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Present in spirit, if not in body

Oct-23-2005 » Filed Under: 1/25 SBCT

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By Hal Bernton, Seattle Times

TACOMA — At the ball to welcome them back from Iraq, a circle of soldiers gathered around a short, slender woman in a long black dress bedecked with silver sparkles.

They reached out to touch her hand. They clasped her in bear hugs. They shared tears. And they all asked Sema Olson a question:

How is Bobby?

Cpl. Bobby Rosendahl, Olson's 24-year-old son, was grievously wounded last March in a bomb explosion in Talafar, Iraq. He has been at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., for eight months. Olson has been there, too, helping him survive the amputation of his leg and more than 30 operations.

Olson had hoped her son would join her for the brief trip to Washington to celebrate the fall return of the rest of the 1st Battalion, 5th Infantry Regiment, of the Strykers' 1st Brigade. There would be cocktails, a white-tablecloth dinner, then dancing in a huge hall at the Greater Tacoma Convention & Trade Center.

But Rosendahl, still largely confined to a wheelchair, had balked. So Olson flew here alone. She arrived for cocktails carrying a big framed picture of her son in uniform — before the bomb. She sat down for dinner and placed it by her side. [...]


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