Thang Nguyen 555

It’s been fifty years since, yet that US-shaped cake with red-white-blue icing still lingers somewhere in my memory: all typewriters stopped, and all Child Welfare staff joined in “Happy Birthday”. Placing unaccompanied minors into foster care to them was just a job. To show me, unpaid interpreter, some humanity was extra.

The 322-22 highway curved along the Susquehanna River to lead the way. My first time away from home. Alone. To face destiny. Everything, everyone and everywhere looked utterly alien.

My mom stayed back in the camp, like a mother hen, guarding the fort of Indian town Gap (yet we had a heart to pick up a hitchhiker). My sister’s family of 6 got group sponsor down to Northern Virginia. My guitar brother had, without missing a beat, restarted his US pharmaceutical career in New Jersey. Voila! 4 different zip codes.

We’re almost out of the woods or so I thought. Maslow scale? No sweat. Starting at the bottom and working your way up the food chain aka the American Dream.

Balls of various shapes and sizes tossed and thrown at us: straight and curve, hit and miss (Playboy centerfold smashed in my face for instance). Threats behind e.g. hot war, Cold War and nuclear war, then war from within: doubt, death and fractious families/nation.

Naive and eager, I rolled up my sleeves: toilet flushing, floor mopping and sandwich-break on night shifts. You probably read about Steve Job’s notorious 3rd-shift demotion per poor hygiene and low social skills. In my case, back then, what “social skills?”! By wiping down really good, I thought this could somehow by way of penance scrub away our collective sin (just finished a book by my classmate: Rain on the Red flag. Could have been my story).

Fast forward to today, with declassified materials, we found in Kissinger a perfect scapegoat, whose politics of backroom dealing undermined the war.

After being washed and dry, sterilized and bleached, immersed and sprinkled – emerges an old Oriental at the gym. “You’re from Vietnam?”. So, it’s still my fault? (a walking sad reminder of a sorry time).

In America, one must first “find oneself” (individualism), live for the moment (without an inkling of the past) before self-effacing phase (world citizen) – the personal before the universal, I before We e.g. shaved head and painted face chameleon (like Woody Allen’s Tron lookalike in Sleeper, or in his Blue Jasmine – “yep, we were very civic-minded,” says the like of Madoff’s wife i.e. Cate Blanchett).

“Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow”, with given fine-print disclaimer (never in Large Print).

Suckers are losers. He who finishes with the most chips wins. It’s always been a numbers game/winner-takes-all society (what else to be there, given predictable and planned obsolescence e.g. fuel, hybrid, electric and Toyota’s recent hydro power, Wayne’s world to Waymo.

Breathe in.

Things will change again in 50 years e.g. hot or cold war, post-cold war, globalization then Monroe Doctrine 2. 0., the China card, Russia card and soon India one. Good luck to citizens of small nations – take heed: per Napoleon’s “whichever side got more ammo wins”. Hence, DoW (department of War).

That said, it’s time to take stock: my mom passed, my dad passed, my sister passed. It’s she who said “It’s finished” at our father’s funeral- while my dad seemingly and reluctantly complied, in limbo and in transit from the Western world to the afterworld.

This was quite consistent and characteristic of him who took the whole decade to join us in the US – someone who once had been in the employ of Air Vietnam yet could barely get a seat on the plane. His dictionary was Larousse. Mine, Merriam-Webster, an office parting gift to kick off a lifelong word search and soul search. Half-life living, in infinity, father and son, ignoring headwind on wings of wax, with occasional reminders of certain end.

In Other Colored, Orhan Pamuk wrote: “Everyman’s death begins with his father’s death”.

In my end, my beginning. While I appreciate being “sentient “and all, that alone could not predict my destiny. His journey consisted of constant uprootedness.

“Oi coi tau nhu xe doi long” …” if you missed the train I am on, you’ll know that I am gone…. you will hear the whistle blow a hundred miles”.

Although I did not leave camp by train, it sure feels like something that runs in the family: urban dwellers turned nomads. Whether it’s in 1954 or 1975 time passes all the same: like a blink of an eye.

From zero to 1. Disruptive behavior e.g. move fast, break things. West Coast upending East Coast, Palo Alto Rte 128. Tear-off jeans displace upscale jeans. “Stop-out” is the new “drop-out”. Who needs college! College? it’s where they teach you to question where technology is heading, whether it’s serving the need of humanity (the majority) or just follow through with humanistic and/or mechanistic rogue train.

When Singularity is here, when machine is more spiritual than man, and we shall all be more like (Greek) gods. Living forever, from head to toe with nip and tuck everywhere in the middle part (organ transplant anyone?). I am not sure I can afford the experiment, nor can I find things to self-occupy should I outlive my natural expiration date. But one must admire MIT (East coast) and revitalized Mission district (SF – West coast). H.G. Wells would be proud.

