As time has passed, I’ve identified the longings of my teenaged heart that were evoked by old photographs and the great standards of American Pop music. I had a longing for loving unity of purpose. This is what I perceived in the sights and sounds of WWII America. Unity. Many years later I still have a longing for loving unity of purpose. Since the trip I’ve had to ask myself how I’m freezing on the beach head, thinking it will save me when the direct opposite is true. How am I freezing on the beach head? If this world that God gave His Son for is our beach head through the Great Commission by means of the Jesus Creed, in what ways at IBC are we freezing on the beach head? Opportunities don’t usually shout, they whisper. If we pause to hear the whisper it may prove to be our breaking free point from the gravitational pull to the sand. If each one of us did break that gravity, what would that be like? I want to see that in my life time. We know it is already happening at IBC. It’s the deepest longing of my heart. I bet it is yours to. There is a reason for this. We were created in God’s image and He exists as loving Tri-unity of purpose. He invites us to partake of His vital life. To partake of this loving unity of purpose will satisfy our thirsts and heal our wounds.
On the trip Dad told us the story of how after the war was over it took 31 days to get to San Diego from Sasebo, Japan on the LST. During those thirty nights, Dad and his buddies would sleep on the deck of the ship and star gaze. Their last night they were told they would be able to see the lights of San Diego at about one in the morning. They watched and waited but no lights. Finally, at about 4:00A.M., they saw the lights of home on the horizon. His voice broke as he told it. When they got off the ship they grabbed the American soil in their hands and threw it in the air.
We are on our way home and the conquering power that brings this world to its knees is our faith. (I John 5:4, the Message) Do you believe what God has said enough to get up off the beach head? One of my attempts to get the sand off my forehead was to write this story. What will be yours? On the trip I asked Dad if he was scared taking the beach heads. He said he was sure he must have been, but he had a job to do. One day we will all be Veterans. I just bet our most significant stories will be the ones where we tell when we finally got up off the beach head and shook the sand off. It requires faith, believing what God has said. By His grace we will do it.
