The Making and Unmaking of a Marine is now on Amazon

The long wait for my book to hit amazon is over. If you would rather give amazon the 60% instead of my publishing company Millrock Collective then you may find my book on the big book seller. If you'd like to help the smaller publisher you can get The Making and Unmaking of a Marine on my website makingandunmaking.com I welcome all feed back.

Larry

Poems Can Heal

There is a chapbook that was just published by Vietnam vet named Dayl Wise. There are 18 vets that have written poems including Dayl. The title of the book is Post Traumatic Press 2007 poems by veterans. It can be purchased by emailing dswbike@aol.com. I have several poems in it and of course highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in understanding what war does to human beings.
Poem

When a man kills another man
he must dig two graves.
One in the earth for the dead man.
One in his heart for his spirit,
or he will not return.

Larry Winters

Homeless Vets

This past Wednesday I spoke at Montrose VA in Peekill NY. The topic was homeless veterans. There were sixty people there many from the Montrose staff including homeless vets, who by the way asked several questions, and made some important statements about there personal plight. There were also folks there from the VVA and other veteran related organizations in the community. The talk went well, my main focus was helping them to role reverse with the vet in order to understand them better when they show up in their offices unwashed, drug addicted, and angry that at once time they offered their lives for this country. Here is a little of what I said, “Yes we have a volunteer army; these men and women did sign up. Did they know the truth about what they were getting into? No. Nor did we. And yet the revelations since then has not slowed down the number of jobless volunteers enlisting. So what would support to our returning soldiers look like? To start with, let's acknowledge that they offer the ultimate - their lives. This deserves the highest honors we civilians can bestow: Care, concern and acceptance when they come home.

War is a powerful initiation. No one comes back from it the way they left. We must accept this and stop expecting to see the same young people we sent off to war return home. Their wounds, both physical and psychological, have altered them. These changes need to be integrated and healed so veterans can find productive roles in society.

Our veterans are more than soldiers who served. They are our warriors who protected our country. In today's high-tech gigabit world there is a danger in seeing our soldiers as little more than "war-bits." It becomes easy to forget that a human being is holding the joy stick in a M1 Abrams tanks and that the video feed is a killing field. Video games can be turned on and off. In war, when the power switch is turned off it's never turned back on.”

It was my experience that many at the VA are folks who are working hard with an overload of clients; they show interest in trying to understand the perspective of the vets they serve.

At the end of the workshop one of the administrators approached me about buying my book “The Making and Unmaking of a Marine”, she agreed to supply her staff with books. This of course made my day selling ninety book warmed my heart and opened my mind to seeing that here were folks that had a true interest in hearing what returning soldiers feel. If you haven’t read the book yet please put your order in the website is makingandunmaking.com

The New Website makingandunmaking.com

I want to say a little about the incredible support I have been getting from my friend Mike from www.HillsideAS.com. He has worked tirelessly on the site. His belief in helping the Veterans cause goes beyond the call of duty. Mike is also one of the actors in the play I have written titled “Nothing Means Nothing.” We have done one animated reading at Pumpkin Hollow NY for Soldiers Heart organization and are hoping to perform the play in January 2008. It is only with the help of folks like Mike that we can get the message out that vets need support, honor and our concern when they return from war. I raise my arm in a sharp salute to Mike for his commitment to caring for the pains of war. If you have the opportunity please check out the new website at makingandunmaking.com.

Larry