|
The Rare Breed
I never had the misfortune to personally require the services of a
Dustoff or Medevac, but I watched and personally knew and lived with
medics, both in Vietnam and on isolated sites where they were the only
medical assistance available. Sometimes, if the weather was bad enough,
they were the only medical help available for a week or more.
Whatever they themselves may have thought about what they did, we, the
people under their care, believed the evidence of our eyes, and trusted
in them, and in their ability, implicitly.
They are special people, a rare breed, who always put the patient first
and their own safety and comfort last. A month or so ago, forty-odd
years after the fact, I listened on the phone to an old combat medic
weeping in frustration because he couldn't save each and every one of
his patients.
Somehow, he still thought he should have been able to keep them all
alive, even when I reminded him that he was, like all of us, only a mere
mortal, in spite of the fact that he sometimes performed superhuman
feats.
None of them, not a single one that I ever knew, in the air or on the
ground, ever let any of us down. If any Vietnam veterans deserve to be
free of survivor’s guilt, Lord knows, they certainly qualify for
exemption.
A rare breed.
For
© |
