In Memory.

I'm attending a Stargate: Atlantis convention, next month, and I have been buying my costume, as geeks are wont to do.

Recently, I bought a USMC Marpat shirt with the name 'Thompson' on the tapes.

Yesterday, I received this email from the guy who sold it to me:

( The Email )

I cried, when I read it, even though I was asked not to feel sympathy for him. I guess I don't - not for him but for his friends and family. It's awful to lose someone you care about - how must his little girl feel? His wife? His friends?

I offered to send the shirt back on compassionate grounds - it belonged to the seller's friend, after all, and he couldn't have anticipated this to happen the every week he sold it. He told me to keep it - said that he believes these things happen for a reason.

So I am. It needs narrowing down the back because Ben was a big guy and I just have a big bust to fill it with, but I'm going to wear it a lot - it's a very cool shirt.

Is still feel very sad, though. I was originally going to replace the Thompson name tape with one that said something else, but I can't, now. I'd feel like I was desecrating it a bit.

How strange for this to happen just when I'm reading Jarhead.