They had accomplished every part collectively. While residing in D.C., the 2 have been inseparable. At bars, events, courses, libraries, eating places, you by no means noticed one with out the opposite. Later the pair would drive within the truck to 49 states and “If you could drive to Hawaii we would have gone there too,” Grossi stated.
But Fred now not jumps out of the again door when Grossi opens it. The canine he credit with saving his life, restoring his soul after he returned from fight and introducing him to his spouse and numerous associates died Nov. 22 at Grossi’s Maine home of most cancers.
“On the one hand he lived 14 years and we did incredible things together,” Grossi, 40, stated in an interview Friday. “At the same time I really do feel like we got robbed. He was so healthy, his eyesight, his bloodwork, everything. But that’s just what cancer does. It just comes and rocks you.”
Grossi has at all times insisted that regardless that he introduced Fred out of a warfare zone, it was the canine that saved him. His canine, he stated, taught him to lean in to issues not run away from them.
That was what motivated him to write down “Craig & Fred: A Marine, A Stray Dog, and How They Rescued Each Other,” a 2017 e book that drew nationwide consideration, gained the pair a social media following and helped Grossi, who suffered a traumatic mind damage from an explosion in Afghanistan, unfold the phrase about PTSD to help veterans like him who have been readjusting to life after the navy.
“I didn’t want to admit that I had been affected or changed by Afghanistan,” Grossi informed The Washington Post in 2017. “But deep down I was really frustrated and really angry, and my brain had been rattled. And to go from combat operations to boardrooms and spreadsheets was really a kick in the gut. So coming home to Fred was what kept me going.”
In 2021 Grossi launched “Second Chances,” a e book about his experiences bringing Fred to a state jail in Maine the place he began a writing workshop with prisoners who had learn his first e book as a part of their e book membership.
“I had a bad attitude about it at first, but I thought ‘Fred will be this ball of light for them and then we can leave,’” Grossi remembered. Instead, after the primary assembly with the prisoners, Grossi remembers sitting in his automotive within the jail car parking zone with Fred and crying.
“I was blown away by how wrong I was about that place and how hard those guys were working to improve themselves,” he stated.
Grossi and Fred additionally teamed as much as increase money for navy households who had misplaced family members. Beginning in 2014 Grossi hosted an annual fundraiser at certainly one of his favourite bars, the Pug on H Street NE, the place he honored the reminiscence of two of his comrades who died in Afghanistan. They donated the money to TAPSa nationwide nonprofit organization that gives care and sources for individuals grieving the loss of life of a navy member.
The fundraiser has grown and now consists of Grossi enjoying drums with a canopy band, 50 Year Storm. This 12 months’s event will probably be held Saturday at Pearl Street Warehouse on the Wharf.
Though the lack of his companion has been devastating, Grossi stated he’s nonetheless studying from his canine.
“The biggest lesson Fred taught me over the years is not to take time for granted and that’s really been hammered home,” Grossi stated. “It’s challenging but I owe it to Fred to really meet that challenge and live the life that he would be so excited about. He wouldn’t want me to stop doing all the things I did with him.”
For now, Grossi retains Fred’s stays in a lovely handmade wooden field at home. He has considered taking him on another journey. Fred might make it to Hawaii in any case.
