2,808 words
Several years ago I was introduced to a man whose head was covered in bandages. I asked him what happened. He explained to me that he had recently had surgery through the Veteran’s Administration to remove fragments from a Soviet-made red phosphorous mortar shell lodged in his skull. The man was too old to have served in Iraq and Afghanistan so I inquired as to where he got such a wound — I expected him to say Vietnam, but instead, he said Zaire. (more…)