Between 2010-15, we witnessed another wave of tech revival: successful entrepreneurs turn around to help the likes of Gu’s Upstarts, solving a critical problem: the unbank. Everybody was into disintermediation, from Carvana to Casava, from Uber X to Lyft premier. At Nvidia, itself is its worst enemy. It’s the Nvidia way. Imagine waking up, brush your teeth and say to the reflection “today, you’re my worst enemy”. Yet its stocks show some truth to it. We’re full of blood and illusion (King Midas) and there is no need to be reminded.

It’s an exciting time to try and fail. Failures are badges of honor. It’s like the opposite of Russian Army in occupied territories (where there was no turning back). In the late 70’s, there in the Valley (silicon), people arrived in drove – driving up prices (of garages), to the tune of 2,500 dollars per square foot – to be barefoot and be disciples of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Hardware and software.

Public right to know vs privacy, net neutrality vs networking. Data is in. Dating is out. Who has the time. We will someday become gods. Or sexless angels. Keep the apps coming. Finally, I understood those Fortune Gods in Chinese restaurants: gourmet and gyms don’t mix. Eat the grease and enjoy life eternal.

Singularity is near. We earn so much money dropping out of college, we can always afford nip and tuck. First, they tell me I have to grow up. Then to thread carefully for fear of breaking things. Then they tell me to “move fast and break things” (no regrets). Now, Daniel Pink found out about “the power of regrets”. oh boy, opioid. So confusing. Peter Thiel often recommends students to drop out. In today’s climate of student loan and student visa restriction, perhaps one should put equal weight to that fork on the road: “To enroll or not to”.

To take the second option is to bet on something like Home Brew and Whole Earth Catalog can happen again in our productive lifetime. Some bets pay off. Most times, in the age of AI, one can still lose one’s shirts. Never become a graduate nor a god. In the valley or at the mountain top. The Greek sought wisdom, the Jews signs. “Give me a sign…hit me one more time”. When the Emperor gives a thumps up, gladiator lives. Down, dead. Binary world we live in, always zero or 1. Keep going down that path, zillions of forks on the road. I once… was blind…but now I see.

Paul Tournier said, “Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets”.

Those moments when we felt more like Fredo than Michael Corleone. Fredo, played by Cazale, half Irish, half Italian was at one time in a relationship with Meryl Streep (also in the Deer Hunter where she played a Vietnam draftee’s bridesmaid in a Slavic shotgun and send-off wedding who in a spur of the moment, accepted Christopher Walken’s proposal – best man and bridesmaid coupling).

In real life, Streep stood up for Cazale so he could finish his production contract. With cancer – unplanned but manageable – he came across feeble, hence a bit ill-suited for Nam (missing out on those Russian roulette wagers, a script originally pitched for Vegas).

Also appeared in Sydney Lumet’s Dog Day Afternoon, Godfather 1 & 2, the Conversation, Cazale was made for second-fiddle roles. Our water boy. “Stop playing around with that (handgun) – here, Nam’s Russian Roulette wager “click” – sweat or blood).

Like a Jim Croce’s line “every time I tried to tell you, the words just came out wrong “; he couldn’t quite defend himself, physically or verbally – not a quick wit – more than often he froze, on a hunting trip or bank shoot-out, terrified with gun – Carbine – to the side).

Subdued and weak (swirling around on a tiny moped in Gene Hackman’s confine sound lab – in the Conversation), he was more a sound man than cameraman (often taller like Michael Douglas in Three-Mile-Island prescient role).

Chris Cuomo of CNN was furious when called “Fredo”. DJT was also mentioned in the same breath when he grandstanded (the Divider pg. 137).

I turned one when both siblings were in college: hence, chores for change. Why not! Someone had to off-load my busy mom.

I know what’s it like to have my Fredo moment. heck, Fredo life. I once was in tears at a friend’s father’s funeral – to a fellow Penn Stater’s surprise. Perhaps I used the occasion to offload my pent-up loss i.e. my father was left behind in Vietnam for a good decade while my friend’s dad “wasted good wine”, hitting tennis balls, in State College.

Other time, a TV producer talked shop jokingly to have me cover Three-Mile-Island melt-down live (an intern was supposed to be expandable = like that sound man in The China Syndrome, fiction incidentally, released a few weeks before real life). When my brother got married again: “Your turn to take care of Mom” (family first). But, but…. (no “but”).

It’s settled – by the new Godfather (that) Fredo does Vegas. Spined-off to outer “Siberia”, his first self-determination to stand on his own feet in the desert on behalf of family (mafia) interests, then fell prey and seduced by a sense of false belonging (indulgent and decadent sub-group – his new “family” sense of belonging, whose “Sinatra” figure face down on the massage table.

