StoryCorps 524: Beautiful and Terrible

[MUSIC]

Michael Garofalo (MG): Fifteen years ago, Scott Skiles had a conversation with his son, Zach, that could’ve been their last.

Scott Skiles (SS): I remember you smiling, saying, I love you, too, Dad. And then you got out of the car and went to war.

MG: This was in early 2003. Zach, a corporal in the Marine Corps, was going to be part of the first wave of American troops to invade Iraq. When the invasion started, a communication curtain came down between U.S. forces and their loved ones back home. Unable to talk with his son, Scott would tune in to the news each day hoping to see reports from the front.

SS: I actually found that helpful, because I could see where you were. And actually I read one time a quote from you in a newspaper article, which was amazing. And it was a really smart aleck response that you had about a gas mask, and you mentioned you’d taken a nap in your gas mask.

ZS: Wow, yeah.

SS: So I read that and I figured, ‘well, it sounds like he’s doing ok.’

ZS: [Laughs]

MG: Zach survived his deployment, but when he came home, it turned out that he wasn’t doing okay.

ZS: I was pretty sure someone was going to kick down my door, and I was scared to go to sleep.

MG: And for the second time, Scott would lose contact with his son.

SS: There was a time period where I didn’t know where you were, and it is difficult to watch anyone let go of hope, but when it’s your son, it’s excruciating.

MG: It’s the StoryCorps podcast from NPR, and in this episode, parenting during wartime: when your child is in harm’s way on the battlefield – and at home. I’m Michael Garofalo. We’ll be back after a short break. Stay with us.

[PROMOS]

MG: Welcome back. In this episode, we’ll meet a father and son who recorded as part of our Military Voices Initiative. That’s our effort to collect interviews between veterans and their loved ones. And in these conversations we do hear battlefield stories, but we also hear about the home front; about what going to war does to relationships and families.  And today, we’re going to hear from a dad who had to answer the question: what do you do when your kid survives one ordeal, only to come home to another?

SS: One of the things about being a parent, even of a kid who doesn’t go to war, is that things never turn out like you think they’re going to.

MG: That’s Scott Skiles. He’s from Northern California, in the Bay Area. His son, Zach, enlisted in the Marines back in December 2000, when he was 18.

SS: He had dropped out of high school, took the GED, joined the Marine Corps. He wanted benefits and liked the discipline, and also liked the ethos of the Marine Corps – kinda the hardcore, toughest group. I had gone down to the recruiter with him and I thought that this was a good plan. And then the world changed.

[MUSIC]

MG: Scott’s talking, of course, about 9/11. And this was true for so many military families. After that day, the reality of the job that their sons or daughters or partners signed up for really set in.

SS: It’s one of those growing realizations, at least for me, not having any experience in this before, that he would actually be in a war.

MG: When the U.S. invaded Iraq in March 2003, Zach, now a corporal, was among the first troops to enter the country. When he came home nine months later, he had trouble holding a job, and he eventually ended up homeless. Zach and Scott never talked about Iraq or what happened afterwards until they sat down for this StoryCorps conversation in 2015.

They start by remembering the day Scott drove Zach to his base, just before he was deployed.

SS: I remember saying to you, every gift that I’ve been given, I don’t have a better one than to be your dad. And I remember you smiling, saying, ‘I love you, too, Dad.’ And then you got out of the car and went to war. So what was life like after you came home?

ZS: I was pretty sure someone was going to kick down my door, and I was scared to go to sleep. I couldn’t sustain employment. I couldn’t pay rent and pay for groceries. It all just kind of fell apart. And then I was homeless. And the crazy thing was that I didn’t think that there was anything super wrong. You know, at night time, I stayed on coastal trails and hiking trails, and in the daytime, I could just pass out at a park.

SS: There was a time period where I didn’t know where you were, and it is difficult to watch anyone let go of hope, but when it’s your son, it’s excruciating. I remember great relief that you decided to go into inpatient treatment. And I remember one night you getting out of the car to walk back into the treatment building. It was dark, and your head was kind of down. And for a moment, I could feel the weight you were carrying. As I watched you walk into that building, I uttered these two words that – I don’t know if they were some kind of prayer or not, but they just came out: my son. And I was absolutely overcome with grief, and love, and the beginning of hope. What is life like for you now?

ZS: It’s pretty cool. [Laughter]

SS: You graduated undergrad.

ZS: Yes.

SS: I heard summa cum laude. I’m just asking. [Laughter]

That’s what I heard.

ZS: Yeah.

SS: I remember my dad saying this to me, and I feel it is so true between you and I. It is your life, so you have the last word. But then, as your dad, that gives me the second to the last word. And the second to the last word is I believe in you, and I’m on your side.

[MUSIC]

MG: Scott and Zach Skiles in San Francisco.

As I said, this interview was the first time that they spoke about what happened to Zach when he came home from war. It was also the first time that Zach told his dad about what happened in Iraq. And he shared some pretty intense memories. For instance, during one two week stretch, Zach lost five close friends, including his roommate. And there’s this story, about driving in a convoy to deliver fuel.

