Major Doug Zembiec, USMC

Just a few thoughts while fresh in my mind...

I had the pleasure of being an acquaintance of Major Doug Zembiec USMC, who was killed on May 11th, 2007 in support of operations in Iraq.

I wish I could say I was a close friend but I am honored to say that I had classes with Doug in college and on occasion crossed paths with him while serving as a US Marine. He was one of those people--everyone has someone like this in their lives--that I would run into completely unexpectedly and he would remember the last conversation we had...and, strangely enough, I always knew I'd run into him again.

I last saw him a few years ago. Doug and a friend were coming out of a movie theater in Maine at the exact same time as me--the odds of this occurring are beyond calculation. He was stationed in NC and was in Maine only briefly to attend some intense training at a school that was under the charge of my husband at the time. Unfortunately I found out later that the phone system was having problems and he never received the invitations to join my husband and me for dinner.

There is a lot I could say about how much I admired his "sense of living and being" and my respect for his accomplishments both personally and professionally, but his life's philosophy is best summed up by a quote from the funeral service bulletin:

"I would rather be ashes than dust!
I would rather
that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze
than it should be stifled by dry rot.
I would rather be a super meteor,
every atom of me in magnificent glow,
than a sleepy and permanent planet.
The proper function of man is to live, not to exist.
I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them
I shall use my time."

Jack London 1876 - 1916


No matter your calling in life, be a meteor and live, truly live...

To his parents, brother, wife and young daughter, Semper Fi and my deepest sympathies.