Fredo, our outer most electron, experienced “de-individuation” (that stripping process that molds a neglected household member into a cult member, reinforced by mob behavior and herd instinct). The Stockholm Syndrome.

Strong men are quite magnetic. After all, they are “anointed”. the Othering = the weakling. We “are pre/destined” for bigger dreams. F*** the fear (foul language was intended to shake loosed old ethics and stoke his rah rah Mad Max base).

“No one listens until and unless we take up arms.” “Shoot ‘m. (Thailand toddlers at a day-care). Rape them, rob them (Thai pirates on Boat People). Results? record-high guns death. Killing as a way to get attention and be immortalized (9/11 martyrdom?).

This is for all lonely people on our lonely planet and On-line: faster connection, fewer commitment and minimum accountability (spam and hacking). Attention-starved and all spread thin. Before the internet, it’s existential loneliness (TV screen).

After the internet, it’s exponentially existential (myriads of “others” – just popped up per software recommendation – always and mysteriously “suits” our propensity and temperament without algorithms like Fisher Temperament Index in match.com).

Petabytes of personal data on X and Meta, Twitter and Tik Tok. Don’t ever call me “Fredo”. It’s the “n-equivalent”, like “gooks” and “illegals”. He who dies with the most “like” wins.

When I am weak, I am strong. Go ahead and call me “rooky gooky”. Strong” Saul-turned-“weak” Paul – a 180-degrees U turn – from “righteous kill” to “love is kind”. No wonder those in a lower caste empathize more – for the meek will inherit the Earth. Beggar shows beggar where (stale) bread is. At this edit, R.I.P. Pope Francis, Jesuit and champion of the downtrodden.

Meanwhile “Genius”, forsaking their stewardship, tend to exploit and extract, from Mother Nature and others – even in the name of Manifest Destiny – for personal gain. “Screw it, let’s do it”. Of all the money, at times borrowed, poured into building bombs, a tiny fraction finally is, unintended consequences, in the hands of common folks, taxpayers, in the form of ARPANET and GPS. Yeah! The equalizer 3.0.

Cazale was in four films that I am aware of. We don’t often think of him as an Oscar-winner for Best Supporting Actor or Meryl Streep’s boyfriend. He ‘d just “done time”, sweated and bald, slumping on the floor at the bank corner or ride in the front seat (Dog Day Afternoon).

We want Robert De Niro (or Michael the Marine) to return and save his fallen friends. Rambo-like. John Waye as Jesus. Revisited and white-washed history in Honorable Exit (or a banker who “saved” 113 Vietnamese, getting a kick and taking his time during “fifteen minutes of fame” e.g. obtaining intelligence from a hooker’s relative).

Yet, our uniform-clad hero hunter had his sudden “Fredo” moment, just like all of us (as he leaned back and hid out of sight in an airport taxi, skipping his own Welcome- Home party – feeling awkward and undeserving: “Johnson, how many babies you killed today!”). It’s one thing to pull a prank by taking on a dare i.e. running naked in the snow; it’s another to see or cause Kim Phuc running from real hot napalm like a Berkeley nude jogger.

In the end of The Deer Hunter, our decorated veteran, tried re-entry i.e. got a deer in crosshair. Unlike his subsequent failed Russian Roulette rescue mission, he got a choice: enough killing already! (My Lai, Song Thang, Song Be with napalm/agent orange). Recreational sporting once enjoyable, now self-projecting. Heroes got secrets too! Can’t get his friend back but he can let go the deer! Imago Dei. All creatures great and small.

So Catavina fades in on Clairton hillside, early 70’s scene. The feel and the fear of being seen as dim-witted – unlike 1945 Times Squares iconic kissing sailor and the nurse.” I feel a distance, far away”, he uttered to Meryl Streep, who was cleaning up after a no-show party. The last few inches are hardest, especially when she happened to previously pick your best friend over you (only to see him went AWOL).

Out-takes show congenial Fredo getting slapped around, tossing and throwing empty lunchbox in the air like Blue-Collar cap.

Every day is Graduation Day at the School of Steel. “This is for all the lonely people, thinking life has passed them by…” All the “Stevies” of Vietnam.

Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets.

Our elderly statesman, former President Carter, once told Charlie Rose he still regrets not sending enough choppers out on Eagle Claw, the Iranian hostage rescue. In the same vein, I couldn’t forget Operation Frequent Wind whose choppers couldn’t be rid of quickly enough.

Those who don’t act also have regrets. But perhaps less than those who do. Thankfully, we are living in a digital age i.e. more tolerance for risks and failing due to larger data set. Keep taking those selfies, until it’s right. Keep tweaking those EV batteries, redesigning those chips and testing the Beta software. Seth Godin once said that without all his previous unsold books, he would not have a hit. Revision and regret: revision makes better version while regret erodes confidence which leads to resign to fate.

