true men: harry truman #33 (1945-1953)

by Wesley R. Bishop

“True men don’t cry,” my father told me the day the pony threw me to the ground. “Those who do, walk home.” Sniffling and sobbing, I trudged the miles back alone as my father drove by, never once looking back. I was only six. Mother was livid but even then I understood; True men don’t cry. They don’t bawl when they have to quit school to help with a struggling farm. They don’t sob when their haberdashery fails. They just stick out their chin and march forward, especially when FDR asks them to be Vice President. I was only on the job for eighty days before the President died. I had never been to a war meeting, never met Stalin, and had no idea what an A-Bomb was. I could have cried and thrown my hands in the air, but I didn’t! I used the damn bomb, put MacArthur in his place, and defended South Korea. I get questioned here in the after-life about some of those decisions. Especially about the bomb. I don’t regret it. Not for a moment. Not even as I trudge down the roads of purgatory and see the ghosts of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Twisting. Burning. Screaming. I certainly don’t cry…true men…chin out…just trying to walk home.

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