KAREN NACHIN (mother of Cpl Michael Nachin) 1:56

My name is Karen Nachin. I live in Westerly, Rhode Island. My folks live in Narragansett, so I’m here off and on during the summer, and it’s just one of my favorite places to fish.

My son is Corporal Michael Nachin. He’s stationed in Okinawa with the Third Reconnaissance, Marines A Company. Ooh-rah!

If you ever have a chance to attend a Marine Corps graduation––it was probably one of the best experiences of my life; it was just completely awesome.

At first, I guess you’re very worried; you’re nervous over boot camp and everything else. Then you get that first letter and you feel a little bit better… But he’s been in—it’ll be two years next month now, so after a while it gets kind of status quo. You get used to it. He was back here actually… he had a month leave in June. We actually came fishing down here. My daughter got married up at the Towers, It was just really great, because he had his dress blues and it was really nice to have him here for the wedding.

I was always say to everybody—and I know he’s going to kill me if he ever sees this—the Marines did for him in three months what I tried for twenty-one years to accomplish. He decided to enlist and at first I was really nervous, and by the time he came out, the transformation was just awesome. I just couldn’t believe how responsible and together and what a changed man he came out. And then he set his sights on recon, which I didn’t realize it’s a little more difficult than I thought, and he was able to accomplish that task, which we’re all very proud of.

I just want to shout out to Mike, “I love you, and I’m very proud of every Marine which serves this country.