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Notre Dame was my college of choice during the depression.  Back then you could choose a college and go without any complications.  It was the land of the free and the brave.  We were afforded the chances and we could freely take our chances in the search for happiness, not laughs, which passes for happiness now, but a deep happiness in doing our duty to God, family, and country.  

There were no applications to go to college, no guessing game with your future prospects by bureaucratic administrators and testy monopolies of con artist magic testing corporations.  If you failed, you left.  It was simple.  It was up to you.  Nobody in-between second guessing "The Bureaucratic City of God".  There was no fitting human beings to measures of masses, so that everyone measured exactly the same in messes and dared not leap out of bounds.

There were no middle men to obscure and complicate the issue.  If you worked hard and studied or if you were just talented and breezed through, you did good.  If you were talented and lazy, you failed.  You didn't waste anybody's time and nobody wasted your time.  It was perfectly uncontrived.  It worked.  It was not contrived to work by sold out politicians, who threw money at issues and drove off to enjoy their well earned luxury at the expense of an admiring and gullible public.

It was summer after High School graduation.  We, the graduates of Benedictine Military High School, asked each other, "What do you think we should do now?  Summer is almost over.  "  There were no over achiever parents prodding us to be perfect pretenders of something we ought to be better than anyone else.  'We could go to college," offered Shep, who was riding his bicycle in circles and making us turn our heads in spirals.

"How about Notre Dame," I recommended as I began to feel dizy.

"We only have a few weeks to get ready," said Joe Byrne.

"We better get started then," I suggested.

All six of us agreed this made sense.  We peddled as fast as we could down Sycamore Avenue to our respective homes on the North End of Richmond, Virginia.

Our parents, who had grade school educations at most thought it was a grand idea.  There were no phone calls, no forms, no letters.  We packed to go.  Nothing stood in our way.  This was America, the land of opportunity, home of the brave.  It was not the home of timid test takers and administrators guarding their back ends in a lucrative sham of intelligent design.  Without supporting a lot of administrators and without artificial inflation of demand, school was affordable.

What an opportunity college was.  Everyone who wanted a chance should be given this chance.  It seemed as if the sum total of the world's knowledge was at our disposal.  I set on a course of pre-med.  Although it was pre-med, we were taught to be a person first, which seemed more important in those backward days.  

We were formed in the humanities, taught to think and feel the way man had thought and felt and discovered and dealt with his relationships from the present to the depth of the past.  As Churchill once put it, "The further one can look back, the further one can see into the future!" or something to that effect.

Besides the medical studies, I learned about poetry and acquired a taste for it.  It helped me more than anything to think out of the box, something that is necessary to a good surgeon, especially in war, which I was.  In war, a surgeon must be innovative and be able to remain human and sensitive under great stress.  

One poet I became aware of was David Jones of WW I fame.  I remember tracing the map of his odyssey from England through France to Mamet Woods and the purposeless slaughter of misguided assaults.  I remember thinking what a terrible thing it must have been.  Little did I know I would be following in his path, visiting some of the same infamous spots he made so well known with his depth of understanding.  

Perhaps my odyssey was a reflection of his and his of Caesar's soldiers or Charlemagne's or ancient Druids crossing Europe in a sea of battles.  If there is purpose or sense to this life, perhaps it is that our lives are the reflection of other lives.  Physicists at this time caught a glimpse of this in realizing that mass, energy, and light were related and could transform one into the other as if life was truly a form of alchemy.  If Energy equals mass times the speed of light squared, then mass equals energy divided by the speed of light squared.  We are made from the same light as the stars.  The same light and energy runs through everything, making one living organism.  Reading poetry makes the relationships self-evident, to see reflections of ourselves in the same self that we see everywhere, sometimes restricted to a small room and sometimes to an open field, but always connected in some elusive manner.  If one touched it even with a word, such as God, or quantum mechanics, it could not be examined without losing the sense of connection, which could not be reduced to a name.

Out of the same nothing or something that cannot be contained, we are created.  The Energy of a split atom, which is roughly equal to the speed of light squared should create new mater when mass of the speed of light squared is passed through the energy.  Perhaps two opposing waves correctly combined at the speed of light squared will do the same.  This is the tickle theory of the heavenly father, don't go to the trouble of looking for the proof.  About 80 proof will get you there quicker.