BCG has a chart which shows people, leaders included, last longer than the companies they helped create. Top 10 companies now fluctuate just as quickly as the USA TODAY Top 10 books. Recently notable dot.com survivors grew into conglomerates e.g. Alphabet and Amazon, Alibaba and Apple, pathway that GM and GE once took.

Will these giants live down their own ITT-size regrets? We are talking about huge projects like human life extension, on-demand autonomous ride sharing, and space X. Google promises to design its phones and A.I. with users in mind – more bars and faster fiber to the curb. Apple maintains its lead in customer satisfaction, given stiff tariff at this edit.

From Frequent Wind success to Operation Eagle Claw failure, we learn that helicopters and instruments might tactically be well planned, but they are at the mercy of field variables such as sand and wind (in the desert).

I’d rather live in regrets for having acted than not at all, to live at the margin than underlive proper. A few more helicopters could have altered many lives, lessening the amount of regrets Carter’s included.

A lifetime of interaction reduced to just a name on grave marker. Something is hollowed out, a vacuum unfilled.

While living, we gave so much weight to feelings: anger, humiliation, humor, humility, assigning ill intention, assigning blame, false accusation, second-guessing and self-projection.

Just stressed out. Just figuring it all out. Then understood, finally (no finality to anything. Just an abrupt and unannounced end).

We are a mixed bag, lash out not on strength, but out of weakness (self-preservation). We were quick to see flaws in others, most conveniently, people close to us. Proximity breeds contempt. Distance makes the heart grow fonder.

Death put a nail on all of this. No more lingering, self-recrimination or regret. Find someone else to mutually commiserate. Drama on screen at least shows credits to actors after THE END. In life, we are conditioned to take down as opposed to build up, criticize versus praise. Bad news, especially fire and storm, make the news.

Here, at the place of final resting, one experiences loss. Warp and all. But loss. Eerie and prolonged absence. Terminally. Like a train at rest at the end of the line, no longer to be attended to. No more departure nor arrival. No luggage, no ride. No ticket.

Just immobile. At rest. All the striving, struggling and competing. A man/woman in full.

Sunrise or sunset, no difference! Being early or late? No difference.

Loved ones, once hugged or greeted, now just a name to be “viewed”. Folded and enclosed, three-dimension person to just a name, from left to right. Two dimensions with choices of font. Yet from our deepest, we recognize resemblance…the face (at arrival gate) the voice (long-distance collect call) and definitely the eccentricity (Killing Me softly…). In dreams and memories. When asleep or while awake.

My sister wouldn’t let anything stand in her way. Colloquial expressions that extinct: “noi cau” (getting angry), “duoc the” (on the roll).

My Dad exercised not at the gym, but in the woods, not punching bag but banana trees. He once swam and pushed a boat on which sat weeping folks among whom my mom, brother and a neighbor to safety.

My brother-in-law insisted on the rule of law (he made no effort to hide his contempt for Kissinger) yet once flanked on both sides by high-ranking “enemies” – forgiveness aside. Just human-to-human link (after having a few, tipsy and all).

And Mom. Blessed Mom. She was busy the whole time I could remember. 30-years’ worth of student workload, correcting mistakes, misspells and miscalculation. Class ratio 57:1. No wonder, my interaction was what left over of her day. Not to mention gender and generation gap.

Now, they are safely under snow-covered graves. Names spelled in accordance with and in the order, originally given: Last name, Middle and First.

Family names first. Individual last. Clan vs individual. Harmony trumps eccentricity.

97 per cent of the same gene pool, rice-fed and war-weary. Striking features similar laugh. Family.

Pew Foundation found 2/3 of people are still religious, mostly due to Covid (and larger forces at work, such as imminent death itself).

A majority of us believe there was a soul, an afterlife, a place of dwelling beyond death.

Just in case. It doesn’t cost anything to hedge the bet. To have faith in the unseen. No use to speculate.

Meanwhile, current address as we all know, is not our permanent address.

That permanent address is not on Amazon shipping label. In this case, it’s a Section. Serenity.

Un-visited graves. On losing loved ones. It hurts like Hell. One’s life is diminished, especially in Asian extended-families culture (Everything all at once etc…) Rest of life living in limping, underlived in fact. still structured but with bitter taste in the mouth (survivor’s guilt).

People as species, in an intergalactic struggle for survival.

On losing loved ones, we try to fill up the huge holes inside. We spot faces in the crowd, gray hair and bent back, on a walker or on wheels, waiting for a ride or being assisted at handicap parking. Deja Vu! Flash forward to our very selves. That’s when we cultivate and grow empathy, compassion and charity. Per Saint Paul, the last is the greatest.

Yet they don’t sell it on Amazon under C, after Books. Nor do they talk about it on Tik Tok.

