larry johnson speaks of an encounter and the mark it left on him; 

 

I got a real bad kick in the balls today. I spent the day working as a volunteer Chief Range Safety Officer at a Veterans and Cigars shooting competition sponsored by the Meritorious Foundation. Meitorious is a networking platform tailored to military needs, designed by those who understand military culture. It empowers veterans and military spouses through the strength of networking.

One of the RSOs who assisted me, a dear friend named Tank, served as a Navy Corpsman who did four combat deployments with the Marines. His job was saving lives, not taking them. Tank and I have a mutual friend — who I met when he took a Basic Rifle class from me — Jamie Lee Sclatter. Jamie also served as a Navy Corpsman with the Marines, but was qualified as a Marine sniper. Just an incredible guy. Humble, kind and very competent. His focus, like Tank, was on saving lives, not taking them. He talked of dealing with combat casualties, but never talked about killing.

Tank and Jamie hung out together. They were shooting together a week ago. As we left the event, Tank got word that Jamie committed suicide today. Fuck me, that hurts. The kid — yes, I consider 43 year old guys as my kids — is gone in part because of the stupid fucking wars we’ve been fighting for 25 goddamn years. This tears a hole in the souls of those who loved him that is not easily healed..............more........