Category: Our Great Kids
Since the fateful day that Darling’s ring landed in his cup, Harris’ life has done a 180. “This is what they call the American Dream,” he says. “I want to thank all the people that helped me out. I want them to see where all their efforts, blessings and kindness is going.”
Winter sports are justifiably popular in the frozen north. However,
such stuff can be terribly unforgiving of foolishness. Public domain.
I had one particularly unfortunate soldier when I was stationed in Alaska. We’ll call him Billy. Billy was a good kid, but he grew up with a dearth of positive role models. We were putting him out of the Army for writing bad checks, but that process takes a minute.
Our arctic military base sported a well-lit ski slope that was visible from all over post. The Army just teems with arcane rules. Included among the myriad of obscure dicta was a prohibition against farting around on the ski slope after hours. However, these were young American males. You can take the boys out of second grade, but you’ll never take the second grade out of the boys.
On this particular Friday evening, Billy and his mates had parked at the base of the ski slope and trudged up to the top with big inner tubes to do some after-hours, off-the-books sledding. Somebody spotted the mischievous scamps and alerted the MPs. The Army cops met the motley mob at the top of the hill and directed them to go elsewhere and do something else. My guys requested and received permission to make one last run to get back down to their vehicles. Cue the ominous music …
Everything is Physics
Billy launched down the sharply angled slope atop his inner tube. As it is not physically possible to maintain any semblance of directional control on such a primitive conveyance, he drifted off the track and struck a light pole a glancing blow. Fret not; there was no significant harm done … yet.
Billy bounced up in the air only to awkwardly remount his hurtling tube. This time, he was on his back, clinging for dear life with his legs flailing vertically in the air. It was in this inelegant configuration that his butt impacted the ski rack set in concrete at the base of the slope. He was traveling at, conservatively, three times the speed of sound when he sheared off that big piece of treated lumber with his rectum.
By the time his buddies reached his side, he had eviscerated himself through his anus and was in the midst of a grand mal seizure. Billy’s entrails had tragically become his ex-trails. Investigators discovered one of his testicles in the snow the following day. To put it mildly, Billy was in a pretty rough way.
Come dawn, I located Billy in the hospital. Before I went to med school, he was the person nearest death, but not technically dead I had ever seen. He miraculously survived the first few days and underwent his first of several surgeries.
Among other things, this ordeal earned him a colostomy bag. For those unfamiliar, a colostomy is a surgical procedure wherein your large bowel is plumbed through a hole in your abdomen to a bag on the outside.
Once complete, a colostomy leaves your butt free to heal, meditate, sleep, or whatever without further molestation. Surgeons perform them for a wide variety of very good medical reasons.
The Inimitable Power of Family
A combat unit is a tribe — a curiously dysfunctional tribe without any secrets. Although Billy was a poor soldier, he was a good kid. We all wanted him to thrive. Given the sordid circumstances, his separation proceedings were quietly binned. He became a barracks rat, spending his days nondeployable in the orderly room answering the phone. In this capacity, I recall he did a simply spanking job.
We all followed his progress from a distance but with legitimate interest. If nothing else, Billy’s travails reliably put our own problems in perspective. You take stuff like pooping for granted right up until it’s gone.
After several more surgical procedures, Billy finally had a test. His surgeons were going to insert a rubber ball in his butt and then start a clock. If he could hold the ball in place for a fixed period of time, they would reverse his colostomy, and he would get to poop like a normal person again. If he failed, then that bag would become his lifelong companion. Test day was a big deal, and everybody knew it.
As he departed for the hospital on the big day, Billy’s buddies slapped him on the back with heartfelt admonishments to “Be the ball, brother!” and “Crush that ball, stud!”
Billy returned a couple of hours later, looking spent but happy. When I queried him regarding the events of the day, he smiled and said simply, “Held the ball, boss.”
A short while later, Billy had his colostomy reversed. He was ultimately medically retired to receive a military pension that would span the rest of his days. All things being considered, I’d say he earned that. Billy had, after all, and against all odds, indeed held the ball.
