I found drama of a different kind in San Francisco’s theatre district yesterday.
On the way to SF Playhouse, I spotted this mural in an alley near Union Square. Recently renamed SF Vets Alley, the space is sandwiched between upscale bars like “Swig” and a rougher ‘hood known simply as the Tenderloin. The SF Vets Mural project bridges both and is now a place where artist veterans can share their stories and have “a permanent voice and presence within the community.”
Reuben “Chip” Santos was a local and the son of Native American parents. He was a decorated Army veteran with eight years of service and a host of NATO medals for service in Kosovo, Kuwait and Jordan. He was awarded a National Defense Medal for his service in Iraq.
When he first returned to the Bay Area from his tour in Iraq, family members thought everything was fine. However, subtle symptoms began to appear, such as the inability to hold down a job, erratic driving at high speeds and nightmares so gripping his girlfriend felt like she was being strangled.
He avoided getting help for the first five years because, according to his mom, “He didn’t want to admit he had a problem.”
To cope, he developed a penchant for playing violent video games around the clock and also enrolled in a creative writing course. In a poem from the class published after his death, he said that video games helped him to deal with the “denial that is burning cancer into hope.”
After sending an email to loved ones saying, “I’m tired of fighting this,“ Reuben lost his battle with PTSD at the age of 27.
The play I saw, “Period of Adjustment”, was about two war veterans (WWII, Korea) experiencing One suffered from PTSD exacerbated by the stress of being a newlywed.
The playwright, Tennessee Williams, was extremely prescient and this work a reminder that no matter how far we’ve come as a society, we have not solved the fundamental issue of helping veterans heal from their deepest wounds.
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