Reviews
for
Welcome Home
Home is where the right telling at the right time emerges easily,
sometimes through caring curiosity., July 17, 2007
The warmth in Jim's heart for his wife, expressed at the opening scene of
"Welcome Home" came across like a bear hug of healing force. Later, the scene
with his son which opened the sharing of Jim's Vietnam memories was tenderly
addressed.
Voss seems to be able to give just the right amount of detail in lightly
expanded vignettes, to paint the picture and ease up emotion:
>> "Sure, Dave, I'm done here. What's on your mind?" Jim asked leaning back in
his chair. Dave sat down on the edge of a small couch that was against the
opposite wall. He leaned forward with is hands clasped between his knees, his
head slightly bowed.... Jim told his son of how people had already decided what
it was like in Viet Nam on their own and how anyone who stood up and said "No
that's not what I saw," was either ignored or called a liar. So some had just
told people what they wanted to hear, and others chose to be silent. <<
A touching tale told by a sensitive man is a gift to behold. Better yet, it's a
story to read. Again Voss gave an ending I hadn't precisely anticipated. But, it
was the exact ending this caring catharsis and teary title required.
This isn't sentimentalism, it's a sentimental schism, allowing gaps in the past
to be filled with hearth fires in the present. Read "Welcome Home" to know how
healing can be easy, especially at the right time and place, with loving human
connections.
This was Edd Voss's first Amazon Short, providing a solid preface for his style
of getting you where you need to be to see something he wants you to see. Maybe
we should all work to have this type of warmth in our homes, to thaw the chilled
parts of our journeys, to make them a history to remember right, and cherish
what's left.
Well done, Voss,
Linda Shelnutt
So true, yet frightening and sad., August 24, 2006
"Welcome Home," As a Viet Nam vet, these were the words we longed to hear.
Edd Voss captured the feelings as only a true veteran could. The feeling of
shame for only doing what was right and the feeling of dread when returning to
an ungrateful nation.
Mr. Voss has shown the way to unlock the emotional footlockers we all have
stored in the back of our minds, locked away from family and friend alike.
Edd says, "Welcome Home, I say "Thank You"
Opening repressed memories, March 31, 2006
There are perhaps thousands of old footlockers hidden away in attics, boxes
hidden in the backs of cluttered closets or old suitcases stored deep in
cellars. Edd Voss shows us the kind of courage it takes to take a new look at
old memories, dig them out again and give them the kind of new light and
recognition that for so long they had been waiting for. 'Welcome Home' should be
read by every soldier, sailor, airman and marine who still wonders whether or
not he will be able to muster his old courage once again and relive memories
that have been suppressed for so long. No longer will memories stay hidden in a
vault of shame but be placed where they belong; a place where they can provide
others with knowledge, respect and admiration for the deeds of honorable men.
This is a powerful story that every young man and woman should read. Better yet,
remember.
If you're not feeling this, you're really not a homo Sapien...,
July 8, 2006
Uhuh, Edd Voss' WELCOME HOME captures the sweet bliss of a somewhat paunchy but
eminently likeable breadwinner returning home after yet another long haul on the
road.
::: cue: ON THE ROAD AGAIN ::: <--- imagine you're listening to this song in
your mind until I tell you to stop.
Jim is a truck driver. Julie is his wife. They've got three adorable little kids
(and I won't tell you about the surprise third one -- we should all be so
lucky). Jim is a Vietnam vet -- highly-decorated, and deservedly so. His comings
and goings have a graceful staple playing out for the past thirty years of his
life once returning from the hellish battlefields. Killing fields where our
young men lost their lives, not to mention the amputees of which, more so than
the actual deaths, will now be outnumbered only by the amputee casualty count
emanating from the Middle East in Ancient Mesopotamia...but you didn't come here
for a political piece, and this isn't about war. Besides, I'm not a polemicist.
Stop the music.
I'm amazed by the verisimilitude between the soldier's solitary march across and
through enemy territory -- only to return to the safe confines of home base at
the end of a mission -- and Jim's peripatetic job driving stick. Jimmy Boy's
once-addled soul seems to be locked into a sort of karmic destiny; only now his
*dharma* plays out over the paved (sealed, if you're from New Zealand) roads of
peacetime America (and Southern Canada -- woo hoo! -- go Canada go!).
Jim hauls goodies over long distances. Out on the road, perched high above the
silly motions of the rest of the planet, schlepping cargo, watching the rest of
the sorry masses get steamed up and down and out frustrated by the vicissitudes
of, er...living. Jim's a soldier, and he knows how to rise above all of this
jazz.
Why? It's cause he's got the "schwartz." Now, I'm kidding.
It's because he knows -- at the end of the day/week/month, or however much those
union-busting trucking companies rip off their drivers these days -- Julie and
the boys will always be awaiting him when he arrives home.
Cue the music again.
James' wife will have one of her scrumptious sandwiches prepared, and the
Jimster can rest assured that all will be good and well in Pleasantville. The
rigours of his job, miles, exhaust fumes and greasy cholesterol-laden spoons
behind him, plus the pressure of the oh-so-crappy "real" consumerist world will
quickly be forgotten by a brisk Julie backrub, a beer on the couch (which he'll
rest on his chubby lambanza), and the sweet reminiscences of all the things Jim
saw while out on the open road.
I'm not quite sure whether others realized it, but I found this soldier/trucker
mirroring quite engaging.
WELCOME HOME is a poignant little feelgood piece. It deals with readily
recognizable themes:
** love.
** dedication.
** pride for service.
** hunger for a cheesburger after 500 miles of flat North Dakota badlands.
plus our man Edd's prose makes for a curious and easily-digestible "ensalata
mixta" -- a very welcome change from the gloom and doom headlines of our present
day in the life of Mr. Cheney's little act of wargames.
On a more serious note, what I'd genuinely like to see is Edd let 'er rip, baby!
I want to read one of Mr. Voss' longer treatments, where he has the time to let
his characters roam free, far beyond the stifling confines of a 10pp Shorty
Short. I'll liken it to an airplane runway, kay?...WELCOME HOME is a SOTL (Short
Take Off and Landing) aircraft using the wide expanse of a two mile long stretch
meant for Jumbo Jets.
I've got a feeling that Mr. Voss' got a lion in 'im. Grrrrowwwlll! Ready to
pounce out and devour our thoughts and emotions in the way that someone of his
talent and mettle could.
It's a five-star story, folks. Allow your inner-chimpanzee to be touched and
cooed. Mine was.
-- ADM in Prague (and I'm not on absinthe, I don't drink)