Oscar-winner Gregory Peck was one of the most popular movie stars ever. His filmography includes epics like To Kill a Mockingbird, The Guns of Navarone, Twelve O’clock High, and Roman Holiday. He died in 2003 at age 87.
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Like most movie stars, Peck was a left-wing Democrat. It’s tough to comprehend why that particular job seems to attract Leftists so, but it does. He considered running against Ronald Reagan for the governorship of California in 1970 but demurred. President Lyndon Johnson stated that had he won re-election in 1968 he intended to offer Peck the position of Ambassador to Ireland. Peck, for his part, later admitted that he likely would have taken the job.
Despite starring in several violent movies, Gregory Peck was a rabid gun control advocate. He championed an international moratorium on nuclear weapons as well. These lofty ideals are laudable on the surface, I suppose, but utterly unenforceable. Giving up your guns as an individual or your nukes as a superpower is a great way to get your butt kicked on scales both small and large.
Now We Get Into Stephen Peck
Gregory Peck was married to Greta Kukkonen from 1942 until 1955. In 1955 he married Veronique Passani. He ultimately fathered five children. His sole daughter Cecilia is a producer, director, and actress. His grandson Ethan is an actor of some renown himself. While Ethan has played many roles on both the large and small screens, one of his most compelling was as Spock on Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. Ethan Peck’s dad is Stephen, Gregory Peck’s son by his first wife. Strange New Worlds is a great show, by the way.
Nepotism specific to Hollywood has a name. They call the successful offspring of successful movie personalities Nepo Babies. The presupposition is that acting is likely not really all that hard, and that having a recognizable name or face is a great way to break into the business. Examples include Jamie Lee Curtis, Nicholas Cage, Lilly-Rose Depp, George Clooney, Scott Caan, Hailey Bieber, Robert Downey Jr, Scott Eastwood, and Liv Tyler. Each of these stars is descended from show business royalty. As they say, the nut usually doesn’t fall far from the tree. And then there was Stephen Peck.
The Philosophy of Plenty
One of the interesting reasons we enjoy such social turmoil these days is that, for the first time in human history, we’re no longer consumed with just not starving to death. In generations past folks were too preoccupied with securing food, clothing, and shelter to fret overly about preferred pronouns and the nuances of social justice. If you’re raised in opulence surrounded by flaming Leftists one might be forgiven for growing up to become a privileged flaming Leftist yourself. However, sometimes the Real World offers a hard lesson in reality.
Stephen Peck came of age in the mid-1960’s. When Stephen’s draft number came up his rich, famous, politically-connected dad could have almost assuredly gotten him out of his obligation. However, to his credit, Stephen bucked up and enlisted in the US Marine Corps. He first donned the uniform at age 22.
Vietnam
The younger Peck enjoyed some proper leadership capabilities, and he was soon commissioned as a Lieutenant with orders for Vietnam. The elder Peck was a vociferous opponent of US military involvement in Southeast Asia. However, with the realization that his son was going to war, Gregory stood behind both him and the troops with whom he served.
Many Hollywood types could not differentiate between government policy and the instruments of that policy. It is our Constitutionally-protected right to petition the government for redress. If you don’t like whatever it is the government is doing, then by all means become active in the process and change it. However, don’t take your frustrations out on the lowly grunts who do the fighting and the dying. I can tell you from personal experience, Uncle Sam doesn’t care about your politics. He just expects you to go where you’re told and do what you’re trained to do. Geopolitical niceties matter little to a soldier who is wondering if he will live to see another sunrise. 
It would have been nice to have had Jane Fonda figure that out before she crawled up onto that North Vietnamese antiaircraft gun. It would have been almost as nice to have had her apologize for such rank stupidity once she matured enough to do so. However, that was a bridge too far for her.
