One day, in the middle of the afternoon, I stopped for gas in Iowa or Missouri or Kansas or Nebraska (I forget which), went inside to tell the manager about my work.
The woman standing behind me in the line interrupted, “you do what for Gold Star Families?” There was a sadness in her eyes.
“Are you a Gold Star Mother?” I asked, hoping that she wasn’t.
“No,” she said. “Where are you going next?”
I explained and excused myself to pump my gas.
She came out a moment after me.
“It’s really a great thing you do,” she said, a little shyly.
“Thank you.”
“Nobody did that sort of thing when I was in,” she offered.
“Thanks for your service to our country. When were you in?” She had my full attention now.
“I was in in seventy-eight. My daughter was in for two and a half years and my son is still serving over in the Middle East.”
“Forgive me for asking, but your daughter was in for two and a half years?” The number seemed strange to me.
“Yeah,” she said slowly, her eyes moistening, “she’s one of the twenty-two.”
I immediately understood. Twenty-two is the official number of veterans who take their own life every day. “Oh, my God, I’m so sorry to hear that. That makes you a Gold Star Mom in our book. I’m so sorry.” My eyes were getting moist, too.
“The Army didn’t see it that way.”
“We are not the Army,” I said, using the words to enforce some stoicism, which in hindsight seems completely unnecessary.
“Thank you,” she said, pausing and looking away a little. I could see she was looking for words.
“I’ve got something I’d like to share with you,” I said, putting the hose back into the gas pump. I walked around the bike and opened a saddle bag, retrieving a plaque. “You don’t know me,” I offered, “but when I meet a Gold Star Family, I leave them with this plaque. If you’ll accept it, I’d like you to have this.”
“Okay,” she said, a little shocked.
…but I cannot refrain from tendering to you…
She wiped a tear from her eye, then reached out to accept the plaque I offered to her.
“You know,” she said, not taking her eyes from the plaque, “so many people need just a little help. Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is ask for help.”
“I think that is totally correct,” I said, fumbling for words.
“I wasn’t sure what I would do; I was on my last ounce of strength,” she paused. “Then, when I couldn’t deal with it anymore, I went to the VA.”
“Are you service connected?” I wondered out loud.
“No, but I missed my daughter, and I served in the Navy, so I went to the VA.”
“And they were able to help you?” I asked.
“They,” she stumbled over the words, “Well, they helped a little,” she spoke like someone who was still hurting. “But the bravest thing I ever did was find the strength to call them and ask for help.”
“It’s not something we like to do.”
“No, it’s not, but when it was done, after I went to see them, they were able to help me cope a little; it wasn’t so bad. I don’t know why it was so hard to do,” she explained the feelings of depression and sadness that so many veterans and Gold Star Families know about.
“I’m glad you found the courage to do it.”
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t,” she said.
“It saddens me. I hate hearing about the twenty-two a day. It’s really a lot more than that, but one is too many. I understand how horrible it is to lose a child, and I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“I’m so glad I stopped to talk to you,” she said, “but I have an appointment. Can I hug you?”
“Of course,” I said. We gently embraced. Then she turned and opened her car door. I waved as she drove away, then turned to get back on the bike.
I never did learn her name, but she knows mine and she’s welcome to call anytime.
I’m not sure about this story but here goes. I was riding something like thirty-two days in the peak of summer when I arrived at a restaurant to meet not one, not two, but three different Gold Star Families. I was surprised to see local news cameras waiting for me in the parking lot. Just to make it official, I circled the lot once or twice to make sure they could film something with me on the bike.
Kickstand down, I pulled myself off the bike, and in a good mood, well rested (which was highly unusual), I walked toward the camera and a small group of people who looked like they were waiting for me. I stole a line from Bill Murray in the comedy classic Stripes , saying as I walked, “What? A surprise party! Whose idea is this?” I don’t think anybody understood the joke.
We greeted each other warmly, everyone anxious to know everyone else. The Gold Star Brother had not met the Gold Star Mother and neither of them had met the Gold Star Son. After the introductions we went inside to a table that had been waiting for us.
We sat around a large table and the camera operator did his best to make sure we could all be captured and heard, and the dialogue rolled along casually.
“What do you think you’ll have?”
“How was the ride over here?”
“What’s your favorite part of the country?”
You get the idea. That sort of talk continued for a while. The waiter delivered our lunches and everyone was chewing and wiping the crumbs of food from the corners of their mouths, when the Gold Star Mom looked at me directly. “I just don’t know,” she said as her eyes glistened with the formation of a new tears, “why my son would take his own life.”
The people at the table, the camera operator, and the people at the surrounding tables, all fell dead silent.
