JustAdvice

As stew­ardesses on an inter­na­tional air­line, we flew troops into Viet­nam at the height of the war. Nat­u­rally the flights didn’t stop when hol­i­days were cel­e­brated at home, and my room­mate found her­self on a mil­i­tary char­ter bound for Saigon, on Decem­ber 23, 1968.

The cabin was full of young men, and the pain was pal­pa­ble. I’m cer­tain the fam­i­lies and friends of every­one on that plane were try­ing hard to enjoy the Sea­son and remain hope­ful, but their prayers were no doubt non-stop for those fright­ened men who were fly­ing into harm’s way.

The crew and the sol­diers were try­ing to ignore the true nature of the flight. Cabin atten­dants flirted, and jokes and laugh­ter were the name of the game. Some asked stew­ardesses for a date in twelve months, when they would rotate back to “The World,” while oth­ers poked fun at each other, pre­tend­ing there was noth­ing they couldn’t handle.

At one point the senior stew­ardess got on the PA to announce the time change, and to say it was now Christ­mas Eve. Rather than cre­at­ing more gai­ety, her announce­ment quelled the racket and sud­denly every­thing went still. Not a crea­ture was stir­ring. It was then that a sergeant in his mid twen­ties rose from his seat, and made his way up the aisle. As he approached her he reached for the micro­phone and asked, “May I?”

Still stunned at what her announce­ment had done to every­one, she handed it to him, assum­ing he would say a few words to the men. She expected him to make a hol­i­day address and to wish them well, but that wasn’t what he had in mind. As he raised the micro­phone to his face, he took a deep breath, and with what she would later describe as an angelic tenor, started to sing.

“Si-i-lent night, ho-o-ly night, all is calm, all is bright … ”

Some­how he made it through the entire song, but no one else did. Men bent for­ward to hide tears that streamed down their faces and olive-drab sleeves wiped wet eyes, while stew­ardesses hud­dled together in the gal­leys, sob­bing. The real­ity of what lay ahead had abruptly slammed into all of their dreams for the future and happy mem­o­ries of past holidays.

That sergeant bravely sang of hope and strength in spite of unknown fates. He was telling those who would return that there were con­stants in life and that faith was at the heart of real liv­ing. To those who would not return, he sang,

“Sleep in heav­enly peace … sleep in heav­enly peace.”