On subject of loss. R.I.P. Play Misty for Me…..The first time, ever I saw your face…Sis, it must have been at the mid-wife hospital where I first sighted and followed your movement (still a young girl then and was not so sure about your newly born baby brother and all). Later, shadowing you to local convenient store, to create an opportunity for myself: the more you bought, the more likely I got those bonus lemon candies.

I must stop here, but as long as I still have a heartbeat, I won’t forget, you take me to first day of school, Ecole L’Aurore …Mom, ironically, started hers at nearby Elementary- busy tending to other people’s kids.

Y’ all nurtured and encouraged me. We’re chain-linked, like roots, on life raft, tearful and frightful, with minimal hope. Together, we’re with better odds to survive the Unknown. Now that losing you doesn’t feel so bad, since I know you already knew what it was.

Just as in Final Destination, the series, I had similar premonition: Tet 75 would be my last! (God knows I have tried: same time of the year, same place, but as Thomas Wolfe put it, “You can’t go home again”.)

Enrolling in pre-med, I was with a mission: to pass the entrance exam. Yet Tet got in the way. Per Oliver Todd’s Cruel April, diplomats and peace observers toasted to another stint in country, oblivious to its imminent collapse. Instead of cramming and burning the midnight oil, I celebrated Tet 75 in ambivalence and apprehension. After all, we had learned from Tet 68 i.e. things might not be as they seemed, sacred or not.

But being native and naive, I was torn: an uncertain future (Vietnamizing of the Vietnam War) vs a fleeting present (Vietnamizing Woodstock), pro vs anti-war (burning monk at my street intersection, and a burning Quaker – at the steps of the Pentagon).

Since I was not granted the luxury of an elite overseas slot (Colombo program to Australia or Exchange student program to the US, the only option left for me was the draft and death-by-attrition if I flunk the exam. Push/pull forces were at work overtime on my hormonal bursting body.

To ace the exam (which we all knew, not 100% meritocracy in war time), or to act on my premonition – that it would be my last Tet, a Tet I wished just like the ones I had previously experienced : extended families, deceased and alive, who surrounded and sheltered me from upheaval (GI’s deaths, VC’s deaths, neighbor’s death, Nightly news with body and ammo counts, classmate back but body part behind).

In short, it’s our turn to die without “mental reservation”, since the path of war was set.

Tet was the only occasion – more joyful – to see relatives from all over including the countryside, aside from Gio (ancestor’s memorial). Yet that nagging feeling was there while we ate our confiture.

Unable to cope with pressures, I punished myself! Shaving my head was to me, a form of self-mutilation and self-isolation. Then friends knocked. Then dances awaited. Pre-Tet, during Tet and Post- Tet celebration. Tango, Cha cha cha and yes, Rock before slow dance. So much for calling it a day.

My friends and I refused to admit, but we all sensed it. Might as well – self-inflicted (hair shred) and self- indulgent (nicotine inhaled) – our version of Sartre (I have seen a lot of tattoo and nose rings of late; modern youth reaction and rebellion – rage against the machine, “rage against one another”). Rumba on the floor, rumbles on the street. “Would you care to dance”. With each evening out, my dream slipped further away.

Outside, hustling and bustling. Inside, dizzying disco (be sure to wear white for better purple haze reflection): hair-down-to-the-knees (not mine, but my first friend at Penn State still had his) hence, the sexes indistinguishable in a Copernican merry-go-round. Seventeen, Dancing Queen.

How could I remember after all these years? I was resting between set, since Blue Danube, a Waltz number, was for the pros (a friend’s dad, a ballroom-dance instructor, showcased his advanced students).

In looking back, it’s our last Waltz, like the Band’s (RIP Garth Hudson).

Any jam session has its end.

President fled, Palace abandoned, Embassy looted, and home vacated. Even my dad was left behind, a whole decade long, like a ghost in our empty house. The only sadder sight was that of an exile Vietnamese lady practicing her partner-less steps in a dimly lit refugees-club on a weeknight.

Back to the week after Tet 75.

In a Science, Physics, Chemistry and Natural Sciences (SPCN) class, we got interrupted by a classmate who collected donation. She was with sincere heart, but short in public speaking. Even with shaved head and determination to tune out, I felt moved, and asked for the mike. We had a bucket full of cash that day for those less-fortunate seen camping out on campus.

Central-region refugees were pouring in, occupying our school yards, makeshift tents and blankets next to French-grown trees. Children were out, much like Gaza today. Eventually, we, givers joined in the same fate (stateless). I later ran into that same classmate in Indian town Gap camp where we both awaited outplacement, as in Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go.

Seeing my “party all night, study all day”, my brother, a pharmacist medic, injected Vitamin B12 then slapped me – like sending off a “Texan horse” to the wild. If it were to be our last, might as well.

