{{{Mercury}}}
Hiya Chic! Long time no see, but mostly due to my schedule..... :o(
How have you been? How's my K-man??? Believe it or not, I find
myself thinking of him every now and then since I went back into the
classroom. You are one wonderful mother Merc with two amazing
boys....errr....men now eh? :o)
Anywho, good to see you posting.
Oh, I still haven't forgot about lunch, Christmas break is right
around the corner!
On Dec 4, 10:34 am, "Mercury.Sailor" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> My Marine
>
> My son Zachary was a gangly high-school junior when he casually
> informed me, in the fall of 2003, that he’d been speaking with
> military recruiters. “An Army guy, a Navy guy and a marine are coming
> over,” Zach said. “A parent has to be present because I’m not 18 yet.”
>
> Past Lives Columns“I’ll be present,” I said. “Don’t worry.”
>
> I wore my best vegan-dyed PEACE T-shirt. I was wary but not too
> worried. Zach was barely 17, graduation seemed far off still and the
> notion that he would volunteer was laughable. He didn’t like killing
> anything, even insects. The sight of blood made him gag. His favorite
> hobby was napping.
>
> Army Guy turned up with a salesman’s enthusiasm. “How are you, ma’am?”
> he said to me, and answered himself in the next breath. “Great! Let’s
> just sit you down here. ... ” Soon the couch was covered with glossy
> brochures detailing the great accommodations at military bases in
> Italy and Germany, the great medical facilities, the great on-base
> T.G.I. Friday’s. Zach looked over my shoulder as I examined dreamy
> photos of Hawaiian bird life and Munich’s museums and beer festivals.
> “Great opportunities if he likes culture. ... ”
>
> “What about the war?” I said.
>
> “The Iraq thing?” I recall him saying. “That’ll be over in no time.
> Let’s take a look at some of the great educational benefits.”
>
> Navy Guy had tender brown eyes and was endearingly soft around the
> middle of his white sailor suit. He confided to me, sotto voce, that
> the Navy had a really low casualty rate. “All the mothers ask,” he
> said, with a sad smile. He stayed for lunch, confiding in me about his
> girl troubles while Zach leafed through a pamphlet showing happy
> sailors on the deck of a destroyer. “Maybe I don’t want to be in the
> military after all,” Zach said later. “It seems kind of goofy.”
>
> Then came the marine. He was fit and spit-shined. “My name is
> Sangster, ma’am. Rhymes with gangster.” As I remember it, that was
> pretty much all he said to me; his pitch was aimed at Zach. “The
> Marine Corps will make you puke, make you cry, and when that’s over,
> you’ll be sent to the most miserable, dangerous, godforsaken place on
> the planet. So let me ask you: Why should I let you join my corps?”
>
> I opened my mouth to answer (“Goodbye!”) but was quelled by a sharp
> look from Zach. “Well ... um, sir,” he said. “I think I’m reasonably
> smart. But I don’t work very hard. I want you to teach me to work.”
>
> Sangster looked at him for a long moment. “We can do that,” he said.
>
> What could happen to my son’s body in Afghanistan or Iraq did not bear
> thinking about. Also unbearable was the thought of what he might have
> to see. My late father served in the Marine Corps in the Korean War
> and later became a combat correspondent. My first husband, Zach’s
> father, a state trooper, was killed in the line of duty when Zach was
> 9.
>
> “Has it occurred to you that you might be looking for some version of
> what you lost when you lost your dad?” I pointed out, in my attempt to
> talk Zach out of joining.
>
> “Of course,” he said calmly. Oh.
>
> My second husband, Simon, is a peace-loving man. “I can’t say I trust
> Sergeant Sangster, or his corps,” Simon admitted. “But I do trust
> Zach.”
>
> Zach graduated from Parris Island skinnier but still recognizably
> himself. After advanced combat training, he was sent off to Fort Meade
> to learn to be a correspondent for military publications. He lived
> with other newly minted marines in a barracks presided over by a man
> who swiftly became the main character in our boy’s stories. We
> pictured him as Louis Gossett Jr. teaching his charges to run faster
> and fight harder. He inspected their uniforms and gave out
> punishments, but he also took Zach’s temperature when he was ill and
> made sure Zach flossed his teeth and called his mom. This Sergeant
> Purcell even encouraged Zach to resume his interest in poetry. One
> day, Zach told us he ran 12 miles in record time. “I was on my knees,
> throwing up, and Sergeant Purcell was hollering, ‘That’s what I call a
> quality effort, Devil Dog!’ ” The pride in Zach’s voice brought tears
> to my eyes.
>
> Sergeant Purcell later went to Iraq and was wounded. (Zach says he’s
> O.K.) My son was sent to Okinawa, where he fell in love with a blue-
> eyed lance corporal named Erin. They married, and in 2007 they were
> sent to San Diego, which did ease my mind somewhat. But this year Zach
> re-enlisted. Regardless of who becomes his commander in chief, I still
> cannot trust the world with my son — there are too many places where
> horrors lurk — but I do trust my son.
>
> Kate Braestrup, a chaplain with the Maine Warden Service, is the
> author of a memoir, “Here If You Need Me.”
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/02/magazine/02lives-t.html?_r=1
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