RAGBRAI-er Runs into "DMFK, Trained Killer" in Fairfield Casey's; "That's a Joke, Right?" I Asked Hopefully; "No," He Said.

Talk about a wake-up call. I walked into a Fairfield Casey's for coffee near Maharishi U., and when I paid or some time during my visit there, I ran into a tall man wearing an orange shirt that said "Trained Killers" at the top on his chest, a picture of an M-16 rifle in the middle, and "DMFK," in larger letters at the bottom.

The whole image hit me hard after Trayvon Martin's killing. The gun and the message hit me especially hard when I hopefully asked, "That's a joke, right?" and I was just sure he'd agree, but he didn't.

He said, "no."

"It is a joke," I insisted.

"No," he said. He was not amused, but he did explain. "I'm in the Army," he said. "It's a softball team." 

I should have asked him if he was in Afghanistan, Iraq, or both. I definitely missed an opportunity because of what seemed to me to be the in-your-face aggression of the T-shirt. I wanted humor, and he just wasn't going to give me humor. And if he wasn't going to give me humor, I couldn't laugh, and that's when I missed my opportunity for a story about one of the many American military adventures we've been in lately, none of which has ended well.

But maybe that is the story. What are we going to do with our trained killers, now that they're home from battle? Or was he in battle? And if he was, what happened to his sense of humor? The good news is that he has his buddies and he's playing softball. 

Does my reaction say more about me than about him? I was scared and hostile and then he was hostile.

I told him I came from a military family.

I told him, "you're defending wealth and privilege."

He didn't care for that. Why would he?

I told him my paternal grandfather was a colonel in the Army who chased Pancho Villa all over Mexico. He died of a stroke trying to pass the physical to become a brigadier general. 

Dan Mo' Fo' Karr didn't care.

My father used to describe how Colonel Houser would eat steak at the officers' club, with fat running down his cheeks. I don't think my father was real fond of his Dad. His older brothers left a bag of rattlesnakes they caught outside San Antonio, Texas in the back of his car when he was stationed there. 

Colonel Houser leaned over to pick up the sack when he saw it wriggle.

Did he think better of it? I never heard the end of that story. I never learned whether he beat the hell out of Dad's older brothers for what they did, but I wouldn't be surprised. He once knocked 13-year-old Uncle Bob down a set of cement cellar steps when Uncle Bob was smart with him.

I told DMFK that Uncle Bob was the third commander of the First Battalion, 21st regiment, 3rd Division of Marines at Iwo Jima after the first two commanders were shot. I think he acknowledged that. Robert Henry Houser was awarded a Silver Star for jumping on an enlisted man and another officer when an incoming Japanese missile was about to blow them up. The enlisted man stood up crying, and said, "I thought you were dead."

Actually, now that I've looked it up again and found a source other than my father, then Major Houser also apparently "courageously exposed himself to raking enemy fire to reconnoiter his entire front line and, subsequently coordinating and directing an attack, aided immeasurably in winning important ground from the Japanese. Throughout the operation, he accomplished assigned missions with a minimum loss of personnel and equipment and, by his skillful tactics, contributed materially to the success of his battalion. His courage and devotion to duty reflect the highest credit upon Major Houser and the United States Naval Service."

Uncle Bob was also at Guadalcanal and Tawara. He was the youngest bird colonel ever to enter the Pentagon at the time. Eventually, he wondered why he'd never been asked to go into the foreign service. He asked aloud and was offered a post in the South Pacific.

"No," he said, "I won't go back to the South Pacific." He retired. He did extremely well in the private sector. In a photo of him and his five children that I saw once, they're standing in front of what looks like a huge gate, a double-doored gate to a castle. I don't know all the details because for years my father didn't get along with his oldest brother. Something about their mother's will. I met her once or twice and didn't care for her. She was a beautiful woman when she was young, but cold as ice. She was definitely not the grandmotherly type.

I didn't tell Dan Mo' Fo' Karr (DMFK) all of the above or about the first Richard Hugh Houser, a young fighter pilot for the Air Force who flew a B-17 bomber and died of a melanoma on his shoulder on his 26th birthday just a few months before his wife in Benedict, Maryland gave birth to his one and only child, Rose Ellen Houser, who still lives in Maryland. Her mother, Rose Houser, was one of triplets. She recently passed away and was buried alongside her young husband at Arlington Cemetery.