On the face of it, it's very simple and rather plain. In fact, the memorial was a tough sell to the government, simply because it was so simple and plain. "Who's going to go see a big black wall?" was the complaint.

Well, it's much more than just a big black wall. It's a wall set into the ground in a V shape. You start on either end with the top of the wall at about ankle height. The names engraved on the wall are arranged chronologically; the first name on one end is the name of the first person to die, and the name on the other end is the name of the last person to die. As you walk down the wall, you move down into the hollowed out depression, and the wall begins to get taller. When you're down at the bottom where the two sides of the wall meet, the wall and the names on it tower over you.

I find it an extremely moving experience everytime I walk down the length of the wall. It's an almost claustrophobic feeling as the wall gets bigger and bigger as you walk, until finally you're nearly crushed under the weight of all those names, all those people who never made it back home. Standing at the junction always makes me feel small and fills me with a deep sense of loss and emptiness. Coming back up the other side is like a long swim from deep underwater -- a rush to be free of the pressure of the wall and the names as the wall gets smaller and smaller, almost a fight to get your head above the surface in order to breathe air untainted by the weight of those names.

Perhaps even more moving than the wall itself are the things left by the wall by veterans and family members. This is the only war memorial I've seen that is so interactive. People leave the "usual" things like flowers and wreaths, but I've also seen many other things, such as cans of beer, packs of cigarettes, pictures, rifle shells, and many other things. The first time I went, I almost asked one of the rangers present what they do with the stuff people leave at the wall. Almost, because I realized I didn't really want to know. The truth is probably that they collect it all periodically and just throw it away. I decided I'd much rather believe that it magically disappears and is claimed by the spirit of the one for whom it was left.

People break down at the wall, especially after finding the name of a friend, loved one, or comrade. The first time I went I saw a veteran quietly crying with his arm against the wall. The first time my father went he and all of his friends started crying when they saw a veteran break down in front of the wall and be carried off gently by two park rangers on horseback.

I think of a few people every time I visit the wall. The first person I think of is my father. He was in the Army for three years, from I think 1958 to 1960. He had his tour of duty extended by three months because of a situation in Laos that basically signified the very beginning of the war. In fact, until the Defense Department officially changed the dates of the Vietnam Conflict to include the years from 1959 to 1974, he was not allowed to belong to the American Legion, as the one requirement for membership in the Legion is that you must have served in one of the armed forces during a war. So when I look at the wall, I think about my father sitting on a troop transport plane in the middle of the night waiting for his fate to be decided. I think about that and I thank whatever gods there may be that the order to ship out never came; that he was allowed to get off that plane at Ft. Bragg instead of somewhere in Southeast Asia and was honorably discharged at the end of his three month extension.

The second person I think about is one of my father's friends that he met through the Legion. A normal man in every way, except that he stands and stares whenever he hears a helicopter flying overhead because of the number of times a quick chopper evacuation saved his life in the jungles and rice paddies of Vietnam. He's the man that recommended that I watch the movie Hamburger Hill if I wanted to know what it was like in Vietnam. I watched the movie and was horrified beyond belief, not just because of the gore and violence it contained but because I spent the whole time thinking about how this man I knew had lived through this and wondering how he could continue with his life in any sort of normal fashion afterwards.

The last person I think of is now deceased. His name was Mike Birch, and he returned from Vietnam with a festering cancer from exposure to Agent Orange. I only remember him as this kind drunk guy who spent all his time at the American Legion bar. He was perpetually bald from the chemotherapy treatment that managed to cause his cancer to go into remission several times but in the end was not enough to cure him. The last time his cancer came out of remission, he was told he could no longer have radiation treatment, because he had received his maximum lifetime dosage and he couldn't legally be given more. Mike spent pretty much his entire day drinking at the Legion bar. Someone would drive him there when they opened in the morning, and someone would drive him home at night. In between, he drank. However, he was also the man who, religiously, took the American Flag out of it's box every morning, ran it up the pole, and brought it back down again every night. I think about that a lot and try to understand him. Was he being defiant, being mocking in his actions? Continuing to pretend to honor the flag of his country even after his country had sent him off to die a slow and painful death in a meaningless political war? I don't think so. I knew Mike Birch, and I honestly think he was still a patriot, still proud to have served his country when asked even though it meant a lifetime of pain and suffering.

After he finally lost his long battle with cancer, the local Legion Post started a High School scholorship in his name. At the annual 4th of July carnival, which was sponsored by the Legion, there were plastic jugs all around labelled "Mike Birch Scholorship Fund" for donations. I remember walking through the carnival looking in the jugs and finding them all empty. People were either too cheap or didn't want to give money in the memory of a man they only knew as the local drunk who practically lived at the Legion bar.

So when I look at the wall, I think of my father sitting in that plane, of his friend who lived through Hamburger Hill and miraculously came out intact both physically and mentally. But most of all I think of those empty white jugs, and how unfair it is that Mike Birch's name does not appear on that wall. He was a casualty of the Vietnam War every bit as much as every person whose name is on the wall. He died of wounds sustained in Vietnam, but he isn't on the wall because he fought a private battle for fifteen years after the official end of the war.

The wall stands as a monument not just to the men who died in that war but to the general stupidity of war itself and of that war in particular. I'll be the first to say that in many cases war is not only necessary but right and just. Any person who would not take up arms to defend his home does not deserve to live in his home, and any person who would not take up arms to fight against an oppresive murderous government or tyrant does not deserve to live in a free country. But this war in particular was not necessary, it was not right and not just. And that's why the wall is so important and why remembering these people in particular is so important. To remind us of the reasons for war and the reasons not to go to war. None of those names should be there. But because they are there, we must remember the lessons those people died to teach us.