Depressed Veteran over election 9-11-08

Depressed Veteran over election 9-11-08
Peter Macdonald 465 Packersfalls rd Lee NH 03824 603-659-6217
The VA Dr. Dan Potenza called me on Sept 10 to congratulate me on receiving 17% of the vote for NH state Senate. This was nice of Dan to feel for a friend enough to call before his work day even started. I have no emotions or feeling for losing the election. You don’t congratulate someone for being massacred. I told Dan that I was proud just to have participated in the election. We did not talk long because I was in such serious pain in my head and my back. I just wanted to lay on the couch. Which I attempted to do all day. By nine o’clock the phone started ringing. The VA suicide hotline was calling me to just talk. I hung up. I just start to fall asleep and the phone rings again. It is the suicide hotline again. Do they see a chance to force me to commit suicide because of pressure. It does not work. In the Marine Corps I learned to set pain and pressure aside to complete my mission. Oh don’t get me wrong, later on the pain and confusion is much worse, then and now. I just knew that the local police would be knocking at my door soon because after receiving so many calls from the VA Suicide hotline and hanging up, it is the next step in the VA’s attempt to pressure me into suicide. I decided to go for a walk.
Trust me it was not easy. A song played on the radio on my way to Durham that brought me back to memories that no one should remember. My legs were tingling as I exited the car. The sharp pain in my back brought me to my knees as I took my first step. I just floated down the side walk like in a daze walking on pillows as people looked at me. Soon I was deep in the “Bush” lost. Tall trees with thick brush made movement difficult. I had lost my M-16 and had no gear. I came to the waters edge and there was no crossing. I could see buildings on the other side in a distance. Maybe I could approach and get a weapon, supplies and location. I had to build a way across the flowing water first. I searched the area and dragged damaged branches and logs to build a crossing. Soon on the other side I climbed the hill through the thick pickers and growth until I realized the building were the UNH gym and the tall white tips sticking through to horizon of the bushes were the UNH Foot Ball goal posts. How or why I got into the UNH woods has no logic. I looked down and my legs were all bloody and my cloths covered with dirt, pickers and leaves. The reality is that I remember the mission as if it was yesterday but it has been over thirty years since I was on my last convoy as an American Advisor.
I lost the election because I came back to a place that I do not belong. As a prominent citizen explained to me yesterday in Durham earlier “returning Veterans have a demented since of reality so we do not belong in an elected positions”. The newspapers believe that I am such a terror they refuse to print my letters. The VA stops my medical care for combat related injuries. The courts are corrupt and I have no place left.
I hate to inform you but if some one wants to die, when it is time there is no way to stop them. I wish that I knew then as I realize now that a body bag was the way for all veterans to return to a nation that just can not understand.
Peter Macdonald Sgt USMC Semper Fi