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Home is where the heart aches

Joye Brown

April 27, 2008

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Sag Harbor welcomed Jordan Haerter home on a cool spring afternoon.

The 19-year-old Marine - the second-youngest Long Island casualty in the Iraq war - was back in the community that had loved him, raised him and, with considerable pride, waved him off to war.

Newsday ran photographs of the young man on Friday.

In his high school graduation photo, Haerter looks like the kid he is. His face glows with the delight - which most seniors share - at the prospect of leaving school and charting his own life.

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In the second photo, young Jordan is looking into a mirror. He's in uniform, now, tying a tie. He's thinner, and sports a new haircut. He's still a kid, according to the calendar, but he looks older than his years.

That kid, according to what Marines told his family, died on the job. He was a rifleman at a checkpoint when a truck filled with explosives ignored orders to stop. He shot the driver, causing the truck to swerve away from several soldiers. But it blew up, and Haerter and another Marine were killed.

"You saved everyone's life," a soldier wrote on Haerter's Facebook page. "I love you, man."

The campaign in Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq have not been like other conflicts. Much of this war has been fought out of sight, out of reach of a majority of Americans, because there is no draft and no economic sacrifices beyond the price of gas.

But for those who have sent brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters into the fray, the war becomes a constant companion, it soaks deep into our souls. I know this; my brother served in Iraq three years ago.

For families, one soldier shipped off becomes every soldier shipped off.

One soldier wounded becomes every soldier wounded. The joy of a single soldier's return spreads to every family.

And a single soldier's death weighs heavy and hard.

Thirty men from Long Island have died in Iraq. Five more have died in Afghanistan.

They hailed from Valley Stream, Baldwin, Rockville Centre, Hicksville and Brentwood. From Jericho, Stony Brook, Bay Shore, Southampton, Centereach, Hauppauge, East Islip and Lakeview. From Mastic, North Merrick, Garden City, East Northport, Manhasset, Levittown, Bellport, Oakdale, Shirley, New Hyde Park and Lynbrook. From Wheatley Heights, Coram, West Babylon, Patchogue and now, Sag Harbor.

Six of those communities - three in Nassau and three in Suffolk - lost more than one soldier.

North Shore and South Shore; rich and poor; white, black, brown.

There are no dividing lines.

And there weren't any yesterday, as groups of Long Islanders paused as a procession bearing Jordan Haerter's body traveled along the South Shore, east toward Sag Harbor.

One more soldier, heading home.