First, what great comments on the Memorial Day post. I had no idea Karen’s father had such a military record. We’ll all take time this Monday to remember…
Thursday night after dinner I treated my Canadian brothers to some beer in celebration of Alyssa’s arrival. As it turns out, I spent the evening talking to my friend and coworker Bob, whom I have mentioned here before, and Eddie. That is Eddie Staniowski. Those of you who followed NHL hockey in the 70s and 80s may remember him as a goalie. He spent ten years in the NHL and joined the Canadian Army after his career. I recently found out that Bob also spent a year as a professional hockey player having one game in the NHL. So, in Kabul, I had great conversation with two hockey pros. They are amazing guys. We talked a lot about military history and strategy and these guys run circles around me with their knowledge. They could skate circles around me as well. Eddie impressed me with his reasons for wanting to be here. One of them was because there were people like us there. He looked at Bob and me and said if there is one other soldier here, he’s on his way to help out.
Tonight I was invited by my friends in the Long Range Plans directorate (the 5 shop for you military folks) to have a cigar in honor of Alyssa. I also brought a box of handmade cookies that I just received today from my friends Nancy and Billy in Pennsylvania. There were around twelve of us out in the gardens enjoying a cigar, cookies, and conversation after dinner. It’s the type of evening that places your mind somewhere else, the type of evening during a deployment that you’ll think about years later. As one of us remarked afterwards, “It was nice to get out of Kabul for an hour.” We shared a lot of stories, insulted our seniors behind their back, remembered people long gone, and for a time forged the relationships that you read about in history books or see in movies. I suppose I am a part of that history now. You will never read any of our names anywhere, but you’ll hear about us just the same. What made tonight different than the times I’ve spent with shipmates long ago or my friends from Combat Training more recently is that the twelve or thirteen tonight were from nine different nations. Nine. You’d never know it except for the uniforms. In the weeks and months to come, we’ll all rotate out, put the war behind us, and most likely not see each other again. But tonight I’ll never forget.
This story shall the good man teach his son…
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
Comrades in arms.That's what its all about. Don't worry.You will never forget this deployment and the goodtimes. With all the bad there will be some good!
But let me tell you what has been lost on Memorial Day here at home. Remember the Memorial Day parade in New Providence when the whole town lined the curb on Sprinfield Avenue and we all went to watch the high school band, the volunteer firemen, the American Legion color guard,etc. There are still some parades but not many go anymore.
The big loss is there is no Memorial Day double headers to go to anymore.In fact some of the teams have the day off. What is Memorial Day without baseball? The Pirates always had a double header at home on that date because by agreement the opened up every year away. This year no game at all! Sacrilege! I guess it was the Unions.
Anyway it doesn't shake the earth unless you love baseball and tradition.
Ithan,
What a touching story about your evening with your international fellow servicemen and friends. I am glad you are having moments like that, except does it have to come with cigars? I never saw you smoke and can't quite picture that. What would Coach Shehata say?
Jane
Since it's still Memorial Day here for another hour I wanted to pop in and say thank you to you, as well as to grandfather and all of our other relatives who either are serving or have served. Happy Memorial Day.
Jerry has said it all.
Post a Comment