when someone asks me what I did in Nam, my usual response is:

"I flew around in helicopters and played games with the guys."

That usually stops the conversation. Occasionally, when I feel like someone really wants to know, I will give them a copy of this poem I wrote:

i flew to desolate fire bases
filled with the tools of war
and the men who used them

it was my job to perform the miracle
of making the war disappear
(however briefly)
for boys who had been trained to kill

it was my mission to raise the morale
of children who had grown old too soon
watching friends die

it was my calling
to take away fear and replace it with hope
to return sanity to a world gone insane

i was the mistress of illusion
as i pulled smiles from the dust and heat
the magical genie of "back-in-the-world"
as i created laughter in the mud

but when the show was over
i crawled back into my bottle
and pulled the cork in tightly behind me