Published: June 06, 2008 11:47 pm      

As long as we’re here, you won’t be forgotten

“Here it comes,” said Yock. He was driving.

That’s OK, I said. I’ve been wet before, and hopefully I will live long enough to get wet again. I was riding.

When you are on a motorcycle and rain becomes inevitable, you might as well relax and enjoy it for the entertainment value.

Yock’s rain suit was in his saddlebags because he didn’t think he’d need it, and mine was 100 miles away in my car because the zipper on the jacket broke when I was putting it on that morning. (Yes, I scolded it.)

Besides, after the rain stopped, the sun and the 60-mph breeze dried us out in no time.

This was a ride I’d been looking forward to for the past year ... the first Sunday in June, when motorcyclists meet in Greencastle, Pa., and ride to the VA Hospital in Martinsburg, W.Va., to raise money for veterans who are patients there.

We didn’t give a damn if it rained; we’d have gone anyway. About 20 motorcycles from our area went, and 30 people or more. We were told that there were more than 1,500 bikes total, it took half an hour for all of them to move out, and the procession stretched out for 14 miles.

This year $55,000 was raised to buy recreational equipment and other items the patients might not be able to afford and which aren’t otherwise provided. Over 18 years, that amounts to more than $285,000.

From the time we pulled out onto the streets of Greencastle, people waited to wave to us as we went by. Many held American flags. They ranged from little kids to old folks, and they lined the railings on overhead bridges or sat in front of their homes. The largest groups seemed to be in front of churches.

Police officers were pulled off here and there along the route, and some flashed their emergency lights or hit their sirens as we went by. Others saluted us, and we saluted them in return.

Yock and I had microphones and speakers in our helmets so we could talk, and he had a CB radio so we could listen to the truckers raise hell about how we had the road tied up. Eventually, some of the bikers and a few truckers got onto channel 19 to tell the kibitzers what was going on. That quieted most of them, particularly when drivers who were themselves veterans got into the discussion.

“This is for the vets at the Martinsburg hospital,” one of the truckers said. “I’m a vet, and if I wasn’t working today, I’d be riding with them.”

The hospital parking lots were filled with motorcycles, some of which may have cost more than my father, my grandfather and my uncle paid for their houses combined (not allowing for inflation, of course).

Patients sat in wheelchairs or regular chairs, and many bikers walked around shaking their hands, bending down or kneeling if they had to.

One fellow who caught my eye was leaning on a motorized walker off to himself. I didn’t know what his particular condition was, but he appeared to be about my age, so that gave me a good idea of where he acquired it.

When I went over to him, shook his hand and told him, “Welcome home,” the look in his eyes told me I had guessed right.

The reaction those two words usually evoke is one you can’t describe, nor can you explain to someone else why they have the effect they do. It’s only after you have seen the eyes and heard the voices enough times that you can begin to understand. In order to understand completely, you must have been there yourself, and I have not.

It’s just a neat motorcycle ride until you turn onto the hospital grounds and begin driving down the “Avenue of Flags,” a street lined with big American flags that are donated by the families of deceased veterans. That’s when it begins to get you.

When you ride past the housing complexes, you’ll see some of the veterans are outside waiting for you — some old, some young, some in wheelchairs, some without the arms or legs most of us take for granted. They wave to you, give you a thumbs-up or just sit there quietly and watch, and that really kicks you in the gut.

You want to stop, go over to them and say, “Thanks for what you did. God bless you. As long as people like my buddies and I are around, you and your buddies will never be forgotten. We won’t let it happen.”

We’re already looking forward to making the ride again next year, those of us who can, that is, because one never knows. My friends and I are in that age range when uncertainty becomes a factor. Most of them are veterans, and those who served in Vietnam may have to deal with the effects of exposure to Agent Orange and other trauma ... if they’re not, already. They’re familiar with what goes on at the VA hospital.

The God Bless America Ride is another reminder that this is still America, and there are more reasons to be proud of it than anyone could ever count. We owe a great debt to those who have helped keep it that way.