Musical Interlude #1: Fortunate Sons

Our soundtrack was a generation out of date. The songs were older than many of us.

Most of our fathers had been to Vietnam. We grew up hearing about the war. Now, as we made ready to fight in our very own war...the music we listened to and the movies we watched were part of our country's last great conflict.

Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, Platoon. We sat in the middle of the desert watching movies about a jungle war.

There's a saying that the generals are always fighting the last war as they make their plans for the next. We were trying to steel ourselves for the coming war through vicariously experiencing the last.

Our track commander, the young sergeant who led our steel box ambulance, was a huge fan of Creedence Clearwater Revival. Their greatest hits were the musical chords that played us into battle once we crossed the berm.

Some folks are born made to wave the flag,Ooh, theyre red, white and blue.
And when the band plays hail to the chief,they point the cannon at you, lord

I remember madly drumming on my thighs...pumped on No-Doze and fear...hammering away on my legs keeping time with the music. We had been awake for days, staving off the need for sleep by popping amphetamines and everyone was in various stages of mental calamity.

Sitting on the jump bench in the back of the ambulance, I wailed away on my legs like a speed fueled maniac. The others started to get swept up in the humor of it. Deejay joined in by playing air guitar and swinging his head back and forth. Weird little Scrappy pumped his fist in the air. Even Brownie...the hardcore rap fan bobbed his head along. It became A Moment.

It aint me, it aint me, I aint no senators son, It aint me, it aint me; I aint no fortunate one

We needed the laugh, we needed the break in tension

But, also, the music spoke to us just then. We knew we were the bottom of the barrel...the bottom rung of society's ladder. The poor, the trapped, the desperate. Kids from broken homes and broken systems, from shitty little towns and shitty blighted neighborhoods.

It aint me, it aint me, I aint no millionaires son, no.It aint me, it aint me; I aint no fortunate one, no

Just a bunch of dumb fucking grunts who volunteered for this shit. few choices in life...so we chose this. Like the First Sergeant said, if we wanted a comfortable life we should have joined the Air Force.

We were dirt. Just dirt. Unimportant people going nowhere that no one cared about.

And we thought that was just hilarious. What else could you do but laugh?

And laugh we did. We laughed at the war protesters and we laughed at the war supporters. We laughed at the generals and politicians and newsmen on CNN. What the fuck did any of them know?

We laughed at each other and we laughed with each other.

And we laughed our asses off during our little impromptu band performance that day. We all joined in. We were all the same. Four kids...four friends thrown together by life's circumstances. All we needed was each other and fuck the rest

Some folks inherit star spangled eyes,Ooh, they send you down to war, lord,
And when you ask them, how much should we give?
Ooh, they only answer more! more! more!

It aint me, it aint me, I aint no fortunate one,It aint me, it aint me, I aint no fortunate son.

And thinking back on that Moment as I write this...where amid the barely controlled chaos we found time to share some of the laughter and camaraderie that got us through the shit days, bopping along to the music of another generation...I realize something.

When I would ask my dad about his time in his war...he would rarely talk about. Sometimes he'd smirk a little and say "Oh, it wasn't always so bad."

I know what he meant now.

Jesus, I really loved those guys.