We were so ignorant of the Cold War, Hot war or lukewarm ones. Per LBJ:” Asian boys ought to do it for themselves…” while nations took side, much like now e.g. N Korean in Ukraine. Their predecessors even joined in on one side, South Korean the other – ignoring signed Armistice a decade earlier (Vietnam War? American War? Korean War? with 3 million US servicemen/women on rotation, and close to that many of all races died – Blacks slightly and unfairly disproportionate.)

Who said it was just a Cold War (where built-up arsenal just got piled up unused). Kissinger drank Orange Juice, while picking out targets for his “Operation Breakfast” (said targeting Vietnam but coordinate switch mid-air to neighboring Cambodia – lately more tariff slapped than Vietnam’s). Darker skin endures more, always!

Hence, I felt that constant chill in the back of my neck. I worried for my family, friends. Not the medical-school dream. That was to be expected. But the dread of an imminent collapse, crack and crumble of then reality; shellshock and culture – shock; statelessness and uprootedness. Like “a complete unknown … like a rolling stone” to borrow an expression from Dylan (in years previous, I grew up contained).

For assimilation, I took on American persona (We Are – in jeans and T’s), printed my own “card visit” – as icebreaker, to bait dates over coffee the way Hare Krishna offered free roses. To a life 2.0 with two set of clothes and copies of birth certificate. My draft-deferred card still certified my being actively enrolled in our Pre-med program (so warring society at best could replenish its medic reserve).

All was not quiet on our front, however. A month before our own evacuation, in sheer panic and hysteria, the Highland retreated (Convoy of Tears) triggered mob madness. M-16’s turning against each other, pushed and punched, shoved and kicked. So much shooting and looting that my classmate, in the Air Force, had secured a slot to fly out, jumped off his overloaded plane.

Chaos. Carnage. Collapse.

Those sweat-soaked shirts outside the US Embassy tell all. Inside, the lucky ones entertained their restless children with paper airplanes made out of soon-defunct currency. Those same people couldn’t wait to be on a real airplane – squatting and staging in batches anticipating their heli-lifts.

A thousand-yard stare. No selfies.

We were utterly betrayed and abandoned. No “just one more chance, another dance”: boulevard empty, bunker erected. Eerily silent, slowly dying.

No oxygen, no ventilation, no aspiration, no destination. No time. After hopping on a barge, we rolled over and played dead – radio silent – human cargo in battery-conserving mode. Freight unpaid, recipient address (RFID) unknown, future and welfare a mystery. We were afraid the towhead would change his mind, or worse, we ours (at times, left to float, we thought that’s what it was; luckily, he went for fuel.)

Years later, as soon as I obtained my US passport, I flew back to join and assist those same folks – Barge People looking out for Boat People. As latest addition to the American story, one was to swallow pride and forget our past social status and standing, credentials and currency, calling card and country of origin.

Just put on a new identity (individualistic vs clannish), apply deodorant and Just Do It i.e. wear Nike since branding and manufacturing were all done for (ironically, manufactural origin is now Vietnam itself).

Unlike subsequent camps in the Philippines and Malaysia, we were at the time pampered on Wake Island with PX surplus (expired?) like Benson & Hedges Menthol, Fruit-of-the-loom underwear (irregular?) and frozen fish sticks. Some folks in D.C. just wanted to spend up that year’s pre-appropriated dollar.

“Do you know, where you going to…Do you like the things that life is showing you” played over Armed Force Radio.

Then Paul McCartney “Band on the run” by DJ portrayed by Robin Williams’ GOOOOOOOD Morning Vietnam. See, I had that premonition that if I didn’t go to the dance (live for the moment), my last, I would regret the rest of my days.

Back then, seventeen, Dancing Queens were all out and eager. They too sensed something. Perhaps with more a premonition and intuition than mine.

American band, American bomb and American PX. In black market via the backway, beer run, beef run by dog soldiers (per Robert Stone). We wouldn’t say we never had fun. But boy oh boy, what a stiff price and opportunity cost. When in war, party as if there were not tomorrow. Another serving of whatever, please. Like in the opening chapter of All Quiet on the Western Front (cigarettes as currency).

For tomorrow we will die. If not tomorrow, then the day after tomorrow. Two things one cannot do anything about: the past and death.

I last largely thanks to my mom, her guardrails, her prayer for peace, for the living or deceased.

As I remember and reflect on the events of those times, I want to be keeper of the flame. To pray that Peace might come, that many would have something to eat (fish sticks are OK). That all will be well. The body wastes away, animal instinct/premonition (to fight or to flight) exists, but our spirits God knows will remain – like He who always does. Marcus Aurelius knew this (that life is short). I know this, that Tet 75 was short.

Like A Quiet American, who I now am,” How I wished there had been someone to whom I could say I was sorry”.

