I spent 19 years at the Minneapolis veterans hospital as a Nurse Anesthetist in surgery. Those were the most rewarding years of my career. I met many veterans through the years and became longtime friends with some of them. I heard many stories and spent many hours just talking with them.
Occasionally there would be a veteran in the pre-anesthesia room who was extremely nervous. I was a corpsman with the Marines in Vietnam and all of my co-workers knew that. I would be summoned to talk with the veteran, and when they heard I was a corpsman, you could see them relax. This happened a lot with Marines.
I had to retire from VA in 2007 because of PTSD and the returning war injuries. It was my pleasure to have served as many veterans as I did.