thedrifter
09-08-06, 08:27 AM
Son’s return to Iraq more than enough
By Peter Gelzinis
Boston Herald Columnist
Friday, September 8, 2006 - Updated: 04:06 AM EST
One week ago, in a seizure of love, rage and fear, Eddie Contilli told his youngest boy that he would gladly shoot him in the leg rather than watch him shipped back to Iraq for a second tour of 545 days.
Michael Contilli just looked at his mountainous old man. “Dad,” he said, “I think I’d really be ****ed if you did that.”
Father and son then locked onto each other in a fierce embrace filled with tears and laughter.
It’s a good thing George W. Bush wasn’t anywhere near Maverick Square in East Boston last Friday, because it would have taken a herd of Secret Service agents to keep Eddie Contilli from choking him like a chicken.
This ex-Boston cop had just learned the Army scoured its inactive reserve list to pull his 22-year-old son away from a job, a wife and a new baby. From a cramped office in the back of Eddie C’s, his legendary Maverick Square bar, he kept screaming into the phone.
“Why doesn’t the sonova***** send his own two kids over there?” he railed. “Let them stop partying for 545 days and visit Baghdad for a year! Then, Bush would know what it feels like to have your heart stop everytime the doorbell rings, or wonder if you should pick up the ******* phone.
“My two kids have already done their time. They’ve served their country . . . both of them!” Eddie said, his voice hoarse and broken. “Mikey with the 101st Airborne and Eddie Jr. with the Marines . . . both of ’em in Iraq. When the hell is enough, enough?
“It’s not fair to ask the same kids to sacrifice over and over and bleepin’ over again! How long are they supposed to keep doing this? Until they’re sent home without an arm, or a leg . . . or in box? It’s wrong. It’s just bleepin’ wrong!”
One day after the twin towers fell, Michael Contilli told his father he was joining the service to fight for his country. He was only a junior at Hamilton-Wenham High School. To get his father’s signature on the recruitment papers, Michael aced a GED exam, which allowed him to bypass his senior year. He thought he was going to fight the Taliban in Afghanistan. He wound up in Iraq, manning a machine gun on an assualt chopper.
When we first met, there was no prouder Dad than Eddie. Portraits of his sons, framed by American flags, hung prominently inside his gritty saloon. His anxiety was tempered by a belief that the Iraqi people valued his sons’ service almost as much as he did.
But that was three years and many thousands of deaths ago. Now, he says his sons’ war has become the war he quit college to fight almost 40 years ago, only to be denied by a football-shattered knee. “I still don’t know why those 58,000 people died,” he said. “The communists are running Vietnam today. And we’re doing business with them. Where’s the justice?”
Next month, Eddie will give his son, Michael, the wedding reception he could not provide three years ago, when the then 18-year-old Army private married his high school sweetheart in an empty Tennessee chapel before leaving for Iraq.
“Mikey was told back then that if he was killed,” his father said, “at least his wife would receive some benefits.” What promised to be a joyous celebration will now be tinged with echoes of farewell and Godspeed.
“My Mikey is 22 now and he’s seen so much, too much,” Eddie said. “He’s lost friends, both my boys have. I call Mikey my little warrior. When I told him I’d shoot him, he just laughed. ‘Dad,’ he says to me, ‘I signed my name. I’ve got an obligation to fulfill. So, that’s what I’ll do. Don’t worry, Dad, I know how to handle myself.’ ”
In the tormented landscape of Eddie Contilli’s abundant face and broken heart lies the soul of George W. Bush’s dismal poll numbers. “I voted for the man twice,” he said. “Now, the candidate that tells me the troops are coming home tomorrow gets my vote.”
Ellie
By Peter Gelzinis
Boston Herald Columnist
Friday, September 8, 2006 - Updated: 04:06 AM EST
One week ago, in a seizure of love, rage and fear, Eddie Contilli told his youngest boy that he would gladly shoot him in the leg rather than watch him shipped back to Iraq for a second tour of 545 days.
Michael Contilli just looked at his mountainous old man. “Dad,” he said, “I think I’d really be ****ed if you did that.”
Father and son then locked onto each other in a fierce embrace filled with tears and laughter.
It’s a good thing George W. Bush wasn’t anywhere near Maverick Square in East Boston last Friday, because it would have taken a herd of Secret Service agents to keep Eddie Contilli from choking him like a chicken.
This ex-Boston cop had just learned the Army scoured its inactive reserve list to pull his 22-year-old son away from a job, a wife and a new baby. From a cramped office in the back of Eddie C’s, his legendary Maverick Square bar, he kept screaming into the phone.
“Why doesn’t the sonova***** send his own two kids over there?” he railed. “Let them stop partying for 545 days and visit Baghdad for a year! Then, Bush would know what it feels like to have your heart stop everytime the doorbell rings, or wonder if you should pick up the ******* phone.
“My two kids have already done their time. They’ve served their country . . . both of them!” Eddie said, his voice hoarse and broken. “Mikey with the 101st Airborne and Eddie Jr. with the Marines . . . both of ’em in Iraq. When the hell is enough, enough?
“It’s not fair to ask the same kids to sacrifice over and over and bleepin’ over again! How long are they supposed to keep doing this? Until they’re sent home without an arm, or a leg . . . or in box? It’s wrong. It’s just bleepin’ wrong!”
One day after the twin towers fell, Michael Contilli told his father he was joining the service to fight for his country. He was only a junior at Hamilton-Wenham High School. To get his father’s signature on the recruitment papers, Michael aced a GED exam, which allowed him to bypass his senior year. He thought he was going to fight the Taliban in Afghanistan. He wound up in Iraq, manning a machine gun on an assualt chopper.
When we first met, there was no prouder Dad than Eddie. Portraits of his sons, framed by American flags, hung prominently inside his gritty saloon. His anxiety was tempered by a belief that the Iraqi people valued his sons’ service almost as much as he did.
But that was three years and many thousands of deaths ago. Now, he says his sons’ war has become the war he quit college to fight almost 40 years ago, only to be denied by a football-shattered knee. “I still don’t know why those 58,000 people died,” he said. “The communists are running Vietnam today. And we’re doing business with them. Where’s the justice?”
Next month, Eddie will give his son, Michael, the wedding reception he could not provide three years ago, when the then 18-year-old Army private married his high school sweetheart in an empty Tennessee chapel before leaving for Iraq.
“Mikey was told back then that if he was killed,” his father said, “at least his wife would receive some benefits.” What promised to be a joyous celebration will now be tinged with echoes of farewell and Godspeed.
“My Mikey is 22 now and he’s seen so much, too much,” Eddie said. “He’s lost friends, both my boys have. I call Mikey my little warrior. When I told him I’d shoot him, he just laughed. ‘Dad,’ he says to me, ‘I signed my name. I’ve got an obligation to fulfill. So, that’s what I’ll do. Don’t worry, Dad, I know how to handle myself.’ ”
In the tormented landscape of Eddie Contilli’s abundant face and broken heart lies the soul of George W. Bush’s dismal poll numbers. “I voted for the man twice,” he said. “Now, the candidate that tells me the troops are coming home tomorrow gets my vote.”
Ellie