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Authors: Vin Packer
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work; a job had to be done. That was the way Stanley felt about it.
Sometimes when you did a job well (like last week when he helped lay Sandran in the Meens’ kitchen, and Mrs. Meen kept saying afterward, Oh, it’s so nice! It really is nice! Oh, my, Stanley, thank you!) your satisfaction was in the reaction of other people. Delighted astonishment, in Mrs. Meen’s case; a direct and forthright compliment from someone like Dr. Mannerheim; a dollar pressed into his palm by Freddy Fulton; or from Min Stewart the offer of a cold beer which he could have out on the back steps in the summer, or in the warm kitchen in the winter.
During the war, of course, it was best of all. There were medals, but it wasn’t just the medals — it was before the medals. It was jumping out of that foxhole with mud on your face and some kind of crazy wings on your big, dirt-clogged fatigue boots, pulling the thing on the hand grenade and shouting “Yah! Yah! Yah!”, as though you were just routing out some stupid crows from a corn patch, instead of Germans.
“Boy, you sure have got guts!” someone would say.
“Man, are you out of your G.I. mind! The chances you take!” Someone else.
And once an officer who didn’t even know a single thing about Stanley Secora took one long look at him, and said he would be good front-line material. A thing like that could make Stanley’s day.
• • •
Stanley never knew where he got his nerve, but he knew he had it.
Every time he did something to win himself another medal, he knew no fear. He even began to believe nothing could touch him, not a bullet, not a mine, not a bomb — nothing, if he, Stanley Secora, had the bull by the horns. That belief kept him returning to the front; and ultimately returned him to an astounded, but nonetheless wildly pleased Cayuta…. Stanley Secora, the third-most-decorated soldier of World War II. The American Legion Band met his train. Min Stewart’s husband, who was still alive then, offered him a permanent job at the drug store (which he would have accepted if it were not for the fact he would have to work alongside Louie Stewart) and the Knights of Columbus had a Stanley Secora Night, with a huge bigger-than-life photograph of him all blown up and wired around the basketball net in the basement of Saint Alphonsus Church.
Stanley sat on the green bench that morning in May, smiling to recall those days. What was that song playing over and over that summer he was a hero? Got no something, got no hum, dum de dum de? Then he remembered. Got no dia-monds, got no rings, but I’ve got plenty of ev-ry thing: I got the sun in the morning and the moon at night. That was it. It always reminded Stanley of good old 1946.
Beside Stanley on the bench were two boxes, one containing two pieces of coconut ice (candy he had made himself) and the other the first three chapters of his novel. The candy, he realized, was a romantic inspiration, and he felt a trifle sheepish about going behind Mr. Wealdon’s back. He could not justify his intentions toward Gloria Wealdon; he no longer tried. He was sick, silly, down-to-his-toes in love with the author of
Population 12,360,
and that was that. The only thing that
did
make him feel better about his date with her that noon, was the fact that Love was not his sole motivation. There was his novel, which he wanted her to read; he called it
A Vet’s Memories.
Stanley Secora, six months ago, would never have dreamed of getting anyplace with Milo Wealdon’s wife. Women (when he thought about them
that
way) had always been a source of painful embarrassment to Stanley. It was because he felt clumsy and ugly in their presence. The summer of 1946, when he was at his peak,wearing his uniform around Cayuta with his medals pinned to it, some of the Polish girls from the Falcon’s Ladies Lodge had crushes on him. This did nothing to inspire confidence in Stanley. They were all fat and pimply and left-over, and instead of being flattered by
Sometimes when you did a job well (like last week when he helped lay Sandran in the Meens’ kitchen, and Mrs. Meen kept saying afterward, Oh, it’s so nice! It really is nice! Oh, my, Stanley, thank you!) your satisfaction was in the reaction of other people. Delighted astonishment, in Mrs. Meen’s case; a direct and forthright compliment from someone like Dr. Mannerheim; a dollar pressed into his palm by Freddy Fulton; or from Min Stewart the offer of a cold beer which he could have out on the back steps in the summer, or in the warm kitchen in the winter.
During the war, of course, it was best of all. There were medals, but it wasn’t just the medals — it was before the medals. It was jumping out of that foxhole with mud on your face and some kind of crazy wings on your big, dirt-clogged fatigue boots, pulling the thing on the hand grenade and shouting “Yah! Yah! Yah!”, as though you were just routing out some stupid crows from a corn patch, instead of Germans.
“Boy, you sure have got guts!” someone would say.
“Man, are you out of your G.I. mind! The chances you take!” Someone else.
And once an officer who didn’t even know a single thing about Stanley Secora took one long look at him, and said he would be good front-line material. A thing like that could make Stanley’s day.
• • •
Stanley never knew where he got his nerve, but he knew he had it.
Every time he did something to win himself another medal, he knew no fear. He even began to believe nothing could touch him, not a bullet, not a mine, not a bomb — nothing, if he, Stanley Secora, had the bull by the horns. That belief kept him returning to the front; and ultimately returned him to an astounded, but nonetheless wildly pleased Cayuta…. Stanley Secora, the third-most-decorated soldier of World War II. The American Legion Band met his train. Min Stewart’s husband, who was still alive then, offered him a permanent job at the drug store (which he would have accepted if it were not for the fact he would have to work alongside Louie Stewart) and the Knights of Columbus had a Stanley Secora Night, with a huge bigger-than-life photograph of him all blown up and wired around the basketball net in the basement of Saint Alphonsus Church.
Stanley sat on the green bench that morning in May, smiling to recall those days. What was that song playing over and over that summer he was a hero? Got no something, got no hum, dum de dum de? Then he remembered. Got no dia-monds, got no rings, but I’ve got plenty of ev-ry thing: I got the sun in the morning and the moon at night. That was it. It always reminded Stanley of good old 1946.
Beside Stanley on the bench were two boxes, one containing two pieces of coconut ice (candy he had made himself) and the other the first three chapters of his novel. The candy, he realized, was a romantic inspiration, and he felt a trifle sheepish about going behind Mr. Wealdon’s back. He could not justify his intentions toward Gloria Wealdon; he no longer tried. He was sick, silly, down-to-his-toes in love with the author of
Population 12,360,
and that was that. The only thing that
did
make him feel better about his date with her that noon, was the fact that Love was not his sole motivation. There was his novel, which he wanted her to read; he called it
A Vet’s Memories.
Stanley Secora, six months ago, would never have dreamed of getting anyplace with Milo Wealdon’s wife. Women (when he thought about them
that
way) had always been a source of painful embarrassment to Stanley. It was because he felt clumsy and ugly in their presence. The summer of 1946, when he was at his peak,wearing his uniform around Cayuta with his medals pinned to it, some of the Polish girls from the Falcon’s Ladies Lodge had crushes on him. This did nothing to inspire confidence in Stanley. They were all fat and pimply and left-over, and instead of being flattered by
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