The control center of our mind creates molecules when we have a thought.  When the heavenly father has a thought, universes are created.  Yin and Yang compliment and evolve.

Exciting thoughts extrapolated and explored universes within my dormitory room.  It was too cold outside to do otherwise.  

Notre Dame was typically cold and windy and bleak in the winter on the plain.  Snow covered the cultured grass of the once wild prairie.  The trees creaked and moaned in a cold unlike the moist, bone deep cold of Virginia.

I stood at the bedroom dresser.  Standing was a strategy for staying awake as I studied chemistry.  We didn't have or know about taking drugs to do this.  

At some point I developed a photographic memory standing at my bedroom dresser.  In class, I could see and read the pages I studied the night before.  When called upon to answer a question, I stood and responded verbatim from the book I could picture in my head.  The professor, a priest, apparently concerned over the tainted condition of my soul, glowered at me with indignation.  It looked as if he was about to pounce on some ancient and hereditary enemy of the human race.  He circled me contemptuously looking for devices of a cheat.  Perhaps a small devil whispered in my ear.

"Hold your hands out and roll up your sleeves!" He commanded imperiously.  He was deeply disappointed and with difficulty, he breathed as if he was about to have a seizure, when he spurted out like Sylvester, the cat, "I will speak with you after 'clath'."

The Interview/Interrogation went as suspected.  According to the Geneva Convention, I was only obliged to give name, rank, and serial number.  He never did figure it out, and he never tired of trying.  He would have worked well as an Intelligence Officer or Judge of the Inquisition.

My one attempt at college sports was to try out for the football team, but I never got past the locker room before the tryout even happened.  Although I was six feet tall, I was a bit on the scrawny side or should I say wiry.  Everyone besides myself in the locker room appeared more akin to elephants than humans.  When they sat, they covered the seats of two chairs, and the chairs, made of metal shuddered under the considerable weight.  

I seriously reflected on what a herd of stampeding elephants could do to a scrawny six foot dwarf.  I would end up toe cheese, an afterthought removed from the sole of a cleat without the slightest empathy.  Perhaps there would be some contempt and a sneer or a wagging of the head to indicate their recognition of a foolhardy attempt at glory.

Having assessed the strength of the enemy, the outgunned dwarf made a strategic withdrawal, not unlike Britain in the Spring of 1940.  

While Hitler's generals argued over who would have the honor of pulverizing what was left of Britain's army pinned down on the beach of Dunkirk, Britain rescued their men in any available craft to cross the English Channel.  Thus democracy was given a second chance, having proved how foolish, ineffectual, unprepared, and naive it was in the face of a crisis.  In a similar manner, I ducked out the door of the locker room to the snarls and hoots of the barbarian hordes.  I would live to see another day of premed studies.

Having narrowly escaped an eminent and foolhardy death, I joyfully remembered the wisdom of the Zen-like question, "What do you call the stuff between an elephant's toes?"  Answer - natives.  No, a six foot dwarf.  No, France in 1940. 

Thus ended my career in sports undefeated, though my interest in sports wasn't so much to win as to play and have fun, to participate in the exuberance of sharing an exhilarating experience.  Sports to me was a place to discover who you were, to build character, and make relationships.  Sports were the agreed upon protocols for a harmonious relationship in the world of opposing goals and common goals.

Naive me!  My experience in the locker room was the dawning recognition of the big, exclusive business of sports and the arid business of schools.

The war in Europe seemed far off.  There was plenty of time and we could always send the football team.  Just in case, we stayed tuned into the radio and newspapers.

There was no serious preparation for the war in the U.S. at the time I was attending Notre Dame.  In fact legislators made it illegal to help England during their greatest trial.  It was Europe's war, not ours.  We did not understand the world was smaller with the advancements in communications and transportation.  What happened in remote parts of the world had a direct impact on us and our revered freedoms.

Notre Dame's own Fr. Coughlin of radio fame and the government in Washington droned on about the phony war, which we should turn our backs to and it would just sort itself out.  

