Five Minutes to...what?

A veteran, a song, and thoughts about how much time we really need

Before we begin…

Do you have enough time, too much, or never enough? How has your relationship with time changed over the years or does it depend on what it is you’re trying to do? Think about the last five minutes - how did you spend them? How did it leave you feeling? 

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“Everybody’s in this water…”

“Time is just common, it’s like water for fish. Everybody’s in this water, nobody gets out of it, or if he does the same thing happens to him that happens to the fish, he dies.” – James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

Photo by Andreea Popa on Unsplash

I came across this passage from Baldwin’s novella Giovanni’s Room just after reading an interview in my local paper with both members of the husband and wife musical team, The War and Treaty who were to perform the next night. Their story riveted me. Michael Trotter recalled that ten years on from his time in Iraq, grappling with PTSD, he intended to commit suicide. He believed his wife and son would be better off without him. His wife, Tanya, called for help and then made a simple request: would he give her “just five more minutes” to love him, to convince him that staying is better than going. 

“I had failed enough. I had let my family down enough — my wife and my children — and my intention was to end it all that particular day…And then love snitched on me, snitched on my plans, and my wife came to me, got down on her hands and knees, and asked me to give her five more minutes to love on me.” - Michael Trotter, from interview in the San Diego Union Tribune. 

That was in 2017. The couple eventually turned that moment into a song, Five More Minutes, that has been playing in my head for days now. The song astonished me. It is not dark. It’s joyful, urgent. The simple lyrics themselves don’t allude to Michael’s despondency, they veer away from the future, they focus on the next five minutes, a small unit of time, that water that keeps us alive until it doesn’t. More important than the words, are the voices of the Trotters which are beautiful singly but magical together. After watching their videos and listening to as much of their music as I could find, I could only think of what a loss it would have been not just for them but for so many others if Michael had gone through with the decision to kill himself. 

I’m thinking of this as Veterans Day approaches. In September, the Veterans Administration announced what at at first looks like positive news: after rising every year from 2001 to 2018, the rate of suicides among veterans declined from 2019 to 2020. Despite the decline, the new figures mean that an average of 17 veterans committed suicide each day of that year for a total of 6,146. Another study by the America’s Warrior Project provides data that suggests veterans suicides are over twice what the VA has counted. Either way, too many lives are still lost, too many families and friends left broken. 

In this essay from The Wrath-Bearing Tree, Army veteran Chris Oliver writes about the loss he feels over men he knew who were lost at war. These losses, though, are easier for him to understand than the losses that continue among those with whom he served or knew years after they made it home. Now he is fighting confusion, sadness, anger every time he learns of a friend who ended his own life. 

 “I flashback to a memory from years earlier in Mosul.  I see Chad Golab leaning against a wall out of breath.  He had just sprinted across an open area through a hail of bullets and rocket propelled grenades.  He wore a smile from ear to ear.  He was laughing.  So very alive.  I can’t believe that the man I saw in that moment was the same one who was found outside of a convenience store in the front seat of his car, dead from a self-inflicted gunshot… The question of “Why?” always lingers in the air, drifting along searching for an answer.  The answer never comes, only more of those horrible phone calls.  More names.  More questions.  I’m angry.  I feel a deep sorrow and love for these men.  I also hate them.  I hate them for what they have done to themselves and the unfair enigma they have left behind for us all.  We cry for those who have gone before us, yet they are the very ones who have created our pain.  What sense can be made of this?” - “Survivor’s Paradox” by Chris Oliver, Wrath-Bearing Tree. 

We need to be concerned about veterans because they are among the groups who with the highest risk of suicide, the ninth-ranked cause of death for U.S. citizens age 10-64 according to the CDC. It’s so easy to be daunted by these statistics. It’s also easy to be daunted by the idea that veterans are a group apart with experiences and pain only those who have served can understand. But whose pain is ever truly knowable to another human being? I have sat across from someone I think of as my friend, and have only known a fraction of what she is feeling or thinking or has suffered in her life.  

When faced with the needs or pain of another person, I am aware of my limitations, sometimes so much so, that I offer nothing. Their needs are big. Perhaps mine at that moment are also big. I am afraid of the failure I will feel when the person before me remains in pain or is facing such a long difficult path that I question my ability to hang in for the long haul. What I loved about the Trotters’ story is that Tanya Trotter knew her husband held the ultimate responsibility for his decision and knew, too, that he would need more than her love to get him through it. She could, though, ask for and give five minutes. That got them to the next five minutes. And the next. Broken down like this, it is possible to see how even just five minutes of connection or some small action can make a difference. 