She did express “regret” for allowing herself to be photographed manning the antiaircraft gun. However, she spoke proudly of her Radio Hanoi broadcasts, her support of a Communist victory, and her attacks on American servicemen as war criminals. As apologies go, that seems tepid at best. Personally, I wasn’t much moved by it. By contrast, Stephen Peck actually did the deed. He trekked overseas and saw the elephant for himself.
Stephen Peck Goes to War
Stephen is quick to point out that he didn’t volunteer. He was drafted, but he served with honor. He fought with the 1st Marine Division around Da Nang from 1969 into 1970. Like many combat vets, he had a tough time switching that off after he got home. His time in combat had a curious effect on his worldview.
Upon his return, Stephen launched himself into the only world he had ever really known. In 1972 he enrolled in a grad school cinema program with the intent of becoming a documentary filmmaker. He made a decent living in the film industry up until 1990 when he helmed a documentary film on the unique culture among homeless veterans living on the beach in Venice, California.
A Change In Perspective
Prior to that time, Peck had kept the details of his military service to himself. Literally nothing triggers a sense of admiration in me like learning that a new acquaintance served our country in uniform. However, in the sorts of circles in which Peck moved, telling folks that he had gone downrange for Uncle Sam was not the best ice breaker. Here is what he had to say on the subject, “I didn’t tell a lot of people I served in Vietnam because in those years you didn’t do that. Around that time those feelings about the war and Vietnam came back to me and I began to think about my experience and talking with other veterans, and produced a film about the combat experience.”
Meeting those homeless vets changed him. Among these hopeless souls he imagined his brothers with whom he had served in the Marines. He later said, “I was making documentary films so I was an observer on the problem but I wasn’t an active participant in solving the problem.” His felt so strongly about the subject that in his mid-forties he quit his job and enrolled at the University of Southern California to earn a degree in social work. His mission now became supporting and encouraging at-risk veterans.
And a Change In Priorities
Today Stephen Peck is CEO of US Vets, an energetic non-profit dedicated to serving homeless veterans. From their website–nearly 38,000 military veterans are homeless in the US today. That’s roughly 9% of the country’s homeless population. US Vets supports roughly 20,000 of those homeless vets each year. They have provided 393,093 bed nights for eligible veterans and have successfully placed 1,236 previously homeless vets in jobs. US Vets has secured 3,061 permanent housing solutions and served 440,141 meals. They have also provided some 57,782 counseling sessions to help homeless veterans get back on their feet.
US Vets has eleven different hubs supporting veterans around the country. They always begin with shelter. Once a veteran has a safe place to call home he or she can begin down the road to economic self-sufficiency. Along the way, US Vets offers services in support of mental health and wellness as well as job training and workforce development.
Solving the homeless problem among American military veterans is a Gordian task. It is easy to feel overwhelmed by its scope. However, Stephen Peck and US Vets attempt to solve this thorny cultural challenge one veteran at a time. It’s indeed a gargantuan problem, but these guys are steadily chipping away at it.
Ruminations On Stephen Peck
Stephen Peck is Hollywood royalty. Had he chosen to do so, he could have coasted on his famous dad’s trust fund and lived out a life of comfort and leisure someplace. However, unlike so many among the Leftist elites, Stephen Peck actually went to war. Along the way, he saw firsthand how Americans from all walks can come together for a common objective and make some powerfully enduring relationships along the way.
You can’t swing a dead cat in Hollywood without hitting some vapid idiot who is more than willing to shoot a brief public service announcement instructing everyone else in what they need to do to solve society’s many manifest ills. Once that PSA is a wrap they climb into their private jets and blast off back to wherever it is they spend their money. 
By contrast, Stephen Peck was sufficiently burdened by what he saw among homeless veterans that he quit his job, went back to school, and devoted the rest of his professional life to making a real difference. Despite the apparent disparity in their political leanings, I suspect his Old Man would be proud.
