Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 2034

Good Evening,

There is not a great deal to talk about today. David got his military ID replaced, Catherine got her Rhode Island driver's license that she applied for in August last year, and I worked on airplane tickets for family members.

David had to get his wounds redressed today and that took almost 2 hours. During Davids PT, he is always telling the therapist that his X-fix on his pelvis is really pressing into his legs. The therapist just tells him to push as much as he can and, I guarantee, he does. Well, today in redressing, when they pulled off his bandages, they found a brand new wound. Last Friday when the wound sites were cleaned and dressed, all the stitched areas were in great shape - now there is a hole in David's left leg. The new wound is about 3" long and about a 1/8" deep and about 1" wide. The X-fix bolts have dug in and opened the new wound across the stitched area. Although he was extremely upset, he treated those dressing his wounds with great respect. It is just so frustrating because David wants to keep pushing beyond what seems possible. He wants those legs back and he wants them NOW. Anytime there is something that has the slightest possibility of slowing down his progress, it is much worse than the pain. We'll all have to see how hard he can work on building his core strength now that he has the new wound. The older gentleman that was working on his dressings really took David's concerns to heart and asked if there was anything he could do. David was so frustrated that he threw out two or things that just had not been answered as of yet.
Withing 20 minutes of us getting back to David's room, he came to the room and told David that his X-fix, 3 month clock starting time, would put the removal at approximately August 21st. We'll hope for that date. We also found out that he could put weight on his right hand to the level of pain that he could take - I hope he doesn't do all of that because he seems to be able to take a great deal of pain. I guess that sometimes it pays to get a little upset.

I want to take a minute to clarify the events of David's injuries. David and his group had to hike in approximately 3 miles to reach the site. They had received a tip that there was a possible IED. When they arrived they saw that the possible IED was a stack of rocks with the dog tag of a fellow Marine that had been injured in that same place a few days before. David and his team swept the area and found two other IEDs. David disarmed one, was working on the second when he heard and felt a blast behind him, he said the blast almost made him fall on top of the bomb he was working on. They immediately ran to Carlos Evans and got him stabilized and called in a Medivac Helicopter. They cleared the landing zone and as soon as the helicopter arrived, the soldiers carried their equipment to give aid to Carlos. They ran back and forth several times + the time they carried Carlos for transport. The pathway had been cleared, walked on, ran on, carried across, cleared with metal detectors, and David was following a bomb sniffing dog on that exact path when he turned to tell his team associate to keep a distance between them - that's when he stepped on it. I don't think they could have done anything to change this. The reason I went over that again was that there was a misunderstanding that came from me earlier when I suggested that they were in a vehicle when they arrived - I'm not sure where I got that information from but I do know it was wrong.

With all the disappointment of the day, David had an incredibly great day. He was visited by General Mattis of the United States Marine Corps. David had made a statement within the past week that there was one person in the Marine Corps that he really wanted in his room and that was General Mattis. He is described as being the modern day Patton. General Mattis was fantastic, he was genuinely interested in David, in his injuries, in his dreams, in his concerns with the way things were being handled in the Afghanistan, and what David thought would improve the needed reliance and respect that newly place young officers, entering the war zone, should give to their senior NCOs (non-commissioned officers). (Like David) I'm not sure if I said that very well. What I mean is that too many young officers don't rely on the expertise of those who have been on the ground doing all the hard jobs for 5 tours before they even received their commission. General Mattis took notes and assured David that those notes would be in front of those who needed to know withing a very short time. When David expressed his respect and appreciation for General Mattis, General Mattis almost stopped the compliment to tell David that he was the one that was respected and appreciated - the General is sincerely appreciative of the ground forces and that do "the hard work."

One of the best parts of his visit was the fact that SSGT Bradley of the Marine Corps Liaison Office told David that General Mattis had sent him an email to let him know he was coming and that he specifically wanted to see David first.

This whole experience has really opened my eyes to so many things. We have great leaders in our military.

You know I love you,

Gordon