Czechoslovakia, a newly formed democracy, was given away to Germany to appease the German dictator.  We ignored the pleas of the Czechs.  Austria and Poland were swallowed up.  Perhaps now the dictator would be satisfied?  Would he ever be satisfied?  Was any dictator ever satisfied?  

France fell in a matter of weeks.  The country changed over night.  The state machinery was the rule.  There was no personal freedom as it is in current day China, Iran, and Northern Korea.  Again, we look the other way and expect the unpleasantness to go away or we suggest more talk will take care of it.

Peace was the easy sell for politicians.  Politicians then as today followed the party line to gain personal power instead of serving the common welfare.  The process was almost accidentally undermined and reformed, but as fate would have it, it wouldn't be that easy.

Wilkie stepped out of nowhere into the limelight of politics to run for president.  Unlike the Republican Party faithful who decided on the runner who could grant the most favors as rightly indebted to the beneficent power brokers, Wilkie owed nothing to anyone.  Yet, Wilkie generated such respect in the party members, they strong armed the delegates to the Republican Convention with such a groundswell of grass roots support that the delegates eventually chose Wilkie to run against FDR.  The party faithful never forgot this and they made sure backroom politics and moneyed interests selected candidates who they could control.  They did not want to be any different than the Democrats.  Thus we have the two party rule of unresponsiveness.

When totalitarian Russia, the home of brotherly love and communism, invaded Finland, the Finns gave them a fight they could not believe.  Russia in her arrogance thought Finland would be easy pickings.  However, it was the wrong time of year to go picking the fruits of Finland.

In the terrible cold, of artic winter, about 20 below, and furious snow, the Russian tanks and soldiers were bogged down as the vastly outnumbered Finns in warm, cozy, white ski outfits fashionably skied circles around the massive army.  The Russians were outflanked before they knew what was happening.  

The Finns were innovative.  They met one assault with fire hoses pumping water from a lake onto the attacking tanks, which froze with the men inside. The technique was varied by dousing tanks in gasoline and setting them on fire, as the courageous Finns skied merrily around the helpless tanks.

One group of 900 Finnish soldiers had the audacity to attack 17,000 Russians and their tanks, which were spread out over 10 miles.  Unbelievably, the Russians were defeated in this battle and many others.  Eventually, the Finns were overwhelmed as the Russian air force bombed Finland's cities with impunity.  Finland had no air force to speak of and when they begged the rest of the Western democracies for aid, it was too little and too late.  It was always too little, too late.  

Uncle Joe Stalin, who killed not only hapless citizens of other countries, he magnanimously killed millions of his own people.  Despite the killing, liberals of our own in the USA, sill love Joe.  He was a good man, just misunderstood.  He wanted the best for the world as he saw it.  As Madeline Albright taught at George Mason University, Joe was "on balance" good for his country.  "He got it industrialized."  Madeline you see is part of the elite group of leaders who know what is better for everyone even if it kills them.

If it hadn't been for England's determination to fight on at all costs, it very likely would have been the end of democracy throughout the world.  Even Chamberlain was mad after the invasion of France, but the English were ready for a new type of leader for perilous times, someone who could make decisive decisions and give them moral courage.  This is not unlike the need now for decisive leadership and moral courage to fight it out with the terrorists of the world.

The French were hampered in their leadership.  There was a moral crisis with illicit affairs preoccupying the leaders.  Paramours were involved in the decision making as much as the leaders.  Such corruption has begun to surface in our nation today and has in the past detracted from our leadership.  The elite media make little of this.  It is a sign of sophistication to have immoral leadership.

A large part of the French population was under the delusion of communism and they called the war against Fascism, an imperialistic war.  Many of the French like the communists were just willing to give up without a fight, and the Maginot Line protected many in their dreams.

Hitler faked them out with a feint to the North, while the main thrust was from the South.  It was fast and devastating.  To the very end, they thought they were safe behind the Maginot line, which Hitler simply circumvented.  If there was resistance from a town, the town was bombed into submission.  Then came the tanks and the swift moving mechanized troops.  Finally, there was the Gestapo to crush any resistance, physical or spiritual, real or imagined.

Refugee children with blank faces were headed to Paris without their parents.  In a few days, food was not to be found.  They were trapped and betrayed!

