 Injured Canadian soldier Mike McTeague lies in bed, hugged by his father, Sean. (SUN PHOTO/Craig Robertson).
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Courage can be found on the fourth floor of St. John's Rehab hospital. And valour.
You'll also find some bomb fragments and some pretty gritty determination from two wounded Canadian soldiers named Sapper Mike McTeague and Combat Officer Denver Williams.
Their physical wounds from Afghanistan are transparent. The ones inflicted from critics of the war are internal. But nothing is going to stop these guys. "I am doing all right," says Mike McTeague, a 20-year-old reservist.
Yeah, he's doing okay. There are different degrees of okay when you have numerous shattered bones in both legs, arms, burned and torn apart skin and extensive internal injuries -- all courtesy of a Taliban suicide bomber.
"They call him the miracle kid," said his dad Sean McTeague. "Compared to when they airlifted him to Germany this is good. You should have seen it. Every vein that he has, they had some sort of intravenous popped in."
Some thought he'd be in the fifth flag-draped coffin from the Sept. 19 bicycle suicide attack that killed four of his buddies and many civilian Afghanis. He and a lot of other heroic medical people said the hell with that.
Yesterday he sat up in his bed for the first time. It's just the beginning for the Orillia native. "My goal is to one day be a police officer," he said.
Surprised he wants to serve? Don't forget he was handing out candy to children when the bomber snuck in looking like an innocent local. His progress has Williams beaming.
"We are proud of him," he said. "He's really coming along."
Of course Williams, a decade McTeague's senior, has issues himself. "I don't remember all that is broken anymore," he laughed.
He's just as motivated. "I intend on walking out of here."
St. John's is the place to be if you have those goals. Since World War II well trained staffers have been helping war vets. Today those staffers include Marcus Staviss and physiotherapist Aileen Ho.
"It has been amazing," Williams said as he exercises.
The excruciating pain on his face as he stretches his damaged legs is almost unbearable to witness. "But put it this way, I couldn't even do this before I came here," he said.
Tomorrow is Remembrance Day. But every day they remember. How can they forget? A ballbearing from a bomb blast went right through McTeague's neck -- somehow not striking the spinal cord or a major artery.
One also would have gone through Williams' mid section and killed him instantly if not for his dog tags. "They blocked the one (that would have killed him for sure) and it landed in my pocket," he said.
He kept it. And the mangled dog tags. Good luck charms.
But the price for such horrific episodes goes beyond the physical. Mike admits what happened that day is often on his mind. "My sergeant was killed right beside me and I think of him a lot," he said. "I remember talking to somebody and then walking away. That's when I heard a big blast. Then I blacked out."
Within seconds he heard medics calling his name. "I woke up on a stretcher and I knew something bad had happened. The first thing I asked was if my buddies were all right."
A lot of them were not. Forty-three Canadians have been killed there in total.
Both McTeague and Williams say Red Rallies like the one in Barrie today have been tremendous for morale. "It means a lot," Mike said.
As for those who are calling for Canada to pull out of the mission or criticize Canadian troops for being in a combat role, he has something to say to Canadians trying to filter all of that. "Don't think negatively about us," he said, adding he disagrees with those who think Canada should leave Afghanistan. "I don't really feel like a hero. I feel like I was just someone doing my job and this was part of the risk that we take. We have done a lot over there. We have built roads and schools. We have put a lot into that country."
For those here not sure, he said they need to know over there "people cheer as we drive by."
In fact Williams says it's the kids' faces he thinks about more than the bomb attack. "I went over there to do the government's mandate to do good for the Afghan people. We did that. Everywhere you go, you get a smile, a thumbs up and a wave."
Williams does not think there should be any debate in Canada. "I don't bother with people who talk like that," he said. "I just move away. You can't go half-assed. The troops are there to do a mission. Support them and the mission because it's a noble one in my opinion."
If you are looking for courage, you know where to find it.
