remembering paul

last week steve's cousin paul loring died.......he was a 26 year old kid......served a year in iraq......was a boston firefighter.......just got engaged.......was days away from passing papers on a house......he and his friend died while driving home from the patriots game......very sad story......

one of the stories i heard over the last couple days was about paul's time in iraq.......he was a transportation guy - drove tanks and whatnot in convoys......they were told never to stop driving for fear it would be a trap and would result in an ambush.......so this one time he was driving and there was a little kid in the road.......his superior officier told him not to stop - to run the kid over......and paul didn't do it.......he disobeyed the order and stopped the vehicle.......well apparently he did this not only once, but twice......

it was the right decision (well in my opinion).......he saved two kids' lives while in the military.......i'm not sure if he directly saved anyone's life in his two years as a firefighter, but i'm sure he would've if he had more time on this earth......maybe he had to die so those kids in iraq could live......that's a notion that i learned from a book called "the five people you meet in heaven"......regardless he was a great kid and i'm sorry casey won't get to grow up to know him......