When 'The War on Cancer' is Forgotten

    Last night this sometimes orator gave the dinner meeting speech to the state convention of the United Daughters of the Confederacy..and may have come away with a nice premonition of our own war with cancer. Oh the ladies and I  had a hootin' and hollerin' good time as I told stories less than flattering--but in good humor--about our Yankee brethren. That's the good thing about being "losers" in a conflict like that. You never forget it. Overtime the loss becomes less hurtful and more humorous, but still, you never forget it. That is until enough generations finally pass that the old time-stained bell, while still ringing, is just more and more distant, finally so distant nobody much hears it.
    Southern young people, say under 40, don't much care. They study "the War" in school. The boys like it better than the girls because of the fighting, but few identify the Confederacy with any part of their heritage. Heritage for many Americans, north and south, has become just a "so what" experience.  A video game about the War for Southern Independence would die on store shelves like a flower would die in a drought, even in the South.
    I, however, am not of that generation. I was raised on stories of the war by folks so close to it they could still smell the smoke and feel the anger. I learned early about  Sherman's March through Georgia, of how the Yankee troopers looted the big house and the smoke house (not to mention digging up the outhouse in search of silver. Ewww!), how grandfather Nations limped on his shot-off  heel back to Georgia from the battle at Perryville, Kentucky, only to put in a crop and limp  back to the army in time to even the score at Chickamauga. My grandmother loved to tell of  how one of my Crawford grandfathers demanded that
General Robert E. Lee himself dismount, advance and show his pass...and got a commendation for it. And she would speak reverently  of four other Crawford/Nations/Foster men who were left forever in the vast burying fields that dot Northern Virginia. When I studied the War in high school history, many of the other students already knew the subject  intimately...and more than willing to fight the battles all over again.
    It has been, however, at least 20 years since I could find anybody else who much cared, not that they didn't have an academic interest in the war (that remains strong), but people who still have an emotional investment it it. Until last night. And what we enjoyed was not the maudlin, but the benevolent humorous, though still at the expense of the Yankees. There were some 150 ladies there, many who wore their Southron  genealogies on their sleeves (Southerners are much like the Chinese. We eat a lot of rice and worship our ancestors.). And happy to remember the Lost Cause and the soldiers who fought it at the slightest suggestion. And their number grows smaller every year.
     They came to Augusta primarily to honor Gertrude Clanton Thomas, who kept a journal of her life from 1848 to 1911. She was a die-hard Rebel in her youth yet died a national leader of the suffragette movement. Her journal, The Secret Eye (available on Amazon) is one of the best known, poignant and realistic journals of  private life during the war and after. Her husband kept them struggling in genteel poverty their entire marriage as she struggled to raise her surviving children, deal with the reality of her dead ones, find someway to fund their lives and maintain their social standing at the same time (which, in the end, faded away). So I made fun of her husband as well, Southerner or no. I am a very democratic fun maker.  The prim ladies loved it when I called him a "dumbass." He even sucked as a soldier and only served as an incompetent aide de' camp to a family friend. And the friend sent him home twice just to get rid of him, both times to Gertrude's chagrin. Yeah, Lord, what a dumbass. Gertrude's story, however,  of strength, commitment and resolve under incredible pressure would make any Knight feel proud and related.
    But as you can imagine, the UDC is not necessarily for the young. In some ways those nice, good natured--but older--ladies looking up at me were remindful somewhat of an old faded photo of a turn-of-the-20th-century Confederate or Union veterans reunion, where the old soldiers peer fiercely into the camera as they lean on crutches, support one another or just sit in wheel chairs. The fight gone, but the pride not.
   And that  made me think of our War on Cancer. How we  are in the vanguard of this mighty millions of conscripted soldiers struggling to win not just our battle but the war it self, to one day to be considered the veterans of a conflict future generations cannot imagine. How we are not only working to survive, but are blazing a way forward when the War on Cancer will be as out-of-mind as the Civil War. Just a dusty note in history. A subject whose only reference might be at some rostrum when a speaker says, "I am reminded of the war on cancer...." And some young listener thinks: "The war on what?"
    I doubt anybody will make light of cancer even then, not nearly as much fun as making light of the Northern aggressors 145 years hence. But what a great day it will be when that young listener wonders "The war on what?"
    Wouldn't you reader, like to join me there,  just to hear the awkward silence? 
    How sweet it would be, that ignorance, that inability to relate to our war. We will have fought it. They will live longer for it, other worries to occupy their time. There will be no memorials or medals or even great speeches about our unwilling, yet brave, army. But that is as it should and, I pray, will be. Just a job done, well done.
    Victory...at last.

   

Comments

[Stacey]

I saw you on the KCA website and am really enjoying your blogs!!!! Thanks so much for taking the time to write them:)

[Debbie]

Wow! Your definition David of just how Warriors are blazing that trail for cancer cure is so true. This is World War III and each of you are the bravest and most courageous men and women who would have fought in any of the previous wars. Cancer affects everyone around the world and shows no mercy on political stripe or nationality. Just think of what each of you are doing for future generations..as you said David, you are contributing to the demise of cancer. The final victory of this War is very close, as I believe a cure is very near. If we just look back to one year ago, there was not much available for RCC patients, and now it seems new drugs are always appearing on the horizon. Those of you who endure the harsh side effects and battle scars are the heros of tomorrow. Hold your heads very high, continue marching gallently even though some days you may step out of pace just a little, for your medals of bravery await each and everyone of you. I applaud you for your amazing strength!

[Richard Schwartz]

A Comment from the North
"I ain't going to study war no more!" DF we share your dream. For what we all want is...peace. Isn't that why we fight the fight. Because in the end we just want it to be like it use to be. So while I proudly say in younger years, I evaded (high lottery number) Nixon's army, today I stand shoulder to shoulder with the likes of David Foster. Putting our geographic heritage aside, we are ready for Pickett's Charge, defense of the Siegfried Line or the Tet Offensive. I am proud to share a foxhole with you.

[Manuel Lopez]

What a sweet dream it is. The day that happens will be a date for the history books to be sure.