“Bill Lawrence is in the bathtub.”
Mrs. Lawrence said it matter-of-factly as she watched a passing ski boat.
Admiral Lawrence disliked bathing.
Not as a matter of hygiene. But as a matter of pride.
He’d fought his way back from a stroke that would have killed most people.
But he still needed help getting in and out of the shower.
Which he didn’t like at all.
And who could blame him?
The man had been on the shortlist for NASA’s Project Mercury.
He’d been the first Naval Aviator to fly twice the speed of sound.
And he’d survived six years of torture and isolation in the Hanoi Hilton.
Six years.
So, no, the Admiral didn’t appreciate the fact he couldn’t take a goddamn shower by himself.
But that was the hand he’d been dealt.
He was stoic about it, as you’d expect.
As was Mrs. Lawrence.
I’d caught up with her at the end of the long dock that extended from their backyard into the Severn River.
She was relaxing in an Adirondack chair and invited me to join her.
I always enjoyed speaking with Mrs. Lawrence.
She was so . . . poised.
Pure class.
And tough as shit.
I’d been brought on, ostensibly, to help the Admiral finish his memoirs.
But really, I was part of his therapeutic regimen.
“Just keep him talking,” Mrs. Lawrence had said. “Bill Lawrence has the most incredible stories. Make him tell you. It’s good for him.”
She always referred to her husband as “Bill Lawrence.”
Which I found amusing.
I’d come over every Sunday morning.
The Admiral would settle into his leather recliner and start talking.
And I’d start typing.
Alan Shepard was a favorite topic.
Yes, that Alan Shepard. First American in space.
There was a signed photograph of Shepard hitting a golf ball on the moon hanging in the Admiral’s study.
“For Billy Lawrence . . .” it was inscribed.
He and Shepard had been squadronmates in Korea and test pilots together at Pax River.
The two of them may or may not have flown under a couple bridges in the area during that time.
The Admiral’s daughter, astronaut Wendy Lawrence, had told me to ask him about it.
“Under a bridge, you say?” the Admiral demurred. “Well, of course, that would have been against regulations.”
And he left it at that.
I told Mrs. Lawrence.
“Well, that’s Bill Lawrence for you,” she replied.
She continued to stare out at the river.
“We’ve had some good times,” she offered.
She talked about how they’d met.
In 1973, Mrs. Lawrence had been running a thriving physical therapy practice.
One of her patients, a recently returned Vietnam POW, had the idea to set her up with a friend.
“You two would really hit it off,” he’d said.
Mrs. Lawrence wasn’t interested in meeting anyone at the time, but the patient persisted.
The patient was John McCain. The friend was Admiral Lawrence.
The future Senator held the Admiral in high regard.
And very much wanted him to meet someone.
It had to do with a recent turn of events.
There was an image of then-Captain Lawrence that had circulated in the newspapers in March 1973. He was standing, still emaciated-looking, in front of a bank of microphones in his Service Dress Khakis. A plane had just deposited him on a tarmac in his home state of Tennessee, one of his first stops in the U.S. after having been released by the North Vietnamese and repatriated.
It was the homecoming for which every POW had dreamt.
But, for Admiral Lawrence, the home to which he returned was very different from the one he’d left.
Only days before standing on that tarmac, he’d learned that his wife of twenty years had divorced him and remarried while he was in captivity.
He’d had no idea.
Can you imagine?
John McCain intended to do something about it.
And he did.
Admiral Lawrence and Diane Wilcox Raugh, McCain’s physical therapist, were married in August 1974.
“When I picked him up to move into our new house, everything he owned fit into one box,” Mrs. Lawrence said. “I nearly wept.”
The Admiral never spoke of his former wife.
And I certainly never asked him about her.
He once commented, however, that “She was just as much a casualty of war as I was.”
Incredible.
Mrs. Lawrence and I chatted out on the dock for half an hour.
“Well,” she eventually said, “we’d better see about Bill.”
I followed her into the house.
She started up the stairs to the second floor while I waited in the kitchen.
Halfway up, she stopped.
“Come on,” she called down. “I’m going to need your help.”
I headed upstairs, not entirely sure why.
This really wasn’t my department.
Someone from the Admiral’s medical staff usually helped with the bathing.
Mrs. Lawrence stood in the bathroom doorway and motioned me in.
There, I found the Admiral.
Lying in the bathtub, just as Mrs. Lawrence had said.
He was fully clothed and staring at the ceiling.
“Bill,” Mrs. Lawrence called to him, “Dan is here.”
“Oh,” the Admiral said, snapping out of his trance, “hello there.”
I immediately jolted for the bathtub and helped the Admiral to his feet.
He was dead weight.
“I couldn’t pick him up,” Mrs. Lawrence said. “But I knew you were coming.”
Later that day, Mrs. Lawrence gave me the full story.
The Admiral had apparently become obsessed with getting his weight down to what it had been when he’d played football at the Naval Academy.
As a result, he weighed himself on the bathroom scale several times a day.
The scale was right next to the bathtub.
That morning, the Admiral had apparently been weighing himself, lost his balance, and fell into the bathtub.
Mrs. Lawrence had heard the thud, went in to check on him, and found him lying there.
Her trained eye had told her the Admiral wasn’t hurt, but she didn’t have the strength to get him out.
So, she’d gone outside to wait until I’d arrived.
And when I had, she’d decided that we should first catch up before going upstairs to deal with the Admiral.
What’s the hurry? she figured.
We got the Admiral put back together and settled into his chair.
“Where were we?” he asked me. “Oh, yes,” he said, and launched into another story, resuming our conversation exactly where we’d left it the week before.
The Admiral didn’t seem the least bit bothered he’d spent much of the morning in a bathtub.
He’d endured far worse.
Vice Admiral William P. Lawrence died later that year.
A division of Super Hornets flew the Missing Man formation over the Naval Academy cemetery during his funeral.
Just as Admiral Lawrence had flown an F-4 Phantom over Arlington National Cemetery during JFK’s internment in 1963.
It was a fitting tribute.
To an extraordinary man.
And an extraordinary life.
Of which I got to be a part.
For the briefest of moments.
For which I’ll always be grateful.
And thank you, Mrs. Lawrence.
I’m glad we had the chance
To catch up.