thedrifter
08-27-06, 07:23 AM
August 27, 2006
Mourning a Marine, Remembering the Man
By ALAN FEUER
A lot of words get tossed around in the Marine Corps: honor, service, duty, country, courage, faith.
But then there is death, which makes these things so sweet to a marine. It is the threat of death, the fact of death, that gives abstractions weight.
They spoke of death yesterday at the funeral of Lance Cpl. Michael D. Glover, although they also spoke of life. Of the young marine who enlisted after 9/11 and was shipped to Falluja. Of “G-Love” from the Rockaways. Of “Glover” from Xavier High. Of girls in the bar and beers on the beach. Of rugby, law school, and Sunday family dinners. Of a black denim jacket and a baseball cap.
Corporal Glover, 28, was killed on Aug. 16 while on a foot patrol in Falluja, when a sniper’s bullet struck him in the head. He was to have come home in October with his unit, the Second Battalion of the 25th Marines. But instead there was a funeral, at St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Church, in Belle Harbor, Queens, the parish of his birth.
Rain fell on the church at 9 a.m., as the Fire Department bagpipe band was tuning up. Corporal Glover’s uncle is Peter E. Hayden, a former chief who oversaw the Fire Department’s rescue operation at the north tower on Sept. 11.
On the sidewalk, three young women in black smoked cigarettes in little sip-like puffs. A group of firefighters stood beside them, shifting on their feet and sipping coffee. Fire trucks lined Rockaway Beach Boulevard, ladders in the air and hung with flags. When the hearse passed and stopped outside the church, it was silent. Saturdays in the Rockaways are like that. No sound at all except the wind.
There were little things. How young the Marine Corps pallbearers looked. How an infant cried as the coffin went by. How Margaret Glover, the corporal’s mother, carried her grief in the muscles of her jaw.
Inside, the church was packed with mourners and marines — some of them so recently returned from overseas, they still had tans.
“He put his life on hold to join us,” Sgt. Todd N. Venetz said in his eulogy. A good marine. Volunteered for everything. Didn’t ask too many questions. Kept to the task.
Corporal Glover dropped out of law school in 2004, after only one year, to join the Marines. He had been feeling anxious, restless, ever since 9/11, said his cousin Peter Hayden Jr., who is the former chief’s son.
“He didn’t talk about it much, but you could see he was feeling helpless,” Mr. Hayden said. “He felt he had to do something.”
And that was the Marines, which in this case meant Iraq. Corporal Glover arrived in March and was sent to the largely Sunni Al Anbar province. He was on patrol two weeks ago with Capt. John McKenna of Brooklyn, his platoon commander, when they were both surprised by insurgent fire and shot in the head. Captain McKenna was buried on Friday at Saratoga National Cemetery. Corporal Glover was buried at Mount St. Mary Cemetery in Flushing.
But Mr. Hayden, in his eulogy, chose to remember Corporal Glover as the funny cousin he used to hunt Easter eggs with, or fight with over a seat in front of the television set. As the guy, he said, who once tried a “Dukes of Hazzard” move on his car, but slid off the trunk and fell through the open hatchback window. Or who forgot his keys one time and climbed the fire escape, but went in through the wrong window — to an apartment, Mr. Hayden said, that happened to belong to “a New Rochelle cop.”
Then came the Marine Corps — and Mr. Hayden was stunned. And proud, he said.
He read from one of Corporal Glover’s letters from Iraq: “I took an oath — and it’s the best oath I ever took. I’m at peace if I come back with parts of me missing. And I’m at peace if I don’t come back at all.”
Rest In Peace
Ellie
Mourning a Marine, Remembering the Man
By ALAN FEUER
A lot of words get tossed around in the Marine Corps: honor, service, duty, country, courage, faith.
But then there is death, which makes these things so sweet to a marine. It is the threat of death, the fact of death, that gives abstractions weight.
They spoke of death yesterday at the funeral of Lance Cpl. Michael D. Glover, although they also spoke of life. Of the young marine who enlisted after 9/11 and was shipped to Falluja. Of “G-Love” from the Rockaways. Of “Glover” from Xavier High. Of girls in the bar and beers on the beach. Of rugby, law school, and Sunday family dinners. Of a black denim jacket and a baseball cap.
Corporal Glover, 28, was killed on Aug. 16 while on a foot patrol in Falluja, when a sniper’s bullet struck him in the head. He was to have come home in October with his unit, the Second Battalion of the 25th Marines. But instead there was a funeral, at St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Church, in Belle Harbor, Queens, the parish of his birth.
Rain fell on the church at 9 a.m., as the Fire Department bagpipe band was tuning up. Corporal Glover’s uncle is Peter E. Hayden, a former chief who oversaw the Fire Department’s rescue operation at the north tower on Sept. 11.
On the sidewalk, three young women in black smoked cigarettes in little sip-like puffs. A group of firefighters stood beside them, shifting on their feet and sipping coffee. Fire trucks lined Rockaway Beach Boulevard, ladders in the air and hung with flags. When the hearse passed and stopped outside the church, it was silent. Saturdays in the Rockaways are like that. No sound at all except the wind.
There were little things. How young the Marine Corps pallbearers looked. How an infant cried as the coffin went by. How Margaret Glover, the corporal’s mother, carried her grief in the muscles of her jaw.
Inside, the church was packed with mourners and marines — some of them so recently returned from overseas, they still had tans.
“He put his life on hold to join us,” Sgt. Todd N. Venetz said in his eulogy. A good marine. Volunteered for everything. Didn’t ask too many questions. Kept to the task.
Corporal Glover dropped out of law school in 2004, after only one year, to join the Marines. He had been feeling anxious, restless, ever since 9/11, said his cousin Peter Hayden Jr., who is the former chief’s son.
“He didn’t talk about it much, but you could see he was feeling helpless,” Mr. Hayden said. “He felt he had to do something.”
And that was the Marines, which in this case meant Iraq. Corporal Glover arrived in March and was sent to the largely Sunni Al Anbar province. He was on patrol two weeks ago with Capt. John McKenna of Brooklyn, his platoon commander, when they were both surprised by insurgent fire and shot in the head. Captain McKenna was buried on Friday at Saratoga National Cemetery. Corporal Glover was buried at Mount St. Mary Cemetery in Flushing.
But Mr. Hayden, in his eulogy, chose to remember Corporal Glover as the funny cousin he used to hunt Easter eggs with, or fight with over a seat in front of the television set. As the guy, he said, who once tried a “Dukes of Hazzard” move on his car, but slid off the trunk and fell through the open hatchback window. Or who forgot his keys one time and climbed the fire escape, but went in through the wrong window — to an apartment, Mr. Hayden said, that happened to belong to “a New Rochelle cop.”
Then came the Marine Corps — and Mr. Hayden was stunned. And proud, he said.
He read from one of Corporal Glover’s letters from Iraq: “I took an oath — and it’s the best oath I ever took. I’m at peace if I come back with parts of me missing. And I’m at peace if I don’t come back at all.”
Rest In Peace
Ellie