A Soldier Comes Home for Christmas

"My son Billy is coming home from Korea today. He was injured fighting communists. We'll be celebrating Christmas together this year."

It was Christmas 1954 in Thelma Johnson's room at the convalescence home, and her son Billy was coming home from the war. These facts are remarkable for two reasons. Everywhere outside Thelma Johnson's room it was Christmas 2004 (everyday was Christmas 1954 to Thelma) and her only son, Lefty, actually was a Korean War veteran who had indeed already returned on Christmas 1954, with only his right hand. After ten years of trying to fit into the world he had left behind, Lefty determined the world had actually left him behind, and he gave up. For the last forty years, he had been just another veteran living on the streets drinking too much cheap wine. Nobody in the homeless community or at the Downtown Rescue Mission where he sometimes slept knew Lefty's real name, or whether he had any living relatives. The monotony of each passing day began to lend a dream-like quality to Lefty's existence, and while he knew it wasn't Christmas 1954, on many days he couldn't say exactly what day or year it was. Each day was very much like the day before, and every tomorrow would be very much like today.

After Lefty had lost both feet to gangrene one summer, the VA was able to provide him with a second-hand wheelchair, which Lefty referred to as his "retirement bonus." He would sometimes wave all three stumps in the air and call out, "Beats the heck out of a gold watch. How's a gold watch going to help an old forgotten cripple get where he needs to go?"

If Lefty had known, and assuming he would have cared, his wheelchair could have easily taken him the mile and a half down Main Street to Sunnydale Convalescent Center, where his mother had been waiting for his Christmas visit every day for the past five years. After her last bout with diabetes the doctor amputated her lower right leg, and now Thelma seldom rose from her government issued wheelchair. It was a fine wheelchair, very much like Billy's, although truth be told, it really belonged to the home and would be passed on to the next needy patient after Thelma's eminent death. At 102, Thelma was the oldest patient at Sunnydale. She had not had a visitor, phone call or letter since her arrival, not counting the occasional newspaper or television report of her continued survival as the most elderly person in three counties. She viewed these strangers as an inconvenience and never failed to fret continuously so long as they were present.

"I hope all these people are gone before Billy gets home; he didn't want any fuss for Christmas this year. Did you know he's coming home from the war today?"

On Christmas Eve, Lefty missed the five o'clock cutoff for those who wanted to spend the night in the homeless shelter. He wheeled into a nearby alley that he frequented on occasions such as this, when he was too late or too tipsy to pass the intake specialist's inspection for the privilege of spending the night inside. Truthfully, it was a bitter night, and the shelter would have gladly made exception for Lefty. Would the receding warmth of the last half pint of cheap wine be the bottle's final deception for Lefty? Unable to accurately assess the cold, and therefore the danger, Lefty fell asleep in the alley, eventually slipping out of his chair to lay face down in a snow drift. The combination of the cold and the wine caused a deeper and deeper sleep, culminating in a dreamless alcoholic stupor where his breathing and heart rate dipped dangerously low.

Two patrol car officers spotted Lefty on their first daylight circle of downtown. As they began to argue about whose turn it was to pull "popsicle" duty, and the paperwork that went with it, Lefty moved. A severe case of hypothermia had left him alive, but just barely. Hoping to at least push the DOA paperwork somewhere down the line, the officers acted with more enthusiasm than usual as they requested paramedic transportation to County General for "one ice block to thaw, and step on it."

Thelma, at the very same moment, was being transported to County General from the opposite direction, due to complications arising from a particularly stubborn case of pneumonia. Basically, she couldn't breathe.

In adjoining emergency examining areas, separated by a thin cotton curtain, Thelma and Lefty lay side by side, nearly within arms reach. It was the first time they had been in the same building since the day Billy quit trying, nearly four decades ago. Thelma was responding well to the emergency treatment, and it seemed likely that she would be released that afternoon. She was resting quietly, half listening to everything around her, but mostly thinking about how nice it would be when Billy got home. She hoped he wouldn't be angry if she was not there to greet him. Lefty, on the other hand, did not fare so well. Nearly dead when the paramedics picked him up, it was now merely a case of following protocol: the death pronouncement, the certificate, and so on.

"How do you like that?" the youngish looking doctor remarked. "This poor fella has papers with him from the Veteran's Administration. Seems he was injured in the service over fifty years ago. From the looks of him, he lost both feet and his left hand. Must have stepped on a mine. Name's Billy. Billy Thompson."

Through her mental confusion and fog, Thelma pondered the doctor's words and held them in her heart. Did he say Billy Thompson? Could this poor man be my Billy? But my Billy is young and handsome. My Billy was injured by a sniper, not a mine. No, surely there must be more than one Billy Thompson in the Army.

Finishing the last of the paperwork, the Doctor released Lefty to the orderly, who wheeled him to the next stop on his ever-shortening list of places to visit on this earth, the morgue.

Thelma was returned to Sunnydale that afternoon, where she began telling one and all,
"My son Billy is coming home from Korea today. He was injured fighting communists. We'll be celebrating Christmas together this year."