The vet and the transgender woman

Sometimes, your life depends on the unexpected

On Tuesday, the New York Times carried my latest favorite story, about how a combat veteran took down the shooter at that Colorado nightclub, where the veteran, Major Richard Fierro, had gone with his family to watch a friend perform as a drag queen.

That paragraph contains the entire world. This was Major Fierro’s first time at a drag show, and, according to the story “he was digging it.” By way of explanation, he said:

“These kids want to live that way, want to have a good time, have at it,” he said as he described the night. “I’m happy about it because that is what I fought for, so they can do whatever they hell they want.”

After he jumped the gunman and was beating him bloody with the gunman’s own weapon, Major Fierro called for a passing woman to kick the gunman with her high heels until he said to quit. A witness in the club said the woman was a transgender woman.

The story does not say when/if the stopped stopped kicking, though in Major Fierro’s interview with CNN, he said she eventually left. The major was aided by a Navy officer, Thomas James, who was wounded in the attack.

Major Fierro was a veteran of four combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he came home trying to fit into the hair shirt that can be civilian life. He’s a regular dude — he called himself, a “fat old vet.” And he and others saved more lives than we can count. So while I’m counting my blessings, I’m including Major Fierro and his family — they lost a loved one that night — for their utterly ordinary courage and grace, and for people who instead of focusing on their own heroism, beat themselves up that there were five people they couldn’t save.