We visited the VA Regional Office the other day in Atlanta, and met with the Military Order of the Purple Heart Service Officer. The National Service Office is located on the first floor of the Regional Office and these service officers do not work for the Veterans Administration, but are infinitely educated about them.

These National Service Officers 

are true advocates of the veteran. 

They are purple hearted and disabled veterans 

doing the paperwork, making the calls

and helping their fellow veterans

get the compensation and benefits they earned.

As in all buildings  Federal, you must walk through security, complete with x-rays for pocketbooks and metal detectors.  CC's leg brace always makes the metal detectors go off, even his shrapnel is subject to do this, but they did not detain him beyond a summary wave of the wand..

But the security just began with the wave of the wand. We had to go into the so called waiting room,

The initial waiting room had seriously screwed up feng shui 

with the progression of action in the room 

making the last place you go, 

the first place you should have been. 

After accidently breaking in line at  the window CC is given instructions  

to press the purple button on the phone 

to get his bonafied Purple Heart Service Officer. 

The phone is under the TV

There are five people waiting to use the phone.  

Being in this room is like being a fish in a bowl. There are only two doors and you must be escorted either in one or out the other. It is very likely everyone is being observed.

CC pressed the purple button while I found the facilities - two single  bathrooms for the first floor and both mixed use for men and women and handicapped. When I came back CC was seated on an end seat, next to somebody else. The waiting veteran  offered to give up his seat for me, but I declined.  No thanks,I'll just sit here and listen to my audiobook in peace.

It wasn't too long before we were called back to the service area. 

It was a huge room of cubicles. Nice big cubicles. Rows of them. 

A good looking man came and got us. 

He thinks I look very familiar. I search his face, but he looks like a composite of several people I have known, but no one in particular. I like him.

He goes through our questions and he looks hard at the documentation

we provide.  He picks up the phone. He makes calls. He disappears down 

the halls of cubes and comes back with answers or people who have the answers.  Nobody is rushing us.  Questions and answers were explored in depth.

What we have ascertained is that CC has not been evaluated for any disabilities since the  early seventies.  He has many conditions, already diagnosed by the VA that makes reassessment an important step to take. 

He goes lame more and more often.  He has infrequent seizures, cataracts, ptsd, nerve damage and collateral damage. He cant' sleep and he pees to much. We won't even go into Ed and Roscoe. 

CC deserves to move up the alphabet of compensations. They told us how to do this, and are indeed helping us to do it. Paving the way. 

We talked to four counselors in all without having to get out of our seats. One was a paralyzed man with white hair and beard. He had been to Vietnam. His injury had come in a helicopter crash in the states.  He knew it all when it came to paralyzed veterans. And he was a talker, a profane man, irrepressible, cussing and making jokes.  Talking about his son, grandson.  

He reminded me of CC.

Both people who suffer immense pain which does not dominate their spirit.

The Black Marine in the cubicle across from us told us of a proud family heritage of service in the Marines.

Our own purple heart counselor who began his service in 1971 and served until 1994 and had a bad back, but a good sense of humor, a loyalty to other veterans and a shared understanding of pain.

We were there for three hours memorable hours and if we don't remember them, I have a notebook full of notes to remind us of all the FIMs and HQCs and who to call and which department is in charge of what.

We expect someone from the VA to visit us soon to assess what home improvement funds and construction money is available to us to  finance for some home improvements.

CC will have a real psychiatric examination to determine the extent PTSD is present in his everyday life. This will be assigned a percentage of disability and a corresponding upgrade of compensation.

What has felt like a lot of spinning wheels in the last year now becomes documentation of existing conditions. 

It takes time. There is tons of paperwork - which our Purple Hearted Counselor will be facilitating and masterminding.  The wheels grind slowly, but they grind. Our government is thankfully still functioning, if limping badly. 

And speaking of limping badly, CC's wheelchair bound dopplegangler told us what kind of wheelchair to request for CC's lame times. Quickie G3 titanium. Sounds like one of my macs.

Life moves on. 

Veterans age and their desecrated bodies deteriorate.  

War creates expenses for the lifetime of those who fight.