Content Warning: This show contains explicit descriptions of war. It mentions suicide and there is profanity.
I'm running An American Life in honor of Veteran's Day. The radio broadcast will be split into two episodes, which will run on consecutive Sundays starting November 9. This web version which you see here is the full show.
A number of years ago, my sister told me she had a feeling that I should talk with her hairdresser, Vaughn Hood. Vaughn ran a hair salon with his wife, Bev, in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, and my sister said that he'd mentioned his time in Vietnam to her while he was cutting her hair. They didn't talk much about it, but she thought maybe somebody should.
It turned out that Vaughn hadn’t really talked with anyone about his time in Vietnam. So we sat down in the back of his salon one day, in those chairs with the attached dryer helmets, and I turned on my recorder, and we had one of the most extraordinary conversations I've had in my life. This is a story about a 118-pound hairdresser when he was drafted into the Vietnam War, and in Vaughn’s war, most men didn’t survive their first three-month tour. This is a story about Vaughn's war, and how he survived his return to civilian life.
Music for this story is by Vermont musician Brian Clark.
If you or someone you know is in crisis or considering suicide, call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.
Rumble Strip is a podcast produced by Erica Heilman and distributed on the radio by Vermont Public. Learn more about the show here.
