thedrifter
10-13-06, 08:58 AM
Local family mourns death of fallen Marine: Garvin laid to rest on Friday, Oct. 13
By Dan Baer/ dbaer@cnc.com
Friday, October 13, 2006
As Melissa Garvin sat at her sister-in-law’s kitchen table, she quietly and deliberately spread out pictures of her husband, Marine Lance Cpl. Edward Garvin.
She was trying to come to terms with the horrible news she received last Wednesday - that her husband, a Malden native, was killed with one other soldier during a combat operation with the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force while fighting the war in Iraq.
He was 19 years old.
"I don’t want people to remember him as someone who died in Iraq," Melissa Garvin said this week. "That wasn’t who he was. When he came home, that uniform was off and he was just Eddie."
In the pictures displayed, Garvin is not depicted in military garb. Rather, he is shown the way Melissa said she’d always remember him - in street clothing, laughing with friends, enjoying life and playing with his 2-year-old son, Grant.
She pointed to one picture of the Marine whom friends affectionately called "Eddie," soaking wet and cleaning up a kitchen filled with soapsuds after he used the wrong detergent in the dishwasher. She then chuckled at another, of Eddie and his friends sharing a laugh about the soapy snafu.
"We called it our wedding shower," she said.
These are the pictures, said Melissa, that show who her husband really was - a funny, happy, optimistic man who loved his family and friends and was looking forward to starting a new life with his wife and childhood soul mate.
"We talked about the possibility of something like this before he left, although you never really expect it to happen," she said. "But he told me that if this happened, he didn’t want anyone to cry for him. He wanted us to laugh and remember him for who he really was."
Garvin lived in Malden and graduated from the Northeast Metropolitan Regional Vocational High School in Wakefield in 2005, one of 10 seniors that year who joined the military. According to the school, he studied culinary arts and worked in a student-run dining room.
He married Melissa, his childhood friend, in May of 2006, and was living near the Marine base in North Carolina when he was sent to Iraq. His wife said he made a selfless decision to go overseas, despite her pleas for him to stay home with 49 other Marines in his unit who were not deployed.
"I was mad at him when he told me, because I knew that there were only 150 slots to go over there and there were 200 people in his unit, so I asked why he wouldn’t stay here," she said. "And he told me that if he didn’t go over there, then someone else would have to go and be away from their family."
Melissa said she and family members appreciate the outpouring of support they have received since Garvin’s death last week, but added she hopes others will afford them time to grieve and remember Garvin’s life.
She continued to look at pictures this week, to make sense of all that has happened in the past few days. She said she is trying to come to grips with losing the man she called her soul mate and best friend - the man she hasn’t spent more than three days apart from since second grade and the man she said will always be with her, no matter what has happened.
"They say when you get married ’till death do us part,’ but that is a lie. I will always be with him," she said. "All I can ask people is to think of a memory that you have of Eddie and laugh about it. Even if it is just for two minutes, two seconds, just think of him as he really was, and laugh. Because that is what he would have really wanted."
In addition to his wife Melissa, Garvin leaves a son, Grant, his mother Catherine Edwards, and two siblings. Funeral arrangements were not announced as of press time.
Ellie
By Dan Baer/ dbaer@cnc.com
Friday, October 13, 2006
As Melissa Garvin sat at her sister-in-law’s kitchen table, she quietly and deliberately spread out pictures of her husband, Marine Lance Cpl. Edward Garvin.
She was trying to come to terms with the horrible news she received last Wednesday - that her husband, a Malden native, was killed with one other soldier during a combat operation with the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force while fighting the war in Iraq.
He was 19 years old.
"I don’t want people to remember him as someone who died in Iraq," Melissa Garvin said this week. "That wasn’t who he was. When he came home, that uniform was off and he was just Eddie."
In the pictures displayed, Garvin is not depicted in military garb. Rather, he is shown the way Melissa said she’d always remember him - in street clothing, laughing with friends, enjoying life and playing with his 2-year-old son, Grant.
She pointed to one picture of the Marine whom friends affectionately called "Eddie," soaking wet and cleaning up a kitchen filled with soapsuds after he used the wrong detergent in the dishwasher. She then chuckled at another, of Eddie and his friends sharing a laugh about the soapy snafu.
"We called it our wedding shower," she said.
These are the pictures, said Melissa, that show who her husband really was - a funny, happy, optimistic man who loved his family and friends and was looking forward to starting a new life with his wife and childhood soul mate.
"We talked about the possibility of something like this before he left, although you never really expect it to happen," she said. "But he told me that if this happened, he didn’t want anyone to cry for him. He wanted us to laugh and remember him for who he really was."
Garvin lived in Malden and graduated from the Northeast Metropolitan Regional Vocational High School in Wakefield in 2005, one of 10 seniors that year who joined the military. According to the school, he studied culinary arts and worked in a student-run dining room.
He married Melissa, his childhood friend, in May of 2006, and was living near the Marine base in North Carolina when he was sent to Iraq. His wife said he made a selfless decision to go overseas, despite her pleas for him to stay home with 49 other Marines in his unit who were not deployed.
"I was mad at him when he told me, because I knew that there were only 150 slots to go over there and there were 200 people in his unit, so I asked why he wouldn’t stay here," she said. "And he told me that if he didn’t go over there, then someone else would have to go and be away from their family."
Melissa said she and family members appreciate the outpouring of support they have received since Garvin’s death last week, but added she hopes others will afford them time to grieve and remember Garvin’s life.
She continued to look at pictures this week, to make sense of all that has happened in the past few days. She said she is trying to come to grips with losing the man she called her soul mate and best friend - the man she hasn’t spent more than three days apart from since second grade and the man she said will always be with her, no matter what has happened.
"They say when you get married ’till death do us part,’ but that is a lie. I will always be with him," she said. "All I can ask people is to think of a memory that you have of Eddie and laugh about it. Even if it is just for two minutes, two seconds, just think of him as he really was, and laugh. Because that is what he would have really wanted."
In addition to his wife Melissa, Garvin leaves a son, Grant, his mother Catherine Edwards, and two siblings. Funeral arrangements were not announced as of press time.
Ellie