Travis Layfield jumped at the chance to be a Marine. When recruiters came to his high school in Fremont, Calif., in 2002, Travis was practically the first in line to enlist. Travis proudly sported a tattoo of a feather, a reminder of his Native American heritage. His friends and family described him as deeply interested in the military even when he was young. He would watch military programs on the History Channel, and seemed destined for a career in the Marines. He arrived at Camp Pendleton, less than 40 miles away from San Diego, and was subsequently shipped to Germany, Kuwait, and finally, Iraq. Travis was fighting back insurgents in the Anbar province on April 6 when he was killed by enemy fire. He was 19.
Marcus Cherry, of Imperial Valley, was a football player who liked to sing. He even sang a proposal of marriage to his girlfriend of more than two years. As a teenager, Marcus would write and perform Christian rap songs with his buddies. Marcus planned on enrolling in a performing arts school after he returned from Iraq, and was to wed on Nov. 20. A lance corporal, Marcus was promoted to team leader just before the vicious battle in the Anbar province claimed the lives of more than 20 Camp Pendleton Marines. Marcus was among them. He was 18.
Brad Shuder, of El Dorado, Calif., was adopted from Korea when he was two years old. His friends affectionately called him a “crazy Asian” who played rugby and counseled troubled kids in high school. He was a passionate gourmet cook who wanted to attend culinary school and open a bakery after military service. He felt an inherent duty to serve in the Marines, and was even more adamant about it post-Sept. 11. His parents tried to hold him back from enlisting, but Brad was undeterred. He arrived at Camp Pendleton a month after the World Trade Center attacks. In Iraq, Brad was involved in the operations that rescued Jessica Lynch, and tried to keep order along with other Marines near Fallujah, Iraq, last week. He told his parents that he had a feeling he wouldn’t be back, but held fast to his sense of duty. His sense of foreboding proved correct, when Brad was killed on April 12 in the crossfire. He was 21.
Wilfred Bellard traveled all over the country with his family, but eventually settled in Lake Charles, La. He followed two other siblings into the military, and was married right before he was deployed last year. His wife, Latricia, was expecting to give birth to their second child on Easter Sunday, but went into labor a week earlier. Wilfred was in a Humvee carrying munitions when it swerved to avoid mortars and fell into a ravine near Baghdad. All three in the vehicle died. Wilfred was 20.
Tyanna Avery-Felder, from Bridgeport, Conn., sang in choir and played basketball at her Roman Catholic high school. Her father called her “baby girl” and her mother remembered Tyanna’s tenacity and assertiveness. Tyanna wanted to work with children, and was enrolled in a program at Southern Connecticut State University before she left for the army. She was supposed to come back to the States to visit family and friends, but never got the chance to come back. She died on April 7 from shrapnel wounds when her truck was hit. Tyanna was 22.
Sixty-four U.S. soldiers were killed last week in the eruption of violence near Fallujah, bringing the total to 689 since the war ended last March. The numbers seem to fade into the newsprint, like the box scores for the Padres-Giants game, except that the only acceptable score for a death toll is zero.
In the lull of campus life and within the limits of my own perspective, it is hard to feel and understand the pain that must come with a life cut short. And it is with shock, grief and confusion that you realize premature death doesn’t just come from newswires and pictures on television. And the pangs are surprisingly sharp even when the victims are not close friends, or even acquaintances.
The frame and focus of daily life undergo a shift, if not a violent shake, when a friend’s brother dies in a car accident. An accident is unexpected and immediate, unlike a military deployment, but no less tragic. Soldiers are in Iraq, fighting a war for the principles the United States stands for, but the pain of death is the same. The greatest equality, the greatest empathy, must come when the final act of a life is completed, no matter how early that may be. The end of a life at such a tender age seems to reverberate more when it is closer to Regents Road than Ar-Ramadi, but the finality is identical.
It is difficult to look beyond our daily existence unless something hits close to home. We live for the moment, and to completely surrender to a deep, unnatural rhythm is to sacrifice the levity and silliness that constitutes the best memories. Yet the abrupt end of these lives begs so many questions: Why? Why now? Why him? We look to the ground, hoping to see some glitter in the pavement — specks of reassurance, celebration, appreciation, purpose for what was and could have been. We celebrate lives and are thankful for the moments we share and may wonder if a reason can be found. The quickening of our pulses when we hear the stomach-dropping news sends blood rushing to our fingers, which in turn yearn to reach out to a loved one’s hand, to hold onto life when it was never ours to grasp.
The only thing certain about life is that it is uncertain. In this uncertain world, if you have nothing to die for then you have nothing to live for. What do you live for?
