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by Larry Moss
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“Don’t Mean Nothin.”
I’ll never forget those three words for as long as I live. They were indelibly etched in my memory fifty-five years ago and have run through my head a million times since. Each time they do, I flash right back to where, when, and under what circumstances I first heard them. It was early October, 1968, and I was a twenty-two-year-old infantryman serving in Vietnam. Upon my arrival, I was assigned to D Company, 5/46th, 198th Light Infantry Brigade, Americal Division. Our home base was LZ Gator in Chu Lai just south of Da Nang. Having been in-country for less than a month, I was a “cherry” or a “FNG” (fucking new guy), as the seasoned grunts derisively called us. They hated us. And for good reason, too. To them, we were nothing but a menace and a dangerous liability who just might get them killed.
Most of them tried like hell to keep their distance from us. But try as they might, we all fought together side-by-side—grizzled combat veterans and FNGs—fighting for our lives as a squad, platoon, or company. As an FNG who was scared to death, I resolved to learn from the experienced guys as much as I could as fast as I could. I knew from the get-go it was either that or a body bag. Simple as that. And I was committed heart and soul to not letting it be the latter.
One hot, steamy morning my entire company was sent out on a search and destroy mission in our AO somewhere in I Corps. A bunch of Hueys flew us to our drop off point. As we jumped out of the choppers, we came under fire immediately. Shots were ringing out from a nearby tree line and things got pretty intense real quick. As inexperienced as I was, something in my gut told me that this day might not end well. The enemy fire went on for what seemed like an eternity. It was deafening, frightening, and a shock to this FNG’s system. I was getting my first taste of the war in Vietnam. This wasn’t newsreel footage; this was the real deal.
Finally the gunfire stopped, and it got eerily quiet. We all held our individual positions for a while until we were confident it was safe to regroup. When we did, word spread quickly that a couple of guys had suffered minor injuries and two were KIA.
When I walked over to gather with my platoon, I found myself just steps away from one of the guys who had been killed. He was lying flat on his back with his eyes wide open. I saw that a round from an AK-47 had entered his chest so close to his heart that he most likely died immediately. He looked to be only eighteen or nineteen years old. Just a teenager for god’s sake. I stood over him for a few minutes trying to take it all in. Moments later, my platoon sergeant, who I knew only as Sarge, came over to see for himself. He was a quiet, battle-tested grunt on his second tour in Nam. After a quick examination, he looked up, and as our eyes met, he paused, took a deep breath and said, with no apparent feeling whatsoever, “Don’t mean nothin.” He took a couple of steps, stopped, looked back and with that one-thousand-yard stare, said it again: “Don’t mean nothin.”
I was dumbstruck. Completely blown away by what I just heard. How on earth could he say that? Where was the empathy, the compassion? As I stood there reeling in a surreal state, a couple of other guys came over to see who it was. To my absolute astonishment, after taking a brief look, they both muttered “don’t mean nothin” and walked on. I just stood there in disbelief and confusion.
I was shaken to my core. My head was spinning. How could they say that?
After a while, we began to move out towards our destination. While plodding along for a couple of hours, all I could think about was what I had seen and heard earlier in the day. I went over it in my head again and again. I was desperately trying to make sense of it all.
It wasn’t until much later that day that I finally began to develop an inkling of understanding of why they said what they did and what those words really meant. I figured out it wasn’t personal. It wasn’t cold. It wasn’t callous. I realized that seemingly heartless expression was simply their way of coping with the deaths of their fellow grunts. It was their emotional shut-off valve. Somehow, they were able to shove these horrific experiences into the deepest recesses of their psyche and dismiss what they witnessed.
Everything I had seen and heard that day began to really sink in. And the more I thought about it, the more I accepted their stoic reactions to death and grief. I started to understand that for these combat veterans, saying that phrase out loud somehow permitted them to let go of their real feelings. It allowed them to file away their emotions and reactions… at least for now. I came to believe that doing so sustained them throughout their tour. This made it possible for them to continue fighting a brutal and bloody war.
As I began to drift off to sleep that night, I knew that on this day the war in Vietnam had become a stark reality for me. I had been in-country for less than a month, but I had now seen its carnage and horror up close and personal. I was initiated. I was a member of the sacred brotherhood of combat infantrymen. Lying on the ground, weary from the day’s events, I wondered about so many things. Mostly, though, I wondered if with eleven months left in my tour of duty, I would become so inured to the war that, I, too, would someday find myself uttering those same three words—”don’t mean nothin.”
Truth be told, for the remainder of my tour, saying those words out loud was a bridge too far for me. Even though I understood their meaning and contextual usage, I just couldn’t allow myself to say them. In my post-army life however, I must admit that I have silently invoked that phrase many times when dealing with the loss of a loved one or dear friend. Strangely, doing so has provided me with considerable comfort. And each time it has been October, 1968, all over again.
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Larry Moss was born and raised in Chicago. Among the last of the Mad Men generation, he worked at major advertising agencies in Chicago and San Francisco as a copywriter and Creative Director. Upon his retirement in 2006 he returned in earnest to his first love— playing jazz piano. He has released five CDs and recently published a musical memoir. Today, he maintains a steady gig at a popular local restaurant near his home in Mill Valley, California.
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