Back when I was a kid and America could afford enemies, GI Joe appeared in a comic book of his very own— telescoped down from the great, generic Grunt to a big, shovel-jawed blond, a Swede maybe, with hair that seemed, well . . . longish. GI Joe was a compassionate hero, as I recall, always with gum for the kids—Italian, Korean, whatever—caring for his buddies and for innocent civilians, not above zonking a Gook in revenge. When we played war, one of us was GI Joe.
Usually John. John could make wonderful sounds. Budda, budda, chillchill: machine gun. Thwick-thwick: bullets (heavy tree cover). G-dang, gdang: bullets (in a rocky defile). John even had a noise for a dud artillery shell. He could do it only once a week, because the effort tended to impact his eustachian tubes. I haven’t seen John in twenty years. He’s probably working for McGovern now (not with a bang but a whimper). And GI Joe. . . . He’s someplace else. Argentina, I guess.
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