I had gotten off of work early in Philly at oh-dark thirty., the wee hours of the morning and realized I had time to make my ride home into a day trip. I had wanted to visit a couple of guys at Quantico so I headed south.
I was at Mainside Base Quantico at the MacDonalds when I saw something unfold. I caught it early. It was an old man walking with a cane. He needed the help the cane provided.
He was headed in the direction of the MacDonalds and I was standing next to a corporal. I told the corporal to watch and see what happened with the spavined old guy. He looked at me curiously but did watch.
The old man spotted a lieutenant and instantly changed course to avoid him. I turned to the corporal and said, "If that lieutenant had been a colonel he would have put his cane at high port and double timed away." The corporal looked at me with curiosity.
The old man spotted the pair of us and made a beeline to us. When he got to us he looked at the corporal and asked, "Hey, Mac. Can you direct me to the nearest head?"
The corporal pointed to the MacDonalds and the old man stumped off toward Mac Duck's.
The corporal looked at me with somewhat of an incredulous look on his face and said, "He called me Mac." He was wondering where that came from. I looked at the corporal and grinned.
"He's an old Marine," I said. "Probably WW2 or maybe Korea. Notice how he avoided the lieutenant?"
"I saw that," said the corporal.
"Back in the day enlisted men didn't speak to officers unless spoken to." I said. "It was a caste system of sorts back then. He called you 'Mac' because he saw your stripes. You were enlisted and therefore safe to address. The Corps he served in is quite different than the one you serve in. Old habits die hard."
"How do you know all of this?" he asked.
"Simple. I'm one of their children. I heard the stories and those guys were my mentors." I noticed a Gunny nearby listening in. I suppose my voice expressed some pride when I told the corporal, "I grew up on the shoulders of giants."
The Gunny interrupted. "I'll say you grew up on the shoulders of giants." He turned to the corporal. "It's possible that that old man back in the day was six times the badass all three of us are put together!"
The Gunny asked me what it was like growing up with those guys. I laughed.
"One time in Scouts I got a particularly large splinter in my ass while playing some kind of game. One of those old birds took one look at it, grabbed a rusty pair of pliers and yanked it out and said 'It hurts less this way' as I jumped. Then he pressed on the bleeding hole with his thumb for a couple of minutes to stop the bleeding. Then he covered the hole with something, probably a wad of toilet paper and stuck it on to me with a couple of band aids. Then he told me to stop being stupid, gave me a swift kick in the uninjured ass cheek, laughed and sent me back into the game. Afterwards he told me to ditch the undershorts if they had any blood on them so Ma wouldn't find out I'd gotten hurt."
They both chuckled. "My Uncle Bob was one of those guys," said the Gunny. WW2 Coast Guard. Ran convoys across the Atlantic. He was a real character. My other uncle was an aerial gunner in the Pacific. They were one of a kind."
The old man wandered out of MacDonalds, saw the corporal and said, "Thanks, Mac!"
While we all supressed smirks, the corporal answered, "Anytime, Pal. Semper Fi."
"Semper Fi," answered the old man and he stumbled off.
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