A History of Mammals
by
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During the dead eye war in Vietnam soldiers could fly anywhere on standby. Go to any airport and there were several hundred soldiers waiting, almost always able to get on a flight - I never had a problem at any rate. If you were a soldier you were on a low cost priority list because the work of death goes on twenty four hours a day, yes it does. In a hurry, always in a hurry. Not much time to waste in airports on a fourteen day leave, or a two day T.D.Y. to your next post. There wasn't time or money to waste and if the airlines could fill their planes up at half price then so be it, they would rake in some of that boom town war money too. Airports in the late sixties probably looked like train stations in the early forties all with soldiers scurry scurry going here there home overseas to a thousand places as small as one syllable. Soldiers with medals and badges and scars - the combat soldiers who keep washing washing, but are never able to clean off the red blood of death and the scars, the scars, the thick scars on the soft flesh of the brain . . . And there were soldiers like me, like all new and clean and stupid. Watching the vets in awe, seeing the tired eyes, the cut right through you look of a combat vet. For me it wasn't the worshipful awe of a hero it was the awe of 'f--- you made it through' and the nervous gut wow of ignorance . . . There I was, all new with orange circles behind the W.O.C. (warrant officer candidate) brass on my hat and collars and lapels and shoulders like "here I am", the orange signifying that you had solold, which, to another warrent officer candidate was the badge of a right of passage, but to everyone else just looked like the orange circles of a creamsicle salesman. And then when I saw a real pair of wings I'd gawk in envy and just knew I'd wear them some day . . . Fortunately that bulls--- thought didn't last long . . . But on that day in late December of 1969 I didn't know how wrong I was about those wings - the bloody f---ing future . . . Billy Crupp lived in Charleston, S.C. I flew there after a Christmas leave with the mother father brother sister-in-law family time in Seattle. All nervous chat, avoiding talk of war and the bags of bodies coming home each day, let alone the bodies of Vietnamese stacking higher and higher touch the sky, no no, not to be talked about. But there was love and hugs and what is needed most by all mammals - a friendly atmosphere, security . . . So there I was in old Charleston airport with Billy after the long fly from Seattle, the two of us planning a trip from there to Ft. Wolters, Texas in his 64 Camero - on the way we would pick up Ferland who’d left his Porsche at the base over the holiday leave. On the way to the airport parking lot we passed soldiers, of course and the suits of business men and women and a few hippies with long hair and bellbottoms and all manner of bright color patchwork sunglassed psychedelic peace symbol people, people I felt like I knew, that I felt close to because up until a few months before, I'd been one. Anyway, there I was in my uniform so I could fly standby and Billy was in civilian clothes, but with my haircut bald head and when we passed the group of four or five hippies I flashed them the peace sign and without a flinch they all flipped it back to me and then a fist of right on and we all felt kind of good brotherly and all. Then, just before the main entrance, here was this guy in a crumpled suit and short hair, selling a newspaper of some sort and he said "Hey pig, kill anybody today?" and me surprised a little walk by, but Billy, little Napoleon Billy stopped. With a southern drawl he said "What'd you say, boy?" This guy was a good foot taller than Billy, but Billy was one little macho dude. "I wasn't talking to you" says he and Billy, "Yeah, well he's ma friend and if you talk to him you talkin’ ta’me." "So you're a baby killer, too?" The guy says. With me holding Billy back, because he was just about to jump at this guy he says, "Look, man we're no different than any body else heah; we either join or we're drafted and anyways even if I do kill a baby sometime it's because I'm protecting assholes like you". "Protect yourself big brave baby killer, don't blame your murders on me." Two cops walked up just then. One of them said "What's the Problem?" Billy said "Nothin’, Officer." He looked at me and said "It does smell like s--- in here, though, doesn't it?" at that the guy says "Big tough baby killer" and I say to Billy "Come on let’s go," or something and we start to leave. As we we're leaving the guy in the suit spit at us – Bring the blood forth abundantly like waters, bring it forth in a flowing all purple from the side of the head and arms and the deep blue of bruised skin. Bring it forth like the waterssssssss – There was quick movement from one of the cops, the one that had been hitting the palm of his hand with a baton. The sound was a slap of skin and a sick thud of wood on muscle and bone crack. The guy in the suit fell to the floor on his butt and held his neck and said "Pig!" and the pig hit him again on the arm and leg and the suited guy fell on his side saying "Okay, okay, ouch ouch." "You want to press charges?" the other cop asked Billy and me all calm and relaxed like this is an everyday thing. "No," I said and Billy said "Na, Officer," and we left while they put information in their little black books all in lines and columns based on state secrets of protocol and there I was sick, I mean physically sick at the violence I'd just seen, ready to puke but holding it down, walking away thinking about what I'd seen all bloody, thinking that I was expected to do worse things than that where they were going to send me and not only that, but I was suppose to be protecting the rights of this guy who'd just been beaten for exerrcising those very rights.
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About the Book
In the tradition of Thomas Wolfe, Jack Kerouac, and James Joyce, A History of Mammals transcends the usual "this is my life" biographical novel by showing us the English language can sing and not just describe. Based on Mr. Monigold’s experiences and antiwar activities in the United States Army from 1969 to 1971, A History of Mammals is a unique look at a time and place that most of us have never imagined. It is as much poetry as it is prose. Starting out as a cadet in helicopter flight training, we follow a 19 year old soldier through, not only the trials and tribulations of growing up, but growing up in a nation at war. We follow along as our hero's social, sexual and political awareness blossoms into what one can only describe as "unique," culminating with his refusal of orders for Vietnam. It is a journey through a military that was as divided as the nation, about a war that is still being debated. There have been no books I am aware of that tell the story of antiwar G.I.’s during the Vietnam conflict, and very few that tell a story like Mr. Monigold does. -Seattle Arts Review-
About the Author
A native of Seattle, Washington, W. W. Monigold is a poet, playwright, and novelist. His poems have been published and performed in the United States, Canada, Ireland, Great Britain, and France. His plays have been performed in Seattle; Portland, Oregon; and Los Angeles. He lives with his partner, Anne, of twenty years and their cat, Cowboy.