Reader Report: Sharing the boat parade with a Marine
The boat parade outside the Balboa Corinthian Yacht Club is beautiful.
Inside a Marine sergeant named Juan Valdez sits with his fiancee at the Newport Beach Sunrise Rotary dinner table. His service dog, Midas, a boxer, waits quietly under the table.
“I like the one with the dragon spouting fire,” Valdez says of a boat parading down the bay.
Throughout the evening he was in constant company of BCYC members, including Phil Reynolds and wife, Liz. They were paired because Valdez wants to go to law school. Phil Reynolds is a graduate of that “little law school called Harvard” and offered advice.
As the evening progressed Valdez answered time and again the question about what happened to him in Iraq and Afghanistan. The answer: physical injuries with his unit, 1st 2nd/8th Marines, and the emotional challenges of coming home.
He credits his fiancee, Christen McGrath, and Midas, for getting him through the ordeal, the emotional roller coaster. Now, unlike possibly a year ago, he could not be with anyone but Marines and McGrath. The outside world wouldn’t understand what he had gone through.
But with the passage of time, treatment and TLC, he has come back from a place that none of us have ever experienced. His life with McGrath (they plan to marry in March) is full, and Midas, whom Valdez trained from 8 weeks old, is the four-legged miracle worker that, like other service dogs, has made it possible for these young warriors to come back from war and cope.
The evening ended where we sat in my family room, looking at actual particles of black sands from Iwo Jima. I showed him some rare documents I uncovered at the National Archives in the past year, and search for information about the various Iwo Jima Flag Raising Monuments that the brilliant Felix deWeldon sculpted, that became the Marine War Memorial next to Arlington Cemetery in Washington, D.C., an icon of America’s 20th century.
Telling Valdez that I have a major effort underway to bring one of DeWeldon’s original works to Camp Pendleton, where the public would be able to see it from the 5 Freeway, he became somewhat animated.
“I would love to see a pathway like the one that they dealt with on Iwo Jima, leading to a monument, like we have at the 5th Marines Camp San Mateo, for our men to train with the goal of getting to the top, to reach the monument,” he said.
A few days earlier Juan sat with me and some Marines, including three veterans of the Iwo Jima battle. There I witnessed the bond, one to another, that lives on among those for whom “once a Marine, always a Marine” is not just a slogan. Their stories are remarkable. Their bravery never-ending. To these men let us never forget how much we owe.
Valdez double-tapped his thigh, and Midas came running, happy to stick his nose out the door of the car as they drove away. Blessings come in many forms! Getting to know this courageous Marine was a Christmas gift that will always be with me.
LAURA DEITZ lives in Newport Beach.