National Veterans Foundation

by Richard R. DiPirro

Welcome home. Welcome back, sir, and welcome home. Welcome back to the world you once knew, which looks entirely different to you now, which resembles the world you lived in before but seems drawn like a cartoon now and scored with music you’ve never heard. Welcome back to a civilization you couldn’t wait to get back to, but isn’t what you remember at all. There are people smiling and shaking your hand and slapping your back – actors in a bad play about the life of someone who looks a lot like you. There are signs and banners and parades and picnics and they whirl around you. You are an observer at the center of everyone’s attention. “Support the Troops!” They yell until they’re hoarse – waving flags and driving cars with yellow magnets, never trying to explain why they weren’t with you there, suffering 130 degree heat, shaking scorpions from their boots and feeling the weight of sand settle in their lungs. Welcome home, sir.