Sunday, November 09, 2003
Thanking Pvt. Lynch
From the beginning of this saga of the rescued Jessica Lynch, I was impressed by the quiet dignity with which her family and community conducted themselves. For them, it was always about caring for this gravely injured young woman, and one another. In Germany, when her parents discovered from her doctors that Jessica had suffered neither knife nor gun wounds, they told us. There were a few on camera interviews with neighbors and friends, but not many, and the question of Jessica's herosim was never a cause that either her family or friends took as their own. The controversies swirled around them, without ever distracting them from the central task of healing Jessica, whose intrinsic bravery was not an issue for those who knew and loved her. Yes, the Pentagon asked them to be quiet. But I had the feeling such a request wasn't necessary. In their unemphatic way, this family from Palestine, West Virginia, insulated by the strong bonds of a rural community, managed not to be used by either the media or the government. They might owe the American public what information they had about their daughter, because we all seemed to care so much, but that was all they owed us. (If you haven't had an opportunity to read the Farmer's musings on liberals and their perennial failure to formulate a rural election strategy, you can and should find it here, check out the comments, too, and here.)
While arguments raged about what the true story of her rescue was, and whether or not the Pentagon and/or the press had used her to advance a story line of brave, good American soldiers versus bad, brutal Iraqis, save one, her family and her community kept to themselves and out of the limelight, seeming to understand just how distorting a lens it can be. The long stay in the hospital in Germany before she could come home to continue treatment here spoke to the gravity of her injuries. While she struggled through what had to be an arduous rehab, her parents, friends, and fiance shielded her from the press and from us.
When she was finally ready to come home to West Virginia, pundits said we'd be inundated with little Jessica, the waif/soldier, and speculated on the huge killing she was about to make off the media synergies that would package and repackage her story, her image, pieces of her image, her meaning, Jessica as icon was going to be irrisistible, to her as much as to us. Remember the network letter to her, CBS wasn't it, explaining all the multiple ways she could market herself and her story?
It never seemed to occur to any of these chroniclers of celebrity, often media stars in their own right, that there might be something, even several somethings more important to Pvt Lynch and those who mattered to her than fifteen minutes of stardom. In fact, except for a brief view of her during her public homecoming, and a brief speech, we saw and heard little from her or her parents or her community.
Yes, eventually she signed a book deal, and a TV movie deal. But that was all. And Rick Bragg insured a certain level of quality for the book, while wisely, she had nothing to do with the TV movie. No one should begrudge Pvt. Lynch the money she will make. She could have made more, she could have given multiple interviews, with Barbara WaWa as well as with Diane I'll empathize till you barf Sawyer. She could have posed for covers of Vogue, Vanity Fair, Sports Illustrated, Good Housekeeping, Seventeen. She could have allowed herself to be feted on Broadway, in Hollywood. She could've have been seen gleefully proclaiming she was going to DisneyWorld.
I might be wrong, but I'm betting she won't. And for that, I feel a deep sense of gratitude to that little town in West Virginia for nurturing a family like the Lynchs, and the real Pvt. Lynch, whose strong sense of who she is, and was, coupled with her concerns for the many soldiers whose suffering will not be chronicled, guided her not to make "the most" of her temporary fame. With any kind of luck, we won't weary of Jessica Lynch before we have an opportunity to appreciate and learn anew, how extraordinary "ordinary" people turn out to be, as we're beginning to, now that she's getting her first opportunities to set the record straight.
While arguments raged about what the true story of her rescue was, and whether or not the Pentagon and/or the press had used her to advance a story line of brave, good American soldiers versus bad, brutal Iraqis, save one, her family and her community kept to themselves and out of the limelight, seeming to understand just how distorting a lens it can be. The long stay in the hospital in Germany before she could come home to continue treatment here spoke to the gravity of her injuries. While she struggled through what had to be an arduous rehab, her parents, friends, and fiance shielded her from the press and from us.
When she was finally ready to come home to West Virginia, pundits said we'd be inundated with little Jessica, the waif/soldier, and speculated on the huge killing she was about to make off the media synergies that would package and repackage her story, her image, pieces of her image, her meaning, Jessica as icon was going to be irrisistible, to her as much as to us. Remember the network letter to her, CBS wasn't it, explaining all the multiple ways she could market herself and her story?
It never seemed to occur to any of these chroniclers of celebrity, often media stars in their own right, that there might be something, even several somethings more important to Pvt Lynch and those who mattered to her than fifteen minutes of stardom. In fact, except for a brief view of her during her public homecoming, and a brief speech, we saw and heard little from her or her parents or her community.
Yes, eventually she signed a book deal, and a TV movie deal. But that was all. And Rick Bragg insured a certain level of quality for the book, while wisely, she had nothing to do with the TV movie. No one should begrudge Pvt. Lynch the money she will make. She could have made more, she could have given multiple interviews, with Barbara WaWa as well as with Diane I'll empathize till you barf Sawyer. She could have posed for covers of Vogue, Vanity Fair, Sports Illustrated, Good Housekeeping, Seventeen. She could have allowed herself to be feted on Broadway, in Hollywood. She could've have been seen gleefully proclaiming she was going to DisneyWorld.
I might be wrong, but I'm betting she won't. And for that, I feel a deep sense of gratitude to that little town in West Virginia for nurturing a family like the Lynchs, and the real Pvt. Lynch, whose strong sense of who she is, and was, coupled with her concerns for the many soldiers whose suffering will not be chronicled, guided her not to make "the most" of her temporary fame. With any kind of luck, we won't weary of Jessica Lynch before we have an opportunity to appreciate and learn anew, how extraordinary "ordinary" people turn out to be, as we're beginning to, now that she's getting her first opportunities to set the record straight.
