My Family Tragedy of War

My Uncle Donald is not very well known to me.  I cannot even picture his face.  He died a while back.

Uncle Donald and my mom were raised by their grandparents and were very close growing up.  Upon adulthood, Donald chose the same path as many other young men.  He enlisted.  I am uncertain as to whether he volunteered or was drafted, the important thing is that he did not evade the draft.

He was in a plane that was shot down.  Although he survived he was outfitted with a metal plane in his head that would eventually result in his death years later.  The plate evidently altered his personality to the point he became homeless sometimes after being discharged.  He would wander from town to town, calling home only when he needed money or was in jail, again.

Previously, I am told he was a functioning citizen.  But now he was a different person.  I asked as a child if he had any children.  I was told maybe, but that they would never know.  I was under the distinct impression that Donald could not hold down a normal conversation for very long and would often act a little crazy.

When he was barely fifty, he came home to visit and stay with his mother.  Upon examination by a doctor, it was found that the metal plate in his head was made of a dangerous metal.  That metal’s effects on him all those years was about to result in his death.  Its poisonous nature had been seeping into his brain since he was about nineteen.  The poison had finally caught up with him.  He lived a few more months and died around 52 years of age.  And  the metal also caused his personality changes and everything else to him.  The effects of the Vietnam War are still with us.