Red Friday
March 7th, 2008 . by Cary
Wearin’ the Patriot today.
We had dinner at Golden Corral last night. While going up to get more steak, I spotted a gentleman wearing a VietNam Veteran ball cap, with his ribbons sewn on. I stopped, thanked him for his service, and said “Welcome Home.” He thanked me for the sentiments, and said a lot of people just aren’t aware of what the average Vet has gone through. I told him I made a point of thanking the Vets I spotted, because too many of them hadn’t been thanked by anyone, and almost none of them were told “Welcome Home” by anyone outside their family. His wife sobbed loudly at that point, and he could just nod and turn away.
Have you thanked a Vet lately?
Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!
Such a simple gesture…and yet it means the world to our Veterans, for who knows how long, if ever, since you all were thanked for your service.
Thank you and may God continue to bless you, Cary, for your service, commitment, dedication, and honour to God, country, and the Corps.
Thank you, Loon, for keeping our fighting forces in the forefront on your blog, thanking them by showing the world the job they do.
Without support like yours, the job would still be done, because that’s what we do – but WITH support like yours, it makes it that much easier to do it.
That was a nice gesture on your part Cary; shame that more people don’t do it.
I miss Golden Corral…all you can eat is never a bad thing.
The lack of concern by a lot of people about the fate of the military once they are out of the military makes me – I don’t know – sad? mad? concerned? – a mixture of feelings; I had two cousins and a few other distant relatives who fought in Viet Nam, and one of my cousins received such a hateful response when he got back stateside that he ended up a hermit in his parent’s basement. Maybe it was just his emotional state of being at the time he got spat upon, maybe he had been sitting next to a protester on the leg from Hawaii to LAX – either way, it triggered a response in him that lasted until his death a few years ago.
And that just plain pissed me off. I swore every time I talked to him that I would not allow my response – or lack thereof – to be the trigger for ANY veteran. Every Vet I see (more accurately, that I can identify) gets a “Thank you for your service. Welcome Home.” from me. And I mean it from the bottom of my heart, and sometimes the reaction from the Vet sets tears in my eyes, too. Not only for the Vet that didn’t get a proper homecoming, but for the memory of my cousin, who died knowing in his heart that his country didn’t appreciate what he had done. He knew that his family appreciated him, but his country didn’t, because some two-bit idiot spit on him in LAX.
Just…. Thank you Cary.
No, GB. Thank you.