Last Monday saw the anniversary of my dad’s passing. He somehow survived that dark decade, home alone. All those years, I was longing and looking for home, yet unable to return; BTW, that’s the legal definition of a refugee.

On my day off from relief work, I sat on the Hong Kong Victoria Peak in the summer of 81, looking in the direction home. Similar time zone, but miles apart. As if, had I stared hard enough, thousand yards out, no Google Earth, I could somehow hover past our roof, underneath sat my dad, in pajamas smoking half-cigarette.

From Tet 75 to Tet 25. For my siblings, dead or alive, my nieces and nephews, cousins and friends.

I remembered those document for the Red Cross to translate but in a hurry and panic, I forgot you. If there were “just one more chance, another dance” but we all know the race against time is one-way.

Boy oh boy; I can use another Vitamin B12 my brother boosted up this Icarus in his flight to a warmer Sun (on wings of wax). I remember because I needed to rest in between set to cool down.

In hindsight and my opinion, it’s my mom’s sincerest prayers that stirred us out of harm’s way, her protective instinct and spiritual deposit deflected our Final Destination. As she joined the very band of ancestors to whom she had often prayed, I, her reservist, step up to ensure the memory chain continue to churn, at least one more Copernican-like Waltz under yesterday disco ball.

Seventeen, Dancing Queen

https://www.yahoo.com/news/georgia-fire-chief-stopped-help-165440802.html

Fire Chief. Stopped to help. Shot to death. News like this don’t normally grab the headline.

Or currently, in California, Los Angeles to be more exact, firefighters are exhausting, overworked and hopefully, not under-appreciated.

I watched The Towering Inferno the other night and came away with a much deeper appreciation for those who “gave their lives so others may live”. It doesn’t hurt we’ve got a A+ class of actors e.g. Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, Faye Dunaway and William Holden among others.

It reminds me of the Titanic “I am the King of the World”….Roman Empire, Roman coins and grifter’s currency.

Of course, those who died by the way side, unsung heroes who “laid down their lives” are no longer around to display their Champion belts. All quiet on the Western front…I am sorry, I am sorry.

The measure of a man ranges anywhere from reflex to reflection, moments of triumph and loss, greed and grief.

We will not always take the elevator up to the Penthouse Suite. At times, it’s the lowly basement, with no ventilation and fresh air. Or on 9/11, played extremely well by Nicholas Cage, trapped under the rubble.

We will have to get use to it. Good Samaritan or seminarian, per a Hindu thought, we die our death, lonely, but authentic. Given current Social Media, the only fear we have is ourselves, its self-projection and self-illusion (ask “creators” what happened when Tik Tok go dark).

When people are stranded and needing help. A call to 9-11 might not be quick enough.

We’re called to living as good Samaritan and not as the ambitious seminarian on his way to an upgrade interview. Blessed are those who lose life …for they may find it. The paradox of life is what we wanted most (unseen) involves first losing everything (seen) as prerequisite.

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Inside CPU’s, clocks. They are instrumental to squeeze max performance out of those chip set. We want train, plane and automobile to arrive on time and on point at the speed of clock.

On the football field, except for Time-Out, the clock and the score board nudge the ball forward, most pressing and precious are those final few seconds. In life, off the field and off the computer, seasons mark time passing. Ground Hog Day.

Presidents take an oath every four years. Their administration clock starts right after the applause. A race against the National Debt clock (which by the way, rattles anyone who cares to look) and our internal biological clock, life expectancy and passages.

Well, except for Jimmy Carter, who seemed to have operated on a different time zone or time-out, if not eternity.

“Today, you will be with me in Paradise” says Jesus to the repentant thief.

By the time all blood drained out, eternity starts, for the lack of a better adverb, eternally (Infinity, like eternity, is a mental construct. No one has ever grasped it yet or come back to tell).

My high-school psychology teacher talked about “subjective time” vs “objective time” i.e. when we emotionally invest in waiting, let’s say, for a date to show, time seems to stretch. We want to speed up the clock (then out of ambivalence, we don’t).

Kairos is when we are lost in the zone, no longer lives under Chronos (clock) domain and spell. Artists ignore hunger or sleep to “complete” their pieces.

In a Clocking society, where time is money, we are subjected to and enslaved to Chronos e.g. waiting in line, first comes, first served, prologue, epilogue, Alpha, Omega, begin and end.

In the Orient, people entertain ghost e.g. burning paper money and josh stick or offering food to the deceased who are “home for the holidays”.

With AI, we are forced to operate at the speed of AI thought: If A then B, then C. Bill Gates will accordingly have to update his book: “At the speed of AI thought” as Ads compressed, lives measured by nano seconds.

