He's gone... He barely made it home...

I wrote that song when I got back from a year deployment to Iraq, embedded with the Iraqis.  And now he is one of them.  He wanted to learn to play the guitar too.  Said he wanted to "surprise" his daughter and wife when he got back.  He had big fingers though and I (the antithesis) have girly fingers, so I can see how maybe having big thick fingers might be a problem.  So we spent time in my hooch, strumming endlessly the basic chords wanna be guitarist often do...D, A, D, A, like a baby learning to speak.  It sounded good but he gave up altogether.  He decided he wanted to bring his guitar back with him but I knew better.  Unless you packaged it real good and got it to the IZ and then you mailed it from there, it wouldn't make it; it took some serious planning for those of us that had to take several choppers from Iraqi bases back to Baghdad in order to mail it back.  Bringing it along with the rest of your bag drag stuff just wasn’t' going to be feasible.  I sold mine on the LZ before I left the Iraqi base, got 75% of what I paid for it, thought of buying me a new one when I got back home, a kind of "hell I made it back alive" present for myself.  He innocently drug his to the IZ, along with his 16 (which had a grenade launcher on it), all the ammo we never got to use and four sea bags.  We had a couple days layover in Baghdad so I asked him "LT, lemme see that Gee-tar of yours, lemme see if it can make some noise".  He opened it out of its case and it was all banged up, busted and although I don’t know how to play, even a pro wasn't gonna make this thing sound good.  I said "sorry boss, I told you it wouldn't make it".  Now I regret that I wasn't more forceful with him.  Because now he's gone.

Sound bites of the Beatle’s "a day in the life" come to mind "he blew his mind out in a car".  His family was with him and they are recovering.   We will miss this Naval Officer, a giant that was ever so gentle.  Fair winds and following seas brother, travel well.