School and the war is over.  I reflected as I ate a chocolate bar, tramping through the woods in pursuit of a simple past of hunting and fishing.  That was me tramping through the woods, not the chocolate bar.  We, my sons and I, were hunting on a farm at the confluence of the James and Chickahominy Rivers.  The Indians fought each other here.  Then they fought the settlers from Europe and then the settlers fought each other in the Civil War.  Now nations fight one another.  We fight the ducks.  My feint is the duck call.

The Germans attacked through the Ardennes forest, not unlike the forest I was in.  I was a surgeon in the war.  Many troops simultaneously attacked ducks, us, through the Ardennes or was it Virginia woods.  I eat a chocolate bar.  In the Ardennes forest, I ate a chocolate bar, when we counter attacked the Germans.  Ate with one hand and dug trenches with the other.  Are we here or in Mamet woods or the Ardennes.  The next world war could bring total annihilation.  Thus went  the dodo and other species.  

Will we be prepared for the next crisis?  Perhaps it has already started and is well on its way, if we don't nip it in the bud.  The trouble is dictators don't listen to reason.  Words are only a weapon.  They only listen to guns.

Our only enemies are not dictators, but they exist within us as well.  Our freedom can become a dictator if it is not tempered in responsibility.  Many no longer believe in the rule of law.  Special interest groups lobby for privileges.  Drugs poison young minds.  Greed corrupts industry.

We no longer believe or even understand stewardship of the land.  The surprise attack from within has polluted streams, lakes, and oceans.  The air is not healthy to breathe and is being depleted.  The food is contaminated with chemicals that raise our estrogen levels and give cancer.  We are the only species with ingenious ways of killing ourselves.  We work as hard destroying ourselves as we do saving ourselves.  

When we returned from WW II, we built sanctuaries to peace, our homes, our families.  We knew how to work and we worked perhaps too much to forget, to cover up, to replace the void that was left in the fabric of life.

Our first peace sanctuary was on Paxton Street.  It was a small house built with cinderblock.  It soon filled up with family.

Our next house was on Maple Avenue, amongst oak, pine, and of course maple.  The autumn was colorful.  The summer afforded the comfort of shade.  Eunice and I enjoyed our gin and tonic on the patio I built on the back of the house.  I'd relax with a cigarette in my hand, and we'd talk of the weather, the garden, tomato plants, camping trips, the dresses the girls were making for proms, nothing of life and death desperation and everything easy.  My wife and I blended with the evening and the cacophony of children was softly modulated in the space of the outdoors.

Stately trees reassured us with their stability and confidence.  After supper, we read books, while the children did their homework.  There was no question back then that they would do what they were expected to do, just as we did in the war.

While we never talked about it for years and years, I found myself drawn to books about war, especially the one I was in.  I read Churchill, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, and many others.  I began to visit Civil War sites and Yorktown.  I felt as if I saw myself in all the disparate roles and multitude of variations in war.  It was as if immersing myself in the story of war brought me into communion with something all soldiers sought in themselves and each other.  Oddly enough, it appeared to lead to peace and brotherhood, a common understanding.  Nobody may know the true purpose to life, to existence.  One may say it is to know God, to love and embrace God, or it may have its own purpose and it doesn't need words to explain it.  The quantum energy runs through it just the same however we try to explain.  We can find the universe dancing at our feet if we are just silent, as Kafka suggested.

At night, my peace, my silence was broken by emergency calls.  This was heaven sent, to continue to be called on to help.  I would have done it for free, as I often did.

Back then, we drove to the patients.  Somehow it seemed unethical to make a sick person come to us.  I had a black bag with most of what I needed by way of materials, but I also brought comfort and courage that I carried from the war.  With a ready laugh I let the patient know that despite all the troubles of the world, one could still laugh and find peace in ourselves.

Back then, we took the Hippocratic oath to support life at all stages for all people.  The ancient Greeks arrived at this though honest analysis of our place in the universe.  Now doctors pick and choose what to promise and they play god with life.  Plain words are not spoken and the words do not necessarily mean what they say.  If the "Bill of Rights" states, "unalienable right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," lawyers typically explain those rights away as dictated by courts, special interests, and the latest trends.

"People are getting smarter.  They now use a lawyer instead of their conscience to guide them." - Will Rogers.

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