- There were a lot of tearful nights
because of some of the issues that I had in Vietnam.
The PTSD, those hidden wounds that we don't see.
I would go to the water and work it out,
rather than having it jumble up in my mind.
Being on the water, it's a sense of tranquility,
there's no competition, and it's peace, it's quiet,
and that's the reason I began my time
with Project Healing Waters.
We did not get very good welcome when we came home.
We were spit on and called baby killers
and all sorts of bad names.
If we had Project Healing Waters I think that the healing
process would have been a lot better.
I entered the service in April of 1968,
I was drafted into the Army.
I was shipped overseas to Vietnam.
My job was to bring these individuals that were killed
in action, my brethren, and take them down to Saigon
where they were then embalmed and taken back home.
We probably processed over 400 GIs that were
killed in action.
To this day I still see them in my dreams
and in my thoughts. There isn't a day that doesn't go by
where I don't see certain people all the time.
(people chattering)
Let's get started guys.
Yeah, what do you think of that?
I'd make that maybe twice as long as you have here.
One day I was walking into the VA hospital
and I saw a sign on a bulletin board that said,
"Free Fly Tying, come join us."
So I went to the auditorium and there were a few
people in there, one of them said,
"Hey, want to tie a fly?"
I was hooked.
Project Healing Waters is where veterans can come
and bond together, whether they have a disability
physical or emotional.
What matters to us is inside a person
and not what's outside a person.
- Fly fishing, you're casting the weight of the line,
there isn't any lure to speak of on the end of the line
like there is with casting or spinning.
The fly doesn't weigh anything, and timing is everything.
- I sat there at that table and started tying flies
and the next thing I know three, four hours had passed.
I felt so relaxed, in my own world,
nothing else around me, it was a very therapeutic thing.
We have all sorts of devices and adaptive equipment
for individuals that have amputations,
that have no ability to move their legs.
We have devices where they can tie flies with one hand.
Somebody begins to feel whatever disability they have
no longer becomes a disability.
It didn't take me long to get myself involved
where I wanted to volunteer my services
and I started coming back week after week,
to help these disabled veterans in any way that
I possibly could.
- I started suffering from PTSD symptoms,
going to a restaurant, you always get a seat where
you can watch the front door or the night terrors,
or the dreams.
We come together with other veterans who may not
be able to talk to their family or their friends
or their wife or whatever but they know that they
can talk to other veterans.
- [Ed] Hey guys!
- [Man] Hey Ed.
- [Ed] You up for some good fishing?
- [Man] Yeah.
- I have a lot of empathy for these vets,
teaching them, working with them,
getting them out on the stream.
They need a cup of coffee, they need a break,
we'll get 'em a cup of coffee.
They need to go for a walk and need somebody to walk
with them, we'll go for a walk with them,
we'll listen to them.
We put in a lot of long hours sometimes,
we get paid by the joy that we have with the participants.
- How we doing huh?
- Oh just hunky-dory.
- [Ed] Hunky-dory 'ey?
- Those are the glowing moments when a veteran
comes up to you and embraces you and says,
"You guys have done a marvelous job
You have made my brother, my father, so much better.
We've seen such a change in him."
And we see it here locally with many of the vets
that are in our program,
and the change that has come about them.
I would do anything I could to try and help these vets.
I've been there, they're my brethren.
It matters what's inside and how we treat people.