How Did I Get Here?

Tuesday

There is a Major in my unit who had to have heart surgery for the second time. The word is that he is quite a character and after meeting him, I can attest to this.

After our weekly sitrep meeting today with the hospital, the XO and I decided to go see how the Major was doing after his surgery a couple of days ago. After being sent to a couple of different places (no one was quite sure exactly where he was which made me curious. I mean, how do you NOT know where a patient is?), we finally located him.

When we finally found him, he was behind a little curtain. We were on the other side wondering how you knock on a curtain but after we got verbal confirmation to enter, a small, older nurse flowed in after us. I think she might have just been someone who cleans up but whoever she was, the Major was in no mood to have her barge in without permission.

This Major is one of those old school Italian guys who has been in the Marine Corps forever. He is very forward with his thoughts and most people, like me, go with the description of “interesting character” when speaking of him. I liked him the first time I met him.

When he saw us enter, he smiled. He was in his boxers only and without his shirt, we saw the big, red, angry scar running down his chest. But when he saw the nurse, his smile turned to a scowl.

“You two can stay, YOU, GO!”

She looked momentarily confused.

“GO. NOW!”, as he gave her a little “go away” hand signal.

She shuffled out of the room.

“Damn people just come walking in during all hours.”

This amused me because I could tell he didn’t like being in a hospital and didn’t take any shit from the staff. What were they going to do to him? He survived two open heart surgeries.

The fact was, he should have still been laid up in bed. It had only been a couple of days and the staff had wanted him to lay down for a straight week.

“Fuck that, I can’t lay there all day.”

So in true Marine Corps style, he was up and walking around before anyone would have ever expected him to even get up unassisted.

“I’m checking out. They want me to stay but I can’t stand this place.”

I loved it.

I was introduced to him and felt strange being HIS Company Commander. But he treated me with respect and really seemed to appreciate that we would stop by. I was honored to be there (and not being barked at to get the hell out) and was impressed that this guy would survive against the odds and retain his “Marine” attitude.

From what I’ve heard and what I saw, this is classic Major L. If there is any question if there are still a “Marine’s Marine” still serving, he puts the question to rest.

Ooh-rah, Major.

Free Advice for Today: “Take the stairs when it’s four flights or less.”

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 25th, 2006 at 12:03 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.