Captain Virgil D Hiatt, USMC,

I want to thank everyone for coming. I know many of you came because you cared for Dad, many of you came for Jody, many of you came for Amy and me, and I know that Dad would have appreciated knowing how many of you loved him or his family enough to take the trouble, today.

My Dad taught me a lot. Play fair. Be good. Vote. Get involved in your community. He taught me how to be nice to girls. He taught me how to downshift. He taught me how to live, and in the end he taught me how to die. Not every lesson was an easy one. One of the hardest for me was about Duty.

My Dad went to war for this country three times. Three times, he packed up and moved halfway around the world and left behind every thing and every one that he loved, out of a sense of Duty.

As a school kid, I knew my Dad was special. Your Dad sold shoes or insurance or taught English or whatever it was. My Dad defended freedom, and made it possible for your Dad to do whatever he did. I was kind of proud of that, even then. It's a funny kind of arrogance, really. Your typical restaurant manager makes more money than a typical Marine, but the Marine's kids grow up knowing their dad is someone special in ways that have nothing to do with money.

I remember the morning Dad left for Viet Nam, the first time. He was dressed in his dark green uniform, with tan shirt and tie, buckles polished and shoes shined. We had had the "Man of the House, Now" talk and I had promised to "Be Good", "Study Hard" and all of that. And then just like a thousand other mornings, he was gone, leaving only the fading aroma of Old Spice after-shave. The difference, of course, was that that night he didn't come home, and he wouldn't for more than a year.

I had asked Dad why he was leaving. He said it was his Duty. He said it was what he had to do, now, as a Marine. He told me that he was going so that some other Daddy didn't have to go. He said that as bad as I felt at that moment, he couldn't stand by while some other Daddy went in his place, and made some other little boy or girl feel that way. I didn't understand it all that well, probably. It seemed to me that sending someone else's Dad was a better deal than the one I was getting, you know? But Dad said he had to go.

Marines, and make no mistake, their families, sacrifice a lot for this country. So, over the years I saw my father pick up Marine hitchhikers, buy a couple of guys lunch, help with directions and gas money and more. And now it is our turn to take up that mantle, because in our family supporting the troops has always meant more than just putting a sticker on the back of a pickup truck.

My father was a Hiatt, a Lakota Sioux Warrior, he was a husband and a father and a brother and he was a son. He carried his father's name, but while nobody called him Junior, nearly everyone in the family back home called him Sonny. He was a salesman and a fisherman and a hunter and a Democrat and an administrator and a great singer and a friend, but his defining characteristic, for me, was always that he was a Marine.

My father has been called to another post. I wish he did not have to go, but I would not visit this misery on another father's child. My father is gone not because he wanted to leave, but because he had to leave. We must try again to understand.

It is common at these occasions to say something like "Well, he's in a better place now" but Marine Corps kids take a great deal of comfort in knowing this must certainly be true.