Never Say Goodbye

Ignatius Hruska

There in the room as I wake from sleep
this vision presses upon me;
The engagement opens there and then in fantasy unreal
The skirmishers begin, they crawl cautiously ahead,
I hear the irregular snap! snap!
I hear the sounds of the different missiles, the short t-h-t!
t-h-t! of the rifle-balls,
--The Artlleryman's Vision, Walt Whitman

It’s winter in America, and all of the healers
have been killed or been betrayed
--Winter in America, Gil Scott-Heron

And being in agony, he prayed more earnestly;
and his sweat as it were great drops of blood
falling down to the ground
--Luke 22:44

I asked my dad where Lily I could find
He said, "Son, now don't be silly"
"She's been dead since 1929"
--Pictures of Lily, The Who
____________________

Our Memorial Day 2011 essay is dedicated to the memory of Ranger's uncle, Ignatius (Iggy) Hruska, WW II seaman.

Iggy has been long presumed dead, though his body was never recovered. He did not die of wounds or in combat, though a case could be made that his death was service-connected, just the same. He was a frequent and long-term patient in the Pittsburgh VA long-term care facility. Specifically, Iggy was a nasty, habitual alcoholic.

He saw much combat, but fair is fair, and his brother (my father), also a WW II combat vet, remained sober and functioning throughout his life. Ironically, my father was drafted while Iggy was a volunteer. Family lore has it that Iggy joined the Navy by fraudulently enlisting (before WW II) by tricking his Slovakian mother into signing his enlistment papers. He told her the papers were required for him to purchase a rifle (from Sears), and in a sense they were. Since she neither spoke nor read English, she affixed a signature -- so long, Iggy.

(As an aside, this unlettered immigrant (Ranger's grandmother) had four sons -- two born in the old country, two in the U.S. Both U.S.-born sons earned their rights of citizenship, a dying concept today, but that's another topic.)

Memories of Iggy are those of a young child, and include seeing him on leave wearing a black wool Navy Class-A uniform with ribbons on the chest. There is no memory of what these ribbons signified other than that he fought in the Pacific war; later he became an air crew member. He survived the sinking of his ship, though my father was told by one of Iggy's former shipmates, "You'll never see your brother alive again." In a sense, that, too, became true.

Suffice it to say Iggy was probably drunk the day he died -- a harsh way to commemorate his life and death, but there are a lot of Iggy Hruskas in the back streets and VA facilities of your hometown, and this is their truth. It's hard to pin Iggy's hard-drinking on his service experience, and it's a fool's errand to try. The fact remains, he served, and seldom thereafter had the ability to climb out of the bottle. He was probably denied reenlistment due to his alcoholism.

Ranger has had numerous friends and associates who followed the same template, and for some, it is too facile to dismiss them as old drunks. Combat stress often results in alcoholism, drug addiction and many other long-term and debilitating behaviors; what the world sees as slovenly was once a functional human being. Such was the life of a long gone sailor named Iggy Hruska.

Iggy disappeared while on unauthorized absence from the DVA hospital and was never seen again; years later, he was officially declared dead. He would never say "Goodbye" while on leave; always, "So long". He believed that if you said "goodbye" that was a jinx that might come true. Sailors are a special breed, and most have their mojos, like ball players.

Since we can't put a flag on his grave, we will say one last thing to Seaman Ignatius Hruska -- "Goodbye".