hoisting one for Eddie
It’s been an incredibly busy stretch on the farm since I last blogged. Once spring finally showed up, Jude and I have been catching up on outside projects. I’ve just about finished a beach along our creek to honour my friend Eddie Weekfall, a Marine boot camp buddy who was killed in Vietnam near the end of his tour. I’ll be hoisting one for him out there later today. I hope you’ll join me in spirit.
As Jude scrambles to get the netting over the blueberry blossoms to keep birds away, my other big project has been deconstructing a century-old cedar shed near the house. Too close, point of fact. I’m replacing it with a tin shed that will house our firefighting equipment. The demolition has required me to move huge slabs of wood. Fortunately, cedar is extremely light as wood goes.
Nonetheless, my aging back told me this morning to take the day off, holiday or not. I slept until noon and had a leisurely breakfast/lunch while watching the news. This is a fortunate time to be exhausting myself by wrestling wood planks. The absolutely needless drama generated by the debt ceiling “crisis” in D.C. makes me nuts every time. The grandstanding by both sides is enough to force a guy to seek solace in reruns of Frasier, Northern Exposure and Star Trek: Voyager, which Jude and I do every night.
Besides grieving Eddie’s death, my heart is especially heavy this year because my best friend from high school, Dennis Bouck, just died. We met as sophomores and immediately discovered that, even with the babiest of faces, we could get served at the Boom Boom Room. We stayed in contact after graduation, but when he didn’t return my phone calls or ‘net requests recently, I feared for the worse. We lost a really good person.
So I’m off to the beach to remember Eddie and Dennis. See you there.
P.S. Because of the heightened awareness of the U.S. military today, I’d like to air a pet peeve of mine: only members of the Army are soldiers, Marines aren’t.
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Anchor Struck 
Always love to see your written words, even when expressing personal loss/sadness. Glad you rested and that your wood was cedar! I always call you Marine because you shal be forever…if you can catch my Facebook post for today, please take five and give it a read…peace old-time friend…forever, just as the Marine you are…
I thought of you and our visit to the Vietnam war memorial in 2012 as I was writing this. Talking with you and the Colonel was one of the highlights of that trip. A month after I got home, the VA upped my disability and that has made my life so much easier. I can’t believe that the clowns in D.C. would even consider cutting veterans’ benefits.
semper fi
so, army people are soldiers, what are the rest called?? sailors? marines? airmen? are those correct?
Yes, although members of the Air Force are Airmen and Airwomen, and members of the Coast Guard are Coast Guardmen and Coast Guardwomen. Fun fact: the Marines are technically a branch of the Navy.
Odd thing Allen. I was really feeling you on Memorial Day, even mentioned it to a friend who was visiting. I’m pretty sure I was with you in spirit. Nice quote: Grief is love with nowhere to go. (don’t remember who said that first, but it fits for me).
I’m putting a word out simply because so much of Canada is burning right now. So hoping you are all OK io your piece of peace. We are currently chocking on smoke for wildfires in Quebec here in upstate NY and smoke at least doesn’t destroy homes and lives. Been reading but not saying much lately. Condolences and cyberhugs around all of it
Q