Sober, vets carve out new life

FITZWILLIAM, N.H. - On Thanksgiving Day one year ago, Bradford Collier passed the holiday crouched behind a cluster of apartments in St. Petersburg, Fla., watching alligators skulk across a stagnant retention pond. Collier, 48, was drunk.

Phil Gray, 61, spent the holiday in Boston, also inebriated, though he eventually found the energy and sense to make his way to the Pine Street Inn for a decent meal.

Today, Collier and Gray will offer thanks as they savor a home-cooked feast with their "family," 13 other veterans scarred by years of drug and alcohol abuse who, day by soul-testing day, are clawing their way toward a safe and sober life.

The holiday cheer will unfold at Veteran Victory Farm here, a unique, pioneering program carved out of 80 acres of New Hampshire woods, where homeless veterans raise animals, grow vegetables, and rediscover the discipline and camaraderie of military service in their quest for sobriety.

For some of the veterans, today will mark the first time in decades they will be sober, and not alone, on Thanksgiving. And if their dinner table this afternoon does not necessarily conjure a Norman Rockwell image, the affection they feel for one another will be just as palpable.

"I've got no more family left," said Collier, a lanky Army veteran who has been homeless for 25 years. "It'll be something I haven't experienced in quite a while. If I can keep a dry eye, it'll be a miracle."

The farm is the nonprofit brainchild of Leslie Lightfoot, an Army medic during the Vietnam War who believed that isolated farm work might be just the kind of empowering, team-oriented therapy that could rekindle purpose and self-esteem in down-and-out veterans.

"I don't believe in entitlement. I believe people should earn what they get," said Lightfoot, the daughter of an Ohio farmer. "A farm just seemed like a common sense, good idea."

The farm, where the veterans can live for up to two years, is the only one of its kind in the country. The US Department of Veterans Affairs provides a small per diem for operating costs; the rest of the funding comes from donations and a 30 percent contribution from those clients with income.

Many of the veterans have a long history of relapses and come here straight from detox programs. Some come by court order. But all of them, once here, must stay sober to remain at a spread that seems cut straight from a New England country postcard.

There are three horses, including a retired racer named Queenie. There's a cow, whose care helps teach the vets "patience and tolerance," as Collier put it. There are two border collies, two goats, one donkey, 17 ducks, more than 40 chickens, and four friendly piglets eventually bound for the dinner table.

The men live in a two-story residence where they double up in rooms and where a sparkling kitchen, comfortable lounge, and basement rec room outfitted with television, dartboard, ping-pong table, and work area provide a long-forgotten sense of home.

Mike Rivers, a former Army Ranger, is the de facto squad leader. A veteran of the Gulf War who served two stints in Massachusetts prisons, Rivers, 42, battled a crack addiction and an affinity for burglary before landing at the farm in September 2007.

He has lived in a Boston commuter-rail tunnel; drunk himself into a stupor seven days a week, every week; and turned the clandestine skills he honed in antiterrorism school into a civilian habit of breaking-and-entering.

At the farm, Rivers began by shoveling manure, then taking care of the ducks and chickens, and now he is top dog at a place where the residents are left by themselves at night and on weekends.

"We all care for each other," Rivers said. "We've all been there, so we all understand each other."

Rivers knows exactly where the nearest alcohol is - 2.5 miles down the road at the general store - and how tempting a drink can be when the vets pass barrooms on trips to VA facilities in Massachusetts. To confront and manage that craving, the veterans attend offsite Alcoholics Anonymous meetings five days a week.

And they keep busy. Rivers, who rises each day at 4 a.m., said he has not taken a day off since March.

"There's never a dull moment," said Martha Gauvin, the farm's case manager. "I love these guys."

The menu today will feature heaping portions of traditional Thanksgiving fare. The main dinner table seats 10, so the vets will eat in shifts as they choose from the turkey, ham, stuffing, squash, mashed and sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, corn, peas, ice cream, and three kinds of pie.

Gray, a Marine Corps veteran awarded two Bronze Stars in Vietnam, scratched his neck and stared at the floor as he recalled the last time he enjoyed a family Thanksgiving.

The year might have been 1994, Gray believed, but even then he probably wasn't sober.

For Collier, the last enjoyable Thanksgiving has all but vanished from his recollection.

"The only time I can really remember a good one is when I was a kid," said Collier, a native of El Monte, Calif. "The early '70s, maybe."

Since then, he has lived in seven states, worked as a clown at a dunk tank, learned to find shelter in the woods, and spent three years behind bars in Vermont.

Rivers said he has seen a big change in Collier since he arrived in August, with chips falling off his shoulder one by one. Collier, for his part, said the farm might be the best thing that has ever happened to him. And for that, he is thankful.

Today, Rivers figures to carve the bird, Gray plans to "help wherever I'm needed," and Collier will concoct a fruit cocktail.

"We're going all out, ain't we?" Collier said, his eyes twinkling above a salt-and-pepper beard.

There will be no staff at the farm during dinner, only 15 struggling veterans with decades of baggage and a flicker of resurgent hope. The moment promises to be special, providing a glimpse of the possible and a reminder of the might-have-beens.

"Like I said," Collier murmured, "this is my family now."