I’d like to share with you how I thought about what to say, but I didn’t. I didn’t know what to say, and to this day, I have no idea from where this came, but I acted and spoke without hesitation, and without a crackle to show my nervousness. I placed my right hand on top of her left hand and just let it lay there. As I looked at her eyes, I could see the blank sadness that comes from wishing you knew why something very sad had to take place, but you just can’t figure it out. I moved my lips and allowed words to fall out of my mouth. It was unscripted, unplanned, but altogether quite natural. “He didn’t take his own life,” I said, quite matter-of-factly, “it was a sniper’s bullet from seven thousand miles away.”
It was as if I had reached across a sink and turned the water on. I can‘t recall ever seeing a pair of eyes moisten and drop tears so quickly and easily. I felt the tears trickle down my own cheeks as well. After a moment or two, when I thought it seemed okay, but before anyone spoke, I glanced around the table and realized there wasn’t a dry eye in the place. Out of respect, we all stayed quiet for another moment.
Then, someone said, “These mashed potatoes are so much better than I thought they would be.”
As quickly as it had changed, the conversation changed back. We were all happy to be there. We finished our meal, made jokes about the waiter mixing up the drinks, asked the camera operator when it might be on the news, paid the bill, and walked out to the parking lot.
“I didn’t know what to expect,” the Gold Star Mom shared. She seemed like she was still a little shy about talking with me.
“I didn’t either,” I quipped. It was true. I never know what to expect when I meet a Gold Star Family.
We thanked each other, and we parted ways. I climbed back onto my motorcycle and started it up. The first few minutes of riding after meeting a family are always the most surreal. Nothing seems like it should. Going sixty miles an hour feels like fifteen miles an hour. Ten miles of highway feels like two.
I rode south to the next state, turned west to the next Gold Star Family – another Mom, then I rode west some more and some more. After a few days, I turned north to ride to other states, cover more miles, meet other Gold Star Family members.
After about a week of riding, nursing sunburn, trying to live through heat exhaustion, I showered in the cheap motel and found this in my email from the best friend of that Gold Star Mom:
I wanted to share with you that your visit to us was very special. After you left, she tore up her own suicide note .
I couldn’t see the computer screen through the moisture that formed on the surface of my eyes involuntarily, so I buried my face in my hands and allowed myself to weep for a short time.
From Chapter Four:
“Been on the road long?” I asked, “You look tired.”
“Yeah, I started in North Dakota,” the old man driving the old truck spoke with a raspy voice. For the record, the closest point in North Dakota to the spot where he and I were sitting is about fifteen hundred miles. “We love this motel,” he continued, “we stay here every time we come down.”
“No rooms,” the woman said, returning to the truck and jumping back in on the other side.
“They have at least one,” I offered, “I’m leaving.” The old man chuckled. We began talking about the Gold Star Ride Foundation, and he shared that he had spent time in Vietnam. I told him about the bottle of Cuban rum I keep in a saddle bag, but he wasn’t interested in it. He did thank me for the offer, but, as he said, “haven’t had a drink in nearly two decades.” That earned a little more respect from me. I know how hard it can be, and I immediately imagined the challenges that this man has had to endure to stay alive this long.
While we spoke, the young person in the back seat jumped out with enormous amounts of energy, investigating this and that. The dog came out with him.
“That’s Schnook,” he said, introducing me to the dog. “He’s a full bred wolf.”
“A wolf?” I asked with a little shock.
“Yes, I’ve had him since he was a pup. He’s thirteen now.” This incredibly beautiful animal which, I’m guessing, weighed about one hundred pounds, and when he put his paws on the shoulder of the boy, the wolf wasn’t even trying to stretch to his available height. He could have put his paws on the shoulders of someone seven feet tall. He was a very impressive creature.
We talked a little about the wolf, and the boy told me the story of winning his black belt in Karate and Judo. He said he owed it all to his grandparents, who have been raising him.
I felt honored to have met them. They went to the next motel on the street, and I rolled west all day.
There was a time on this road, and I’ll use no exaggeration in the telling of this, when I was rolling toward New Mexico, when the only things you could see were cacti. Not the big beautiful ones you see in books, these were short; most only a foot tall. There was no ditch along the sides of the road, only flat land that rolled out into the fields of cacti. Every now and then, there was a mountain in the distance, but mostly it was flat, dry, and very hot. During one sixty minute period, I did not even pass or even see a car on the road.
I had plenty of time to not be distracted by anything. I was able to speak to God in complete sentences. Not all of those were filled with flattery, but they weren’t filled completely with complaints either. I think I’ve already mentioned that God and I have had differences in opinion along the way.
There’s something indescribable about being alone for that long. About being that alone. I mean, we’ve all had moments when we were alone. Hopefully, it happens every time you go into the bathroom; but this is different. This is so alone, that there is not a living person within fifty miles, and you can feel it. You can feel the fact that even if you wanted to come in contact with another human being, you’d have to travel a long time to get there. Distance adds something to the alone factor and it’s palpable.
