Preparing for goodbyes

Last night, Gunny had a little chat with me through Carrie.  The details regarding her aren’t necessary to share, but he then told me he’d be leaving soon.  This makes me quite sad, as he has become part of our family.  But we understand he needs to move on, as his job here is coming to a close and it’s detrimental to his development to stay much longer.  That doesn’t make it any easier to say goodbye however.  I guess it’s something I have to learn to deal with though.

In any case, he told me I’ve been an inspiration, which always makes me feel silly. He said I taught him about living in faith.  Asking later he clarified that while he understands it, I’m a living example.  I guess I can understand that.  Back to the original conversation he told me that I don’t understand how rare a gift it is to have faith.  I may not ever be able to see or hear what Carrie does, he doesn’t know, but I have always walked my path intuitively.  I am able to continue to follow it, remaining centered.  I guess as gifts go, that’s not such a bad one.  If I’m not going to be given lots of raw data, to be able to intuitively go the right way is pretty darn useful.

And finally he put a hand up, which I grabbed.  He clasped my hand very tightly and said we’re brothers in arms, brothers in life, and (will be) brothers in death.   I’m not quite sure what all of that mean, but I get the gist of it.  I’m really going to miss him, though he’ll probably be here for another 2 months or so.

Last night we had a good chat after we went to Half Price Books.  While there Carrie and I had a good chat with a female Army captain.  She said she couldn’t be a Marine, I said I couldn’t be an officer.  lol  It was quite fun actually.  I had to go look for a book, and when she left she told Carrie she felt like she wasn’t pressed enough and wanted to smooth out her pocket.  But those darn new uniforms aren’t easy to keep super pressed.  I didn’t notice though.  But, when we were there I also saw a VHS box set called Semper Fidelis, a history of the Marine Corps in WW2 using combat footage and stuff.  I can’t wait to watch it.

Talking about that box set got Gunny into story mode.  He told us things he wouldn’t normally be allowed to.  But we aren’t going to use it to identify him or anything.  It would serve no purpose.  He told us about being in Recon, and about missions that ‘never happened’, and about the two gay guys in his squad.  We learned he had a son, and that he was in Vietnam, which is what I suspected.  All in all, it was an interesting night.  It’s just too bad he has to leave.  He said we’ll never be unprotected, but we won’t have a relationship with new guards like we did with him.  I guess that’s ok though.  Another lesson in letting go.  I don’t like those lessons…