“I’m not going to sugarcoat it,’’ he said with a grin. “Forty or 50 years from now, I’m going to be in really bad shape.’’
But Burke radiated gratitude in a speech to hundreds who came to participate in one of the neighborhood’s oldest traditions, a parade and graveside tribute to those who have died in military service. He acknowledged heroes of long-ago wars, a litany of veteran’s service organizations, the troops now serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, the medics who saved his life.
And before and after the ceremony, he stopped to say hello to each of the cops and EMTs he saw, something his older brother, T.J. Burke Jr., said he does wherever he goes.
“You’ve never seen him on an airplane; we’re almost late for every flight because he has to shake every [officer’s] hand,’’ he said. “We go to the Bruins game, every cop, he’s got to shake everybody’s hand. He wants them to know … ‘Thank you for welcoming me back.’ ’’
Burke’s recovery has not been easy. His Purple Heart, he said with a wry laugh, is “the one medal you don’t want to get.’’ But as war veterans return home to a sluggish economy and, all too often, anemic support networks, Shane Burke seems to be one of the luckier ones.
His brother — who yesterday wore a T-shirt with Shane’s name on it — flew to meet Burke at a hospital in San Antonio when he arrived from Germany, dependent on a respirator, his skin blackened from the explosives.
When Burke returned to Boston, he was flabbergasted, and elated, when 50 Marines and about 150 Boston police officers on foot, motorcycle, and horseback turned out to greet him.
And although Burke had to give up his patrolman’s job, his advocates at the department helped him find a position that he has grown to love for its variety and challenging combination of science and law. Yesterday morning, he had been at work gathering evidence at a murder scene until 3 a.m.
