Marine Lance Corporal Ethan Salzano has landed in Iraq. He knows
it won
’t be easy or fun but he is convinced it will be worth it.
Marine Lance Corporal Ethan Salzano has landed in Iraq. He knows it won’t be easy or fun but he is convinced it will be worth it.
“I saw how much the generations before me gave up for our freedom,” Salzano said. “I don’t think enough people of my own generation are serving so I felt it was my duty to do something.”
Salzano chose the Marines over the other services for the same reason any Marine will give.
“I always heard they were the best,” he said.
Salzano, who turned 20 this month, started off on the long road to war the summer after graduating from high school.
How he got this sense of duty and responsibility is not a total mystery to his mother, Mary Ellen.
“I believe Ethan was born with a gift for service,” Mary Ellen said.
She said that Monte Vista Christian School, where he transferred to in eighth grade, gave Ethan a series of life skills:
Integrity, initiative, flexibility, perseverance, organization, humor, effort, common sense, problem solving, patience, friendship, curiosity, cooperation, caring, discipline and responsibility – Mary Ellen spells it ‘response-ability.’
Salzano’s memory of school was simpler.
“I enjoyed myself a lot at Monte Vista,” he said. “It’s a lot smaller than Live Oak and you can get to know the other students more.”
Joining the Marines was different.
“I think the Marine Corps was two-speared for him,” Mary Ellen said.
“Part one is that, from a love of history, he recognized that others have gone before and their choices have enabled our freedoms today,” she said, mirroring Salzano’s own words. “He wanted to give that service back to self, to country and to the world.”
Part two, Mary Ellen said, is that the Corps is a “band of brothers,” giving a sense of family, of camaraderie, almost a selfless sacrifice. “It give him an inherent trust in a group of people, knowing that whatever happens, you will be protected.”
It also matters, she said, that, if you are a Marine, you know that your service has made a difference in the world.
Scouting, and the challenge of reaching the Eagle rank, was a part of making Ethan Salzano into a Marine, too, enabling him to become more focused.
“Scouting, spirituality and the service have all worked together to produce the person he is,” Mary Ellen said. “I asked him over and over – ‘why did you do this?’ (join the service), and his answer was “It’s my privilege to do it.’”
“His talk is his walk and his walk is his talk,” she said. “I am very proud of that.”
Salzano experienced bone stress fractures about five or six weeks into a 12-week boot camp.
“Being hurt as a Marine really tests the soul,” Mary Ellen agreed. “He went through six more weeks living through that pain, facing whatever needed to be faced. He knows he is making a difference.”
“They really train you well,” Salzano said before heading to Iraq. He went to boot camp in San Diego, then to Pensacola, Fla., where he was further trained in communications.
“It sounded interesting,” he said. “Radios, satellites, computers, too.”
The job will be to use the radios and satellites (satellite phones aren’t limited to call areas as cells are) so the generals can speak to each other.
“I made tons of new friends from all over the U.S.,” he said. “At first it’s a little different (being from California) – they all ask ‘Do you surf, man?’ And sometimes they give you a hard time.”
Salzano said his civilian hobbies are weight lifting, snow boarding and, fellow Marines will be happy to know, surfing.
“Being an Eagle Scout helped, too,” he said. “It teaches you lots of things the Marine Corps teaches you; it helps me to be ahead of the pack and to get promoted.”
Salzano said knowing how to set up camp, hike and set up a 50-pound pack properly so it doesn’t wear so badly all made boot camp life easier.
Before shipping out to the Middle East, Salzano was stationed at the Marine Corps Base at Kaneohe Bay in Hawaii. The Corps website describes what they do there.
“Marine Corps Base (MCB) Hawaii maintains key operations, training, and support facilities and provides services that are essential for the readiness and global projection of ground combat forces and aviation units, and the well-being, morale, and safety of military personnel, their families, and the civilian workforce.
MCB Hawaii manages the installations and natural resources located on a total of 4,500 acres throughout the island of Oahu, including Camp Smith, Kaneohe Bay, Marine Corps Training Area Bellows, Manana Family Housing Area, Pearl City Warehouse Annex, and Puuoloa Range Complex.”
Somewhere among that description one would have found Ethan Salzano training for the job ahead.
One of the first friends Salzano made after the move to Morgan Hill at age 12 was Alex Price. The Salzanos moved into Price’s neighborhood off Watsonville Road and the two stayed friends even when Ethan peeled off to Monte Vista. Price finished at Live Oak and is now a sophomore engineering student at Santa Clara University.
“Ethan didn’t have much of a sense of self-preservation when he was a kid,” Price said. “There were a couple of (Price would like to keep these quiet) incidents (involving the two of them) where the fire department or the police had to come. Fortunately, between Scouts and the Marines, he now has a lot more sense.”
E-mail is the new way for military people stationed away from home to keep in touch.
“You can even set up a chat room,” Salzano said, “It makes being away easier.”
Mary Ellen said her son e-mails the family “every single day.” However, she expects that to change now that he is in Iraq.
There, Salzano said, it will be more difficult getting to a computer regularly but he promised to do his best.
“It will be a challenge,” Mary Ellen said. Besides, there is always the old-fashioned way: letters.
Salzano said he is taking photos of friends and his family – sister Julia, 16, dad Tom and Mary Ellen – along.
LCpl Salzano doesn’t quite know what he will do after his five-year enlistment is up, in August 2007.
“I haven’t decided whether to go on,” he said. “The Marine Corps is giving me a lot of training for college.”
Mostly though, he said, the Marines have given him confidence in himself.
“I know I can do whatever I set my mind to,” Salzano said.
He will likely take advantage of the G.I. bill and go on to college. The bill, first established after World War II, has given thousands of veterans the chance at both undergraduate and graduate education by offering financial assistance. It still does.
Salzano’s mother Mary Ellen signs her e-mails, “Proud Mom of LCpl. Ethan Salzano, USMC.” And she has every reason to be.
Salzano expects to be in the Middle East for seven months, tentatively; it could be longer. His mother said she’ll expect him home when he walks through the door.
“There are never any certainties,” she said. “We call it “Semper Gumby – always flexible.”
The Marine Corps motto is “Semper Fidelis” – always faithful. Prayers, she said, are welcome.
