Our oldest son returned home after graduation, and despite pretending to apply to law school or graduate school, he gave no sign of leaving. At our insistence, he did get a very good job selling cars. Last December, he entered Marine boot camp and is now stationed at Camp Lejeune; his unit leaves for Afghanistan after the first of the year. Talk about growing up!
God bless him. He’s my brother now. I proudly served in the Marines from ‘55-’79. He’ll be in harms way, to be sure, but I always thought an impious little saying we had in Vietnam summed it up just right: “Yeah, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil— ‘cause I’m the toughest mother in the valley.”