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An impressive young lady
Nothing like being up 5 miles in the air, exposed to extreme cold and having one of the best air forces in the world trying to kill you. Now Ladies & Gentlemen this is what I call REAL MEN at work!!!!! Grumpy
The man looked like the archetypal southern grandfather—skinny and old in immaculately pressed bib overalls and a button-down shirt fastened at the neck and wrists. He was never without a ball cap. I drove past his house every day as I went to work. Whenever he was outside he would wave. I seldom gave him a second thought. You wouldn’t have, either.
One day he came to my clinic complaining of arm pain. I asked him to roll up his sleeve and was surprised to find that his forearm was a veritable mass of scars. I inquired concerning the original injury, and he sheepishly explained that his arm was dirty with fragments from a German potato masher grenade. It had never been quite right since.
A Most Remarkable Man
At 0630 hours on 6 June 1944, this old man was crouched in a British Landing Craft Assault churning toward Omaha Beach as a member of the 2nd Ranger Battalion. He carried a Browning Automatic Rifle and landed in the first wave. Ever see the movie Saving Private Ryan? He did that.
He and I spoke often of the war. I explained that every time he came to see me as a patient he owed me a fresh war story. The man was old and a widower. I’m fairly certain he enjoyed the attention. Lord knows I enjoyed dispensing it. He once told me what D-Day smelled like. If you’re curious—a weirdly unique mixture of burnt cordite, petroleum, and blood.
He obviously survived the invasion as well as the hell of the bocage country that followed. He lost two toes in the Bulge and met General Patton twice. He said the man had a presence. He picked up the frags in the Hurtgen Forest. He despised that place.
War Story
My buddy was once hidden in a ditch on a reconnaissance patrol feeling out German strength for Patton’s Third Army. He said the big German tanks were roaring past almost close enough to touch. To his credit, he didn’t describe them all as Tigers. Most did, but, then again, I am in no place to judge.
He said a motorcycle with a sidecar rumbled up and stopped right in front of him. The driver remained on the bike, while the Kraut officer in the sidecar stood up and peered in the opposite direction with what he described as an exceptionally nice pair of binoculars. My friend looked left and right and saw no handy German tanks. Rising up out of the grass he leveled his BAR and emptied its 20-round magazine, killing both of the German soldiers. He then “scampered”( his word) out onto the road and retrieved the binoculars.
His patrol leader was livid. He said the ass-chewing he received was simply life-changing. Then he got a conspiratorial look on his face, leaned forward, and said with a wry grin, “But I still got those binoculars back at the house…”
Subtle Wounds
With the war finally over, he took a troop ship back across the Atlantic. Enroute they hit a storm. He said that was the most terrified he had been during the entire war. He claimed it was worse than D-Day. He explained that after all he had seen and done he was afraid the ship was going to capsize and that he would drown in the icy cold waters of the dark Atlantic.
Once he finally got home, his mother threw him a party. Friends and family came from all around to celebrate the fact that he had made it home safely and intact. They all stayed up visiting until late, and then all the guests gradually went home.
His mom then took him to his bedroom. She had maintained it exactly as it had been three years before when he had left Yocona, Mississippi, to become a Ranger. She hadn’t changed a thing. She tucked him in bed and then went to her own room, changed into her night clothes, and climbed into bed herself.
In his words, “I sat there in the dark staring at the ceiling, and I just couldn’t do it. So I got up and tipped outside to the woodshed and fetched myself a shovel. Then I dug a hole in the backyard and crawled into it. I found that after a year under fire I could no longer sleep above ground.”
He continued, “My mom heard the noise and came out to investigate in her nightgown. When she found me curled up in that hole and realized for the first time what I had been through and how it had changed me, she fell to her knees and wept.”
Deep Magic
How does one respond to that? I had no words. I just sat there, took his hand, and tried desperately not to embarrass myself.
I took my friend for granted. I assumed he would always be there—right down the road, waving at me as I went to work. But that was obviously not the case. We are all living under a death sentence.
My buddy developed a vicious aspiration pneumonia and then, just like that, he was gone. With the crystalline clarity of hindsight I now appreciate that this quiet little invisible man was actually something quite remarkable indeed.