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My city has a lot of veterans. At the intersection of two very busy streets, you can see them standing there with cardboard signs that say, "Homeless and hungry". One guy has a sign that says, "Got your seatbelt on?". They never approach the cars but, people will stop and give them a few dollars.

They're forced to live from hand to mouth by begging. Some collect soda cans and cash them in for refunds. They use this money to buy the few personal things that they need to survive. A lot of them are just waiting to get their government benefits.

We have a very large V.A. Hospital which offers some of the best services to veterans in this country. There is a waiting list for the housing services and many vets are compelled
to fend for themselves, and as a result they become homeless.

They have become incredibly ingenious, by setting up a community of tents which are hidden in a wooded area not far from the edge of town. Somehow they have devised a way to heat their cloth-condos with generators. One man reports that he has a working T.V. in his tent. He says that, "The guys look after each other, like brothers" so that their meager belongings are not robbed. The police, many being vets themselves; look out for them also, and even drop in for coffee. They are planning to spend the winter there if necessary, and I am wondering how those tents will hold up in a Nor'Easter.

We can recall, that these men were once young and handsome. They had mothers and fathers, brothers, sisters, wives, and children. What happened to them? When they returned from the war many were able to fit back into society, but more often than not, a condition called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, kept them from re-adjusting to civilian life. The guys were not "crazy", but suffered from the trauma of war with nightmares and strange physical ailment associated with the chemical Agent-Orange. Their disabilities often caused their marriages to fail and slowly their relationships with their families began to crumble. The soldiers were often given morphine on the battle-field to ease the pain of their wounds suffered in combat, and as a result became addicted to it. Others turned to alcohol; as in the case of my own brother; who after returning home from Vietam died from liver disease at the age of thirty-nine.

Not remembered, not recalled, not recollected, lost, out of one's mind, erased from one's consciousness, beyond recollection and relegated to oblivion, surely defines society's forgotten veterans. They can now be seen as they emerge and disappear into the woods; just like in the movie (Field of Dreams).

Learn more about this author, Diana Claude.
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