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I fully appreciate that, by now, some readers have had enough of Veterans Day stories. I agree that sometimes we are just inundated by them and I kind of apologize for contributing to such a deluge.
“Kind of,” because readers can stop reading right here if they have had enough and because I just came across such a touching and eloquent coverage of an issue that is not often mentioned on Veterans Day — one that readers who are still with me will find very relevant on this Veterans Day.
It is about the spouses, sons, daughters, mothers and fathers who are left behind when their loved ones go off to war or leave home on lengthy, unaccompanied assignments and deployments.
It is about whether it is appropriate or fitting to, on Veterans Day, thank the stay-behind moms and dads, wives and husbands, sons and daughters for “their service.”
T.T. Robinson, a proud Navy wife and mother of two toddlers was recently told “Thank you for your service,” when she mentioned that her Navy husband was deployed.
Uncomfortable and puzzled at first, she gave it some more thought.
When thinking of “service to country,” Robinson could “hear bayonets and see the tattered flag waving valiantly in the breeze,” and conjured “images of the wounded, the battered, the proud declaring victory on Yorktown battlefield.”
She pictured her grandfather “in a foxhole in Saipan watching bullets fly overhead in the pitch black sky, a long way from his bride in South Dakota,” and so many other images of heroism and sacrifice long ago and continuing today.
Even thinking of her husband’s service “in peacetime and in wartime, in jungles and in deserts,” and although humbled and honored by his service, Robinson would not consider what she does as a wife and mother — “loving a man in uniform” — as service.
Until now.
When explaining to her daughter the meaning of Veterans Day and of honoring the sacrifices that so many men and women like her Daddy have made, her 3-year old daughter, looking at her mother “with those bright blue eyes,” said, “I’m sacrificing! I’m going without my Daddy!”
That is when Robinson realized that it is perfectly alright to, on Veterans Day, also remember “the fortitude of those who give our heroes their strength, and recognizing that this too is a type of service.”
Robinson thinks of:
…the mothers who pace their kitchen floors, anxiously awaiting a phone call to say, “I’m O.K.” following news of an attack; the moms who kiss their sons at the airport praying that it won’t be the last time.
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…the siblings, whose graduations, weddings, promotions and so many milestones are missed.
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…the children [and] the tears shed at bedtime; the “promise me you’ll come home”…the paper chains, the countdown calendars, the missed birthdays, the holidays; big days and little days.
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… the spouses entrusted to keep it all together…the ones who kiss the tears, console the mothers, reassure the fathers, keep in touch with the siblings, and do their very best to put one foot in front of the other, when their hearts are aching too…the ones who welcome their babies into the world with proud new daddies watching an ocean away on Skype.
Of course, Robinson has a special “Thank You” for those “who bear the Gold Stars” and finally accepts the thanks from the person who thanked her for “her service.”
T.T. Robinson is right.
As we approach the end of yet another Veterans Day — our 36th one — I want to take this opportunity to tell my wife, who served with me for 20 years and who sacrificed perhaps more than I did,”Thank you for your service.”
Please read T.T. Robinson’s “On Veterans Day, Offering Gratitude and Accepting It” in its entirety here.
Lead photo: Lt. Mack Elliot holds his son and his newborn daughter with his wife upon the return of the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Carney (DDG 64) to Naval Station Mayport. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Salt Cebe.
The author is a retired U.S. Air Force officer and a writer.