Will to live and die

Upon reading Ralph White’s “Getting out of Saigon”, I noticed a sad fact about the bayan tree of the US Embassy, as if it had once been a symbol of America’s resolve, up until it’s time to “turn the Embassy’s courtyard into a lumberyard” pg 37.

It also reminds me of a story about visiting the sick and dying (in looking out the window, the patient noticed the last leaf was still hanging in – which the perceptive visitor later managed to paint it , overnight and permanently on the wall, to help prolong the inevitable”….

The good Senator of California has died today.

Last leaf fell.

The banyan tree got chopped down, dollars burned and helicopters landed and took off, frequently.

Flag half-staff or flag folded.

Martin and the Marines.

The will to fight, to live and to die. To let history speak for itself. To let Art flow. To let my people go.

So much pain. Drama. Until the last minute, up in smoke.

Hell No We won’t Go. No will to fight. No will to stay. Last leaf and last testament.

All withered or wasted. Like those 58,000 names on the Wall, and subsequently million unnamed deaths at sea.

The will to live and die, sapped. Hearts stopped. History moves forward with course-correction. With leisure trajectory.

Lay down for now. Lion next to the Lamb. Rested but not in peace. For en-masse we fled, we grabbed and we shared not.

Survival of the fittest.

Natural selection. Of the elite? I am afraid not. Coward perhaps. Courageous at best (with Revisionist Historian accounts).

Mostly just time and chance. The right moment. Up to the minute. With memories behind, bodies unaccounted for.

So many instructions, intentions ended up in destruction.

Self-reinvention amidst PTSD…like Rambo’s “Do we get to win this time?” (Rhetorical ).

Or Captain Kurtz “Horror, Horror…” Un film the Coppola.

Gooooooood Morning Vietnam…..It’s a Wonderful World.

I look forward to the second installment of the ” A Man of two faces”…by Viet Thanh Nguyen.

Meanwhile, back to evacuation, the closing down of Chase bank branch in Saigon. Suspense.

“turning the courtyard into a lumberyard. ” After all, it’s just one tree. A symbolic and practical tree.

Now we plant trees, at the tune of One Billion, thanks to President Biden.

To heal the Earth, after all the pain and destruction e.g. kids grow up all distorted and contorted.

Agent Orange and Agent 007. Missions are always Impossible. Should you choose…either way, the message will be self-destructed in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1….

Music please.

Our mission today is to strengthen the will to live and should we choose to die, e.g. cut off your ears (as Vincent Van Gogh), breathe out your last breath (Mozart), or paint it on the mural as in The Last Leaf, then do so contributively. Don’t be bested by a mere tree. (Except in the case of those 19th century living oaks, planted 100 years ahead in anticipation of Oxford’s New College beams which later needed replacement).

When did Ms Feinstein know it’s her time to go? When the last leaf got pulled down by gravity. How would anyone know by April 15, 1975 when tax payers were mailing in their checks – that Saigon would soon fall like the last domino (of a war which had started out with the Domino Theory as raison d’etre)?

Then the bayan tree was still there. It got a two-weeks life extension (not by the IRS), to exert itself, to show strength and provide some shade. To save its best for last.

The bayan tree, the will to live and die. To fight. To stand. To do what it was meant to be and do all along.