Brownmoor School - El Alacran Yearbook (Phoenix, AZ)

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You are silent as you watch your son and his front-yard leave for training camp. His guileless aggressors slightly irritates you, but isn't he just a boy? His letters from the camp somehow reassure you - my son will be home, my son will finish college, but there is perpetually that intangible thread of fear and doubt. Then your fears and doubts are confirmed and intensified - and active duty - Now you are not exactly sure what happened - you have had only one short and scribbled letter from him, and that was three months ago. Automatically your mind begins to form a picture of the possible cir- cumstances. Your son among hundreds of anonymous uniformed boys of his own age, dauntless before the cam- ouflaged enemy. Heat, exhaustion, fear, hunger - death always in their wake. Bombs exploding, illuminating everything for a second, and then - darkness. Suddenly, a bullet burries itself in his chest, then his world be- comes darkness, then his world becomes God's. You reread the words on the crumpled yellow piece of paper . . . Missing in action, and you want to know - why your son? Can anyone condone war to you, and what's more, can anyone condone war before 9 God . The cry of a baby as it gasps for its first breath, The smile of a young child as it gains hope from its mother, The self-conscious laugh of a teen-ager on her first date, The radiant look of a bride at her wedding, The anxious feeling of a husband pacing the floor, waiting for his first child, The tender half-smile on a mother's face as she sees her first-born, married, The peaceful expression on the face of one destined for greater things: All those are life. Sue 56 -lyme .da 7764-ze 56. .OJ Age. What is life? ls it the glorious opportunity of which poets write? They say it is in human hands - we act - or retract. Is it the Cest La Vive which people quote? - or the stoical submission with which X they accept iniustice and error? Life is the chance offered to all - few attempt to -grasp it, fewer attain it, and - none keep it! Smut Way: L56 f 1 if 'I' 5 0. -

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I 744 'iawwz 'v,.Wm,' N I stand this day upon a threshold. I do not know what the tomorrows that are mine They say he IS Insane' WIII IDIIIIQ' Hesiiclhugeworld of his ow I can but look back upon the days and years But -1 II' that I have spent. Even as I stand here this day, the minutes that I try in vain to grasp, are slipping through my fingers, and I am left only - Memories. Is he insane or Far ahead of our comprehension? How do we know? For - Are we not in a world of our own? God, give me the strength to take the time who are we Io Iudge That You have graciously granted me, and let me Insanny? Spend it wisely instead of wasting it foolishly as , I have done before. So, when I stand upon the next threshold that Beckons me to the vast unknown called Eternity, I will be ready for that life with the knowledge That I have lived this one fully. SWM 20464 '57 7f Zoe Wodd flow' H H add '7 7. 7. I4 If you would allow - Wh Sh Id' ar k M cate W I would tell of the Jhatoio I2 di or Sa I was confronted familiar glow when I see you smile Why shguldpl worry. YI xiii' gllbobiem. and your eyes smile, too. WIWY 'lol be 9aY? unaware I If you wcgluldlallow - ' . . I woul te I of how Does it matter if they try, Thal Ihey loo . and fail in the attempt? Had a Pfoblem- I bl?:1gI:gd?hLL!IIsI saw You I ' f I1 , - . . VIE? gill gggeangxemptr The problem? as though you were wanting. one mess, Never an emotional moment An Uncomforlable feellng II you woUId allow - shall sit Upon mY Soul Experieneed by all- bIfI:hYo:I land I are I'Il not think of their feelings, :II SLI' gave' ,P Calmness is my goal. Tien - ee I e 50' ecame aware. I , VH not care about 'hem They too were made aware. nor help them find the light, Now - f , d I'II simply watch them stumble by, We are Hen S' The problem,- Solved. but - - - Could I sleep at night? some QW, '56 .lynn gamma '57 A12 V gp . .9 Can we excuse and condone war before countless mothers and fathers who have lost their sons IH the quicksand of war? Can we iustify war before God? It is dusk, and another ordinary day has almost passed when a delivery boy in his over-starched uniform hesitates before the wrought-iron numbers on your gate. The gate is still swinging as he punches the door-bell, then - Sign here, please. Uncertain, you reflect for an instant about the possible contents of the telegram, then you open it. Your entire world freezes about you as you read the final words - Missing in action. Almost instantly you are conscious of the mental vacuum that is forming from disbelief and hostility. Then slowly you begin to think of your son. A blond-haired boy iust eight, clad in a helmet and clutching a wooden machine gun, stands threatening his playmates who, with their own machine guns, are appearing, from the four corners of the front yard. Stay where ya are, or ya're going to get it . . . bang! then only a few years later - war becomes a reality.

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