“Today, you shall be with me in Paradise”, rewind, pause, lip-read (throat and tongue dry). Two unbelievers heard it, then a few days later, two followers confirmed it (via non-verbal table manner e.g. breaking the bread – motoring cues undiscernible yet by today’s AI…).

Greenwich Village of our Global Village is chosen as base line e.g. born at certain time EST, died PST with the hope of a re-incarnate life or eternal life, Paradise regained, Lunar New Year and garden variety of cults and sects. All compete for attention and supremacy. In Japan, there has been a call and sanction of Unification Church.

Globalization meant inevitable conflicts. The League of Nations (UN) and rules of law (international) barely hold. Notice: every time we see government in transition, people are treated as pawn (from Iranian hostages to Israeli hostages, from bombing of Cambodia to peace in Paris)

Let’s say, in Lost Angels city where Paradise can be regained (where “strategically, firefighters were pre-deployed for the worst of scenarios i.e. hillside burning”). Real-life version of Hollywood in Hollywood e.g. the Towering Inferno (from John Wayne to Steve McQueen).

Life imitating Arts. Artists donate to save lives. Live-Aid for Today. For America. Charity finally begins at home (World Kitchen in Rose Bowl arena). As it should. The West operates by the clock.

Alexis De Tocqueville says” In America no one bothers about what was done before his time i.e. with no concept of life (or lives) previous or follow. Robber Baron? What’s that. Ponzi? Who is that!

“Living for Today, yuh huh.” unlike people of other cultures, who live one life then the next, in circle, time and eternity intersected and converged from which the concept of territorial integrity which China and Russia are currently trumping could be used as pre-text for war. Paradise mind you is not geo-centric. It’s a promise albeit more real for the faithful and hopeful.

There exists a different dimension of time (since we seem to be made not just to convenient others) and that is most sacred of all: we are free to make choices, have more options and nuances than just simply binary. From the vantage of the future looking back we’re better each day, wiser each moment, and communicate more clearly and accurately as we accrue more data.

We don’t live or die by clock speed alone (even biological clock can be extended per exercise and nutrition). By wisdom of the word, repentance and remorse, we too shall be with Him (eternal Present) – like that cellmate thief.

President Carter seemed to “get” it, by his insistence to operate out of norm e.g. not “four more years”, but “a lifetime more” post-Presidency. With his passing, we all got a glimpse at exhibit A (Alt) to current convention e.g. walking down Pennsylvania Avenue.

What’s wrong with putting up a solar panel on the roof, or to barn-raise for poor people in the Deep South? We need to strategically pre-deploy an Army of builders to re-construct an alternate ending, a director’s cut for our on-going sad saga, an elegy for the city on the Hill.

In so doing, Today, we can experience partial Paradise. At the speed of AI clock. As long as we all “chip” in, squeeze out or ooze out more performance per person. It takes a village – with AI help, local and global, to educate young guys/girls, Afghan or Austrian. Or else, by default, we’ll see an anti-social Century, when individualism and ideology reign, without the need for neighbors and friends (who need them when we’ve got the phone and apps for every conceivable scenario 24/7 tic toc).

Like on the field, those last few seconds might decide the outcome of the game. Ours.

At times, due to the widening gap between Belief and Action, I tone down the Left side of the equation albeit still reaching.

Who wouldn’t want to live a fuller version of the ideal self?

Getting things done. Praised by the people. Projects completed, under promised and over delivered.

As it turns out, with so many balls in the air, we quickly find out we’re not magicians.

Balls get dropped and relationships neglected. Wild ride. I remember learning from a Chinese proverb e.g. ” a journey of a thousand miles begins…” Then today, laid to rest at his last, was our Nation’s leader, Nobel Prize winner and needless to mention, a carpenter at heart (Habitat for Humanity). Peter, Paul and Mary would be proud, with their folk songs, among which besides Puff the Magic Dragon, is “If I had a hammer”.

It’s been a while since we saw Amy Carter on Television. I remembered how close the family was, when issues of global importance was discussed at their dinner table (s/t about asking his daughter).

Then the crisis at the US Embassy in Tehran, with Terry Anderson blind fold. What a decade it was, just right after we celebrated our Bi-Centennial at 1976 ( I watched the fireworks from Philadelphia, courtesy of Bob, a camp counselor colleague, who let me stay with him in town, overnight from leave at Camp Akiba, Mt Poconos).

President Carter was truly a humanitarian. I could only volunteer for a few summers away from school, then contributed whatever little to Habitat. He meanwhile set quite a bar, in integrity, humility and love in action.

We’re forever in debt to his lived life, its transparency and truthfulness. I remember watching Charlie Rose, who asked ” what’s your regret?” question. Mr Carter’s answer:” I wished there had been more helicopters ” (for the rescue). Me too, on my way out of Saigon on its last day. We all have but not harbor regrets. We all have that Belief-Action gap. His was much narrower than mine. RIP.