Every little things gonna be alright - Com From Ed

Friends - Wisdom Jacket kicked me in the butt and said COMMUNICATE.  I finally finished a battery of tests last week that gave us some definitive information (not much is definitive in this fight as it just goes one day at a time).   

Sooooo First, where have I been?? 

Sitrep 21 had me approaching the end of my hospital treatment and the possibility of being able to go home vice living in Palo Alto near the hospital.  They call this moving to clinic.  That is when we found out that we were in two fire fights.  I walked into a L-shaped ambush.  I found out that I had to survive the transplant as well as the cancer.  Most of August was spent in and out of the hospital with graft versus host disease (GVHD) in transplant talk. 

Then the last trip had me in the Stanford emergency room and ICU with a staff infection and a viral infection.  Heather and Analicia drove me to the hospital and were doing paper/rock/scissors to see which one was going to call Mary to tell her I was dead.  It was a close one.   After several weeks they let me out of the hospital, but strapped a couple of IV machines to me for 24/7 antibiotics.  I got to come home, but it required in-home nursing care for a while.  So now we hit October/November.  Still a few flair ups but I have been able to stay out of the hospital and I finally got to go to clinic. This means I only have to go to Stanford once a week as long as there are no further “complications”. 

We also got the definitive test (bone marrow biopsy and PET/CT Scan).  I am in total remission.  No sign of any cancer.  The transplant fight will continue, but that is getting better as long as I follow directions.  It looks like lots of restrictions until the Spring of 2013.  So looking at the stats of AITL Lymphoma, I just joined the 60% that survive past 5 years.  So, all is in harmony.  I have to get off my butt and start getting some strength back.  My biggest problem is sleeping too much.  

Heather and Analicia are much more entertaining than I am.  Hopefully, we can get  them back them on the blog.  Heather’s sitrep 22 captures the situation.  They have  been on their cousin’s campaign staff for a seat on the Santa Cruz City Council and she just won.

I usually like to leave you with something learned or observed. 

So who and what is Wisdom Jacket??

Wisdom Jacket is a call sign originally used by Major General “Dutch” Schultz as a battalion commander in Viet Nam.  Colonel Shultz was my CO at the Basic School.   Several years later he was the inspector general of the Marine Corps, and I was on I&I duty in Denver, Colorado.  We had the case of a young Lt. gone missing.  His car was still in the parking lot and none of his belongings touched.  The Marine Corps had handled it by the book, he was AWOL.  Turns out his body was found over a year later just several hundred yards from Barrett Hall, a suicide.  He was a missing person, a Marine we should of looked for.  Bottom line, we screwed it up for the family.  Major General Shultz was there at the memorial service in Colorado Springs to take responsibility for the Corps.  He taught me that a families’ grief is nothing like the grief we feel for lost friends and fallen warriors.  His empathy and demeanor showed me there are many sides of a warrior.  Wisdom Jacket was a true poet warrior.

Several years later, I was the Executive Officer of 3^rd Bn, 3^rd Marines in Hawaii.  My CO was LtCol Chuck Krulak.  His Commander in Viet Nam was Dutch Schultz in the 3^rd Bn 3^rd Marines.  He adopted Wisdom Jacket as his call sign.  I learned from him that there are no simple anserws, take the bigger picture.  You might see something undiscovered with a smaller lens.

When I was the battalion commander of 3^rd Bn 11^th Marines.  I adopted Wisdom Jacket as my call sign in honor of these men. We were in Somalia and we had a patrol ambushed.  One Marine was dead.   My on scene commander of the reaction force was asking for guidance.  He was calling for Wisdom Jacket.  I had blood in my eye and wanted to start a fight for the sake of revenge.  All of a sudden the question was, what would Dutch do?!  The enemy had already melted away.  To start the fight now would be with innocent bystandards.  We retrieved our patrol and our fallen Marine.  And left peacefully into the night.

What this talks to is the value of having mentors and calling on them when you are facing tough decisions.  I call them my ghosts. 

However, it is more important for mentors to remember that what they teach and the values they reflect in their leadership may haunt the battle decades later.

Semper Fi

Ed Lesnowicz

PS: My birth day is 12/12/12.  Happens once every century, and 8 months ago it was doubtful I would make it.  I guess that is why my Marines dubbed me “Fast Eddie” because of the unexpected.