the face of war

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Nina Berman, USA, Redux Pictures for People.

Wounded US Marine returns home from Iraq to marry

giboyojimbo (gbx), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 01:56 (seventeen years ago) link

http://i59.photobucket.com/albums/g283/misanthrop3/6938468_Detail550.jpg

aidsy (aidsy), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 01:58 (seventeen years ago) link

His wife is a much, much better person than I am.

milo (milo), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 02:00 (seventeen years ago) link

i hope they can fix his face

giboyojimbo (gbx), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 02:01 (seventeen years ago) link

My least favorite new word of recent years: 'polytrauma'.

Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 02:03 (seventeen years ago) link

the backhand of modern medicine

giboyojimbo (gbx), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 02:09 (seventeen years ago) link

this story makes me so sad ... and angry.

Eisbär (Eisbär), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 05:35 (seventeen years ago) link

this war is so fucked it makes me want to cry

max (maxreax), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 05:42 (seventeen years ago) link

The story in more detail. Personally I think the bride, Renee by name, really IS all that and more -- she lost her father a couple of years back in a freak accident. Someone like that has true strength.

Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 05:44 (seventeen years ago) link

But look at her face and her body language! She looks so unhappy.

Trayce (trayce), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 05:50 (seventeen years ago) link

she looks numb

friday on the porch (lfam), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 05:55 (seventeen years ago) link

It's awful to even speculate, though one can't help it. Something about the story itself is cruel - the story being a media sensation rather than a quiet tragedy, I mean.

Not For Use as Infant Nog (A-Ron Hubbard), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:02 (seventeen years ago) link

True.

Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:07 (seventeen years ago) link

But look at her face and her body language! She looks so unhappy.

i know -- i didn't want to say it, but i thought the same.

when i think about this, all i can do is hope -- and pray -- that they can remain together somehow. it's only my speculation -- and it may be rude for me to say so -- but she may be the only thing keeping him going and it would destroy him if she left him. that's one hell of a burden for anyone to bear.

Eisbär (Eisbär), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:07 (seventeen years ago) link

seemingly crass but pertinent question: does his stuff work?

ryan (ryan), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:09 (seventeen years ago) link

The article says they're planning on children.

Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:12 (seventeen years ago) link

ah ok. that's good.

ryan (ryan), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:12 (seventeen years ago) link

I guess they're not exactly declining media attention. But they're very young and, in a sense, romantic. They might stay together, they might not - I really can't say. But it seems awfully easy for the news media to make a hallmark card out of it and for everyone to feel reassured of "the power of love" and then forget about it before things start getting really difficult for the couple (which they will whether or not the marriage lasts)

Not For Use as Infant Nog (A-Ron Hubbard), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 06:15 (seventeen years ago) link

fuck this world

Johnney B's got a system (stigoftdumpilx), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 10:40 (seventeen years ago) link

I have nothing but the best of wishes for them.

War sucks.

Dee Xtrovert (DeeXtrovert), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 11:25 (seventeen years ago) link

gah, FUCK this story, fuck everything about it, it shouldn't even exist.

emsk ( emsk ), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 11:30 (seventeen years ago) link

it's terrible, but um guys there are 100,000s of stories exactly like this coming out of the war. think of the number of deaths, the number of injuries, then the number of loved ones affected. this guy at least had good medical treatment and is in a better place than most of the victims.

temporary enrique (temporary enrique), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 11:32 (seventeen years ago) link

You should be a Viz character, enrique.

Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 11:35 (seventeen years ago) link

really, when was the last time you saw the person you were kissing when you kissed them?
When did you look at that person, as opposed to feeling and kissing that person?
he looks great to me - because he is alive.
And his ruined face still shows the adoration he has for the bride who rubbed his toes when he was in the hospital.
the only thing that bothers me is the article - because it doesn't do justice, or lend dignity, to their union.

However, I don't like her dress. her dress is the most bothersome thing about it, IMHO.

aimurchie (aimurchie), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 11:56 (seventeen years ago) link

I feel a bit sorry for all the attention they are getting. It's harder to get down to normal things when you're held up as unique irregardless of how supportive it seems.

aimurchie really seems to have the right opinion. Except about the dress, I think it works well with his uniform. There probably needed "something blue" over the shoulders like a scarf.

kv_nol (kv_nol), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 12:02 (seventeen years ago) link

Well, it takes a lot of courage to be photographed, in uniform, with such obvious scars!
of course his bride looks stunned - she probably wonders how it all happened! But I don't think you fall in love with a face - or, if you do, you fall in love way beyond that when you fall in love.

her dress is just not my taste - I don't like the red heartshaped neckline! But it is really nice with his uniform.
Much better than the black suit she could have been wearing.

aimurchie (aimurchie), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 14:23 (seventeen years ago) link

While receiving a folded flag.

aimurchie (aimurchie), Tuesday, 13 February 2007 15:55 (seventeen years ago) link

the entire photo gallery.

Eisbär (Eisbär), Wednesday, 14 February 2007 03:55 (seventeen years ago) link

not to be a prick, as this is a truly amazing story of love amidst tragedy.

BUT YOU CAN'T EVEN HAVE A WEDDING (or much of a happy life) IN IRAQ RIGHT NOW. let's not forget that. the fact that he is alive and with the person he loves most is fantastic, but so many won't get that chance on either side of this bullshit war.

the table is the table (trees), Wednesday, 14 February 2007 04:07 (seventeen years ago) link

"Becky recalled that on Valentine’s Day in hospital in 2005, Ty was so wounded he could hardly speak. She and Renee taped a pen to the splint on his hand and he wrote as best he could on a dry erase board: “Ty and Renee”.

“Well, we think it said ‘Ty and Renee’,” Becky laughs. “Then doctors removed his ‘trake’ – the tracheostomy tube in his neck that had been feeding him when his lips were too burnt – and he said, ‘Renee, will you be my valentine?’ I cried.” His next words were: “Do you want to make out?"

There must been an awkward moment or two, just then.

This story is really sad, but as painful as it is to think about it, there needs to be more coverage like this in the media, and other newscasters should emulate the end of the Jim Lehrer newshour, when they show photos of all the soldiers who died that day, silently.

Zachary Scott (Zachary S), Wednesday, 14 February 2007 04:18 (seventeen years ago) link

And not just on the field.

Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 14 February 2007 04:21 (seventeen years ago) link

...at 8:35 p.m. on Jan. 16, Eric, who was in Florida on business, received a phone call from Jonathan, who was staying in an apartment in New Prague, Minn., that Eric owned and where he gave Jonathan a room.

Jonathan told Eric he was in the basement standing on a stool and tying a noose around his neck with an extension cord. A bottle of Captain Morgan rum, three-quarters' full, was at his side, and he was slurring .

"I tried to stall him by being nice, and then I tried getting mad at him, telling him he was taking the easy way out. I told him, 'What about your faith?' I was doing everything I could," said Eric.

"He said: ' The hell with it all, the Marines, the VA, the hell with religion. The hell with it all. I am doing it,' " said Eric.

Then, Eric said, he heard the phone fall to the floor.

Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 14 February 2007 04:24 (seventeen years ago) link

i just watched flags of our fathers with the moms, and i actually thought it was pretty well-done. eastwood got the ridiculous jingoism down to a 't'.

the table is the table (trees), Wednesday, 14 February 2007 04:27 (seventeen years ago) link


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