ZS: We were driving down and a bus full of young women in school uniforms pulled up right next to me on my left hand side. So I look over and I see a young woman, and my twenty-year-old brain just, the only I think to do is blow her a kiss. I have not seen a girl in six months. So I blow her this kiss and she looks at me and starts to laugh, and all her friends around her laugh. And I just nod, and she blows me a kiss back and gives me a nice look. One of those looks that kind of just said, you know, ‘only if we spoke the same language, only if, you know, this wasn’t a war.’ And they pulled forward about fifty yards. And that bus actually exploded off of some heavy artillery ordnance. Something beautiful had happened in a moment that wasn’t tainted by war, and it got taken away.

[MUSIC]

SS: That sort of wound — it’s hard for guys to bring that moment to other people who haven’t been in that moment.

MG: That’s Scott again, from a follow-up conversation I had with him just last week.

SS: It’s so different from the world that I live in, and for him to bring that moment to me is something I’m grateful for.

MG: What is it like to hear your son talk about those things?

SS: It’s a cliché, but it’s a cliché because it’s true: if you could trade places with them you would. There’s a kind of suffering to watch your kid suffer. There’s not a word bad enough to describe it. I’m not sure there’s too many things worse. But when you go through something really terrible, that maybe has no inherent good in it whatsoever, but over time, over a long time, things get formed in you that you can only call a good. Compassion, patience and wisdom and strength.

You know, I probably wouldn’t ever voluntarily choose suffering that brings about character, but I think that was the case for Zach and I think that’s the case for me.

MG: Here’s what he means: First, I’ll tell you about Zach. He went on to help other veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who were suffering from PTSD at a place called Pathway Home. That’s the same recovery program that he went through. He also helped start a therapy program for veterans using horses in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, and today, he’s working on his doctoral dissertation in clinical psychology. This is the kid who dropped out of high school.

And whatever it is that’s giving Zach the ability to do these things is probably hereditary. See, for years, Scott worked as a social worker in emergency rooms, and his job was to notify families of their loved ones died, often in terrible accidents. And after Zach came home from war Scott also took a job working with veterans at the V.A. in Palo Alto.

SS: They were doing the medical rehab for the young people catastrophically injured in Iraq and Afghanistan. Traumatic Brain Injury, and amputee, and I couldn’t do a lot for Zach, but I went to work there to try to do something. And it was definitely connected to the struggle Zach was going through and my sense of helplessness with him.

MG: Scott did that for about a decade, then he took a job at a children’s hospital, where he still is today, helping families cope with the death of their child.

SS: You see tremendous courage, tremendous grace. Profound love. And it’s within the context of suffering, so that is a sadly hopeful, um, lesson. I think I learned it with Zach, I think I learn it every day at work.

MG: You said earlier that you would choose the easier thing if –

SS: [Laughs]

MG: But – but it doesn’t sound like you ever do! Why do you think you’re drawn to this work?

SS: You know, when you say that actually I get what you’re saying. I’m trying to think of a way that doesn’t sound corny, but I have this seeking. I seek after — and I don’t have a good word for it, so I’m just gonna use an inadequate word for it. I try to seek after God. And that word may be misunderstood, but I mean that in a larger way. I have had some sort of sense of something sustaining people when they go through the most terrible times. And I kind of want — I don’t mean that in a selfish way but I want to understand that. And then when you’re seeking after that it does feel like if there’s anything I can do, I want to help.

And when you’re in those moments, it’s not like the helper and the helpee. You’re looking for grace just as much as anybody else is. Your suffering isn’t the same, it’s not my moment it’s their moment. But t is profound work. And it’s a real honor to be in there and try to provide that kind of support.

MG: There’s a remarkable amount of trust you need in order to do what Scott does – both at work and as a dad – trust that there’s always reason to stay hopeful. Something he still needs today, in his relationship with Zach.

SS: Zach and I don’t have a lot of communication right now. And he doesn’t have any communication with the rest of his family, he said that he wants distance for a while. He said, ‘Let’s come back together a little bit later,’ but I’m hopeful that the distance that Zach and I have right now is a chapter, and not the final chapter. I mean we don’t have to be BFFs but it’d be nice to have a little bit closer relationship. You know, we’re actually a real family and I don’t like to pretend that somehow everything is just all golden and perfect and uh, you know, it’s messy.

[MUSIC]

SS: There’s a quote from Frederick Buechner. And it’s probably — I won’t presume to know what it’s like to be in combat, but I know it’s very relevant to the experience of being the father to someone in a war. And the quote is – ‘Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid.’

Because it is very easy to carry fear – and a lot of it – when your kid is in harm’s way. And at the end of the day, the foundation of it all has to be love because that’s about the only thing that can allay fear. We may have other pretensions and we may have other illusions in life, but what we really only have that can last is love.

[MUSIC]

MG: That’s it for this episode. Zach and Scott’s original StoryCorps interview was produced by Andres Caballero. This podcast episode was produced by David Herman, and edited by me. Find out more about our Military Voices Initiative at our website, StoryCorps.org. And while you’re there, find out how you can record your own interview. Don’t forget to rate or review us wherever you get your podcasts. And if there’s ever somebody on this show, and you want to leave a message for them, we have a voicemail line for that. The number is 301-744-TALK. That’s 301-744-T-A-L-K. You call in, leave a message, and we pass it on to the participants. And maybe feature it here on the show. That’s the StoryCorps podcast. I’m Michael Garofalo. Thanks for listening.