UNSUNG HEROINES

If you visit the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington D.C., you will expect to see the names of the 60,000 men that died serving a cause. Whether that cause was noble or not, these men gave their lives for it. In retrospect, it did not measure up to the Second World War, or even the first in people’s minds, but like the Korean conflict, it seemed set a tone that we fight a war based on our belief that we as a nation needed to look out for everyone’s interest that helps our own. The way we fought the Korean and Vietnamese wars, one would think we fought a holding action, there was NO mass unified movement to win, just one that accepted that we were sending young men into as they say today: “harm’s way.”

But aside from all that, as you look at the wall memorial, and all those names that appear, you come to a monument with 4 figures. 3 of the figures casted in bronze are of women nurses and one is of a dying or wounded soldier being held in the arms of one nurse. All three nurses are part of this horrific drama, as it plays out this man’s agony. I looked at it and I was moved. At first I recognized what it was showing and the center of the attention was on the draped man. But the closer I looked, the more a different realization and horror set in. I looked at the eyes of the nurse cradling the man in her arms, and I felt the sudden pain that these women must have

experienced.

These women were in a hostile environment, reacting to death and slaughter, mayhem and sacrifice. Although they did not bear arms, they dealt with the aftermath of it all. On their shoulders fell the burden of relief, of grown men and young boys made into instant men by their ordeal, some crying for their moms and wives and children. These women had to give them comfort and heal their pain, tell them they would never walk or see again, and some they didn’t or couldn’t tell then anything, ever again.

They were the angels that God sent after we as mankind made a mess. These angels go unsung for the most part, we forget that they too have suffered mightily, yet we miss a clue that would help bring peace to this world: giving the power to women. Isn’t it true that they come after the storm, after things fall apart and give comfort and aid? Why do we call them then, why not before things heat up? Put them (women) in charge, they are more reasonable, seek justice for the most part, and are non-violent. If God’s angels ran the world, there would be less conflict, less young people going to kill one another, and the world itself would be kinder and gentler.

Let’s be real, men have been in charge too long, they have failed and failed badly, it is time to give women the chance. Maybe then they won’t be needed to fix things.