Photo by Agê Barros on Unsplash

I was brought up sharp by what the Trotters seemed to understand so well: if you break time down into small amounts – a cup full at a time, to stick with the water metaphor – it is possible to keep afloat, even to swim. It’s an old idea that persists because it works. Just ask artist Austin Kleon who espouses those artists skilled at working in small, consistent blocks to create something bigger, or anyone who has followed a twelve-step recovery program one day at a time. If a day is too much to think about, then an hour will do, or five minutes. 

How has this idea worked in your work, your art, your life? Have you ever been overwhelmed by how much there is to do? The impossibility of perfection? The fear of not being enough? How do you get through it? Does the idea of five minutes at a time make sense to you? 

A few things that take only five minutes to do

I’ve been thinking about some of the things I can do in 5 minutes: write a decent sentence or two, call or text a friend to say hi, listen to a song by a veteran who is mining his experience to make art and to grow and I can pay for that song (or story, or art). I may not be confronted by a person - veteran or civilian - who is contemplating suicide but I can, in 5 minutes, support programs set up to save the lives of veterans or others who are contemplating suicide. I’m thinking that these are some of the ways I want to observe Veterans Day this year. After all, we are all swimming in the same water. 

The National Suicide and Crisis hotline: 988 

• Dialing three digits can put you or a loved one in touch with help. Read more about it HERE. 

Help the helpers

• Help the helpers: Here’s a list of organizations focused on prevention of suicide among veterans and here’s a list of ten resources focused on prevention of suicide by anyone. 

• Since 9/11 nearly 19% of Native Americans have served in the Military, compared to an average of 14% of other groups. The Native American Veterans Association helps veterans transition from service back to civilian life. Learn more here and consider donating. 

Support art made by veterans

• Read Chris Oliver’s essay, a new piece of fiction, or a poem in this month’s issue of  The Wrath-Bearing Tree, a publication and nonprofit organization established by combat veterans and maintained by a diverse board of veterans, military spouses, and writers compelled by themes of social justice and human resilience. Then donate to this organization to make sure more voices are heard.  

• Learn about the visual artists, playwrights, performers, and other artists and their work at the United States Veterans Artists Alliance (USVAA) and consider donating. 

• Treat yourself to music from The War and Treaty. You can sample it here on Youtube, then buy their latest album Hearts Town or any of the others wherever you buy music or here on their website. 

• Read the rest of this beautiful poem “The Art of Breathing” by Chris Soucy over on the Savage Wonder Substack, and learn about the Veterans Repertory Theater

Excerpt from “The Art of Breathing” by Chris Soucy

we mistake our individuality for being alone
we are not separate, we are not apart
we are not skin and blood and muscle and bone
we are all colors of the same work of art...(More)

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Take time to vote (if you haven’t already)

Vote on Tuesday - then tell the world you exercised your right to make your voice heard. Maybe don’t stick out your tongue, though. 

What’s on Your TBR List? 

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Ciao for now.

Gratefully,

Betsy

P.S. And now, your moment of Zen…a deer with a difference

Tom M. of New Jersey sent this shot of a piebald deer who wandered into his yard wearing a coat that will come in handy when the snow flies. Until then, she wanders through the fading fall colors, refusing to blend in. 

Calling for Your Contribution to “Moment of Zen”

What is YOUR moment of Zen? Send me your photos, a video, a drawing, a song, a poem, or anything with a visual that moved you, thrilled you, calmed you. Or just cracked you up. This feature is wide open for your own personal interpretation.

Come on, go through your photos, your memories or just keep your eyes and ears to the ground and then share. Send your photos/links, etc. to me by replying to this email or simply by sending to: elizabethmarro@substack.com. The main guidelines are probably already obvious: don’t hurt anyone  -- don’t send anything that violates the privacy of someone you love or even someone you hate, don’t send anything divisive, or aimed at disparaging others. Our Zen moments are to help us connect, to bond, to learn, to wonder, to share -- to escape the world for a little bit and return refreshed. 

I can’t wait to see what you send!

Bonus Tracks from The War and Treaty