Gone, but not forgotten

Deepa Bharath

Jeanette Chervony has heard it her entire life:

“Hey, Jeanette, you walk like your dad.”

“Jeanette, that’s exactly the way your dad used to say it.”

“You look just like your dad.”

It’s all heartwarming yet distant to the 34-year-old Costa Mesa

resident who has seen her dad only in photos. She was 4 months old when

Eddie Chervony set out to fight the war in Vietnam.

The Puerto Rico native, known for his youthful good looks, exuberance

and courage, was killed while protecting fellow soldiers on May 5, 1968.

He was awarded a Distinguished Service Cross and Silver Star for his

sacrifice. His daughter was barely a year old then.

“I heard he was killed as he shielded another man with his own body,”

she said. “And I believe he rescued six soldiers by physically carrying

them, one by one.”

Chervony loves and adores her dad. Hungry for details, memories and

stories, she set out to learn more about him.

“Who was this man who I’ve never met or known, but I’m so much like

him?” she asked herself.

Chervony did get some answers over the years, but she didn’t stop

there. Her focus has moved from her life and her story to the lives of

other grieving children.

Now, she is seeking out and helping others just like herself who are

struggling with those unanswered questions.

Chervony, a civilian employee of the Costa Mesa Police Department for

15 years, is president of the Southern California chapter of Sons and

Daughters in Touch, a national organization for children of slain Vietnam

War soldiers.

“The kids, as we call them, don’t like to talk about this stuff,” she

said. “It’s hard for us. The war [was] painful and ugly. But our group

looks at how we can make it a positive experience” for the children.

What the children of slain soldiers experience can best be explained

as “delayed grief,” Chervony said.

“It’s hard to look back,” she said. “But it’s important. There are

lessons to be learned from the past. It makes us better people.”

Many of the children are frustrated, Chervony said.

“Anger is part of the grieving process,” she said. “Some don’t want to

deal with it, and that’s OK. But for the rest of us, it’s a bonding

process. It’s like the [Vietnam Veterans Memorial] wall brings us

together.”

On Memorial Day, she made her annual trip to Washington, D.C., to see

the wall erected in honor of the soldiers who died in Vietnam. It’s

almost been a sort of pilgrimage for Chervony over the last eight years.

Usually, she and other “kids” would visit the wall every Father’s Day,

but this time they made it for Memorial Day.

Chervony said she usually takes her son, Eddie, 7, who was named after

his grandfather, with her. But he could not make the trip this year and

was sorely missed, she said.

Chervony’s mother, who helped reconstruct some of her father’s

memories, died four years ago. Chervony is her parents’ only child,

although she has siblings from her mother’s second marriage.

For Chervony, the experience at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial every

year is almost surreal, she said. This time, she and a couple of other

members of Sons and Daughters in Touch hung out by the wall at 3 a.m.

“It was great,” she said. “At that time of day, there was no one

around and it was almost like we had domain over it.”

One of her friends could not reach up and touch her dad’s name because

it was higher on the wall.

“And you know what we did? We gave her a boost up,” Chervony said,

laughing. “She was so happy, so happy. She said she had never thought she

would be able to feel her dad’s name on the stone.”

The group is getting ready to make a trip to Vietnam in 2003, she

said.

And the Internet has opened a new world of possibilities for Chervony,

whose next goal is to connect with one of the six men rescued by her

father.

“Even if I know one of them survived,” she said, “I’ll know my dad

didn’t die in vain.”

FYI

For information about Sons and Daughters in Touch, call Jeanette

Chervony at (714) 444-3707, send her an e-mail at o7 jeanette@sdit.org

f7 or visit o7 https://www.sdit.orgf7 .