A young man joins the Marines
At 17, he decides to serve

By KEITH GOLDBERG
Times Herald-Record


GREENVILLE — They gathered to say goodbye to Daniel Fitzgerald Sunday, beneath a large white tent in his backyard.

Everyone was there: relatives, his girlfriend, his high school football buddies. They toasted 17-year-old Daniel, whose life is about to change.

The middle of Ed and Carol Fitzgerald's three boys, Daniel was always his own man. "If he had the choice of a straight, smooth path up a mountain or a rocky one, he'd take the rocky one," Ed says.

His path took him to the high school football field. He was good enough to start as middle linebacker for Minisink Valley — good enough, his coach, Kevin Gallagher says, to play college ball.

But Daniel was never a fan of school, a feeling confirmed during visits to schools upstate and in Connecticut over the winter. College wasn't his path.

So in April, he told his parents he wasn't going to college. He was going to enlist in the Marines.

Carol was stunned. Ed tried to talk him out of it. He knew the decision could land his son in Iraq and Afghanistan, and in harm's way.

"I'm afraid," Ed says. "I'm very proud of him, but I want to see him grow old."

What does Daniel think when he hears about Moshin Naqvi of the Town of Newburgh, who last week became the 17th local soldier to lose his life since 2003 in the war on terror? "I don't think about dying," Daniel says. "That's not what I want to think about."

He prefers to think about how powerful he'll feel being a Marine; how it's going to make him a better man.

Ed made a deal with his son. They would go camping one weekend, and if Daniel was still set on enlisting by the end of it, Ed would give his blessing.

At a campground in Huguenot, they fished and talked about his decision. Ed pressed his son to reconsider; Daniel held firm. Ed finally relented.

"I'm scared, but I know he's going to be a better man," Carol says.

On Oct. 14, Daniel will step on a plane at Stewart International Airport, bound for Parris Island, S.C., and boot camp. He'll turn 18 while he's there.

He appreciated the fuss everyone made Sunday, but wondered why "everyone's making such a big deal out of this."

It's because his mother feels like "I'm putting him on the school bus when he's four years old again."

It's because his father says it will be hard to write letters to his son, instead of talking to him. "I don't need much, but I need my kids," Ed says.

It's because the Sunday sendoff of Daniel Fitzgerald wasn't just for him.

kgoldberg@th-record.com

Ellie