The years of the Vietnam War were a confused troubled time for American foreign policy, making the suffering of the participants all the more tragic. But out of it has come the marvelous story about Captain Gerald L. Coffee.

His plane was shot down over the China Sea on February 3, 1966, and he spent the next seven years in a succession of prison camps. The POWs who survived, he says, did so by a regimen of physical exercise, prayer and stubborn communication with one another. After days of torture of the Vietnamese version of the rack, he signed the confession they demanded. Then he was thrown back into his cell to writhe in pain. Even worse was his guilt over having cracked. He did not know if there were other American prisoners in the cell block, but then he heard a voice: "Man in cell number 6 with the broken arm, can you hear me?"

It was Col. Robbinson Risner. "It's safe to talk. Welcome to Heartbreak Hotel," he said.

"Colonel, any word about my navigator, Bob Hansen?" Coffee asked.

"No. Listen, Jerry, you must learn to communicate by tapping on the walls. It's the only dependable link we have to each other."

Risner had said "We"! That meant there were others. "Thank God, now I'm back with the others," Coffee thought.

"Have they tortured you, Jerry?" Risner asked.

"Yes. And I feel terrible that they got anything out of me."

"Listen," Risner said, "once they decide to break a man, they do it. The important thing is how you come back. Just follow the Code. Resist to the utmost of your ability. If they break you, just don't stay broken. Lick your wounds and bounce back. Talk to someone if you can. Don't get down on yourself. We need to take care of one another."

For days at a time Coffee would be punished for some minor infraction by being stretched on the ropes. His buddy in the next cell would tap on the wall, telling him to "hang tough," that he was praying for him. "Then, when he was being punished," Coffee says, "I would be on the wall doing the same for him."

At last Coffee received a letter from his wife:

Dear Jerry,

It has been a beautiful spring but of course we miss you. The kids are doing great. Kim skis all the way around the lake now. The boys swim a dive off the dock, and little Jerry splashes around with a plastic bubble on his back.

Coffee stopped reading because his eyes were filling with tears as he clutched his wife's letter to his chest. "Little Jerry? Who's Jerry?" Then he realized. Their baby, born after his imprisonment, had been a son and she had named him Jerry. There was no way she could know that all her previous letters had been undelivered, so she talked about their new son matter-of-factly. Coffee says: "Holding her letter, I was full of emotions: relief at finally knowing that the family was well, sorrow for missing out on Jerry's entire first year, gratitude for the blessing of simply being alive." The letter concluded:

All of us, plus so many others, are praying for your safety and return soon. Take good care of yourself, honey.

I love you.

Coffee tells about the long, long hours during which the prisoners played movies in their minds, of going from room to room in their houses back home, the camera taking in every detail. Over and over they played scenes of what it was going to be like to be back. Coffee says it was his friends and his faith that helped him through. Every Sunday the senior officer in each cell block would pass a signal — church call. Every man stood up in his cell, if he was able, and then with a semblance of togetherness, they would recite the Twenty-Third Psalm: "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies, thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over."

Coffee says: "I realized that despite being incarcerated in this terrible place, it was my cup that runneth over because someday, however, whenever, I would return to a beautiful and free country."

Finally, the peace treaty was signed, and on February 3, 1973, the seventh anniversary of his capture, Coffee was called before two young Vietnamese officers.

"Today it is our duty to return your belongings," one said.

"What belongings?" he asked.

"This."

He swallowed hard and reached for the gold wedding band the soldier held between his thumb and forefinger. Yes, it was his. He slipped it onto his finger. A little loose, but definitely his ring. He had never expected to see it again.

(My) kids were 11 or 12 years old when my ring had been taken away. Suddenly I felt old and weary. During the prime years of my life, I had sat in a medieval dungeon, had my arm screwed up, had tracted worms and God knows what else. I wondered if my children, now older and changed so much, would accept me back into the family and what our reunion would be like. And I thought of Bea. Would I be okay for her? Did she still love me? Could she possibly know how much she had meant to me all these years?

The bus trip to the Hanoi airport was a blur, but one thing stood out with clarity for Coffee: The bright beautiful, red, white, and blue flag painted on the tail of the enormous Air Force C-141 transport that gleamed in the sun, awaiting the first load of freed prisoners.

Next to the aircraft were several dozen American military people who smiled at them through the fence and gave them the thumbs-up signal. As they lined up by twos, the Vietnamese officer reeled off their name, rank and service.

"Commander Gerald L. Coffee, United States Navy." (He had been promoted two ranks in his absence.)

As Coffee stepped forward, his attention was riveted on an American colonel wearing crisp Air Force blues, wings and ribbons. It was the first American military uniform he had seen in many years. The colonel returned Coffee's brisk salute.

"Commander Gerald L. Coffee reporting for duty, sir."

"Welcome back, Jerry." The colonel reached forward with both hands and shook Coffee's hand. When the plane was loaded, the pilot taxied directly onto the runway without holding short, then locked the brakes and jammed his throttles forward. The huge beast rocked and vibrated as the pilot made his final checks of the engine's performance. The roar was horrendous as the brakes were released and they lurched forward on the runway. When they were airborne, the pilot's voice came onto the speaker and filled the cabin. It was a strong, sure voice.

"Congratulations, gentlemen. We've just left North Vietnam." Only then did they erupt into cheers.

The first leg of their trip home took them to Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines. The crowed held up banners: "Welcome Home! We love you. God bless." From behind the security lines they applauded wildly as the name of each debarking POW was announced. There were television cameras, but the men had no idea that at that very moment in the small hours of the morning, millions of Americans back home were riveted to their television sets, cheering and weeping.

Special telephones had been set up to accommodate their initial calls home. Coffee's stomach churned as he waited the interminable few seconds for Bea to pick up the phone in Sanford, Florida, where she and the children were waiting.

"Hello, babe. It's me. Can you believe it?"

"Hi, honey. Yes. We watched you on TV when you came off the airplane. I think everybody in America saw you. You look great!"

"I dunno. I'm kinda scrawny. But I'm okay. I'm just anxious to get home."

After his long-awaited reunion with his wife and children, he and his family attended mass the following Sunday. Afterwards, in response to the parish priest's welcome, here is what Coffee said. It summarizes as well as anything I know of the optimist's code:

Faith was really the key to my survival all those years. Faith in myself to simply pursue my duty to the best of my ability and ultimately return home with honor. Faith in my fellow man, starting with all of you here, knowing you would be looking out for my family, and faith in my comrades in those various cells and cell blocks in prison, men upon whom I depended and who in turn depended upon me, sometimes desperately. Faith in my country, its institutions and our national purpose and cause ... And, of course, faith in God — truly, as all of you know, the foundation for it all ... Our lives are a continuing journey — and we must learn and grow at every bend as we make our way, sometimes stumbling, but always moving, toward the finest within us.

(from Chicken Soup for the Soul)