Some clock in the soul always reminds them that the anniversary has come again.
It was this month in 1965 when the men of Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 163 appeared on the cover and in the pages of Life magazine in a famous, wrenching photo essay that helped awaken the nation to the reality of the Vietnam War.
There's the handsome young helicopter crew chief, James Farley, shown with one hand on a jammed machine gun, the other seeming to hover powerlessly over a dying comrade. And the final frame, showing the anguished warrior breaking down unabashedly when the battle was over.
Something is different this year for the men who departed from El Toro Marine Corps Air Station in late 1964 and flew the mission 34 years ago this week.
They felt an urgency to hold their first reunion in 21 years. They have started to fade away; the youngest are in their 50s. Now, their country is involved in another war in some obscure corner of the world. They also came to say goodbye to an old veteran, the air base where they trained and served before and after their time at war. El Toro is being retired and possibly turned into a commercial airport.
And beyond all that, Americans everywhere have seemed preoccupied with war this past year, what with the popularity of such films as "Saving Private Ryan" and "The Thin Red Line."
Every year when March 31 approaches, Paul Gregoire of the 163 tenderly, ritualistically, leafs through the weary pages of the old Life magazine. "I just don't want to forget. I have trouble seeing the people I knew on the cover of a magazine. But a lot of time has passed, oh, Lord, and I've done a lot of grieving."
Reunions like the 163's are becoming more common for Vietnam veterans as they confront their mortality and seek the company of those who know what it was like.
"You're probably seeing an upswing in these reunions," said Scott Campbell, director of public affairs for Vietnam Veterans of America. "People are hitting their mid-50s to mid-70s. A lot of these reunions are a catharsis, a cleansing of the soul. The only way you can do this is with other veterans who understand."
On Wednesday night, men from the 163 came to toast and greet one another--some trim as the day they wore a uniform, others bursting over their belts--and swap ribald recollections and take snapshots of one another.
