The Desert Sun
Sherry Barkas
August 16, 2014
Ezra “Jim” Pratt was born and raised in Indio, where he lives again today. A member of the Indio High School Class of 1963, he was drafted to serve in the Vietnam War.
(Photo: Sherry Barkas/The Desert Sun)
“My physical wounds healed quickly, but the spiritual, psychological wounds still today can give me trouble,” Pratt said. “I started to question, ‘Is there really a God and why has he got me here going through this,’ ” he said, sitting in his sparsely furnished Indio home.
One year on the front lines in Vietnam put Ezra “Jim” Pratt’s life on a different course, forever.
He went over thinking he was doing something positive for the country and returned with a hardened outlook on the war and the United States’ involvement.
“I wasn’t in Vietnam a month and I realized it was just some kind of race between the communists and capitalists...,” he said. “We were just kids.”
“I came from a middle-class family and thought I would get married and go to work at the same job for 30 years,” said the recipient of a Bronze Medal for valor and a Purple Heart. “I got over there and I started questioning life in general. I got involved in something so terribly horrifying, it killed my spirit.”
His life since has been wrapped in addiction, relationships and jobs he couldn’t hold for long and some time in prison on drug charges, Pratt said.
It was a diagnosis 25 years later of post-traumatic stress disorder that finally helped Pratt get his life on track, showing him the root of his anger and ways to curb it without becoming violent. With that he also sought help for his substance abuse.
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