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Mar. 25, 2003 ~ Helping out

If you want to do something to help our troops, you don't have to join an organization, though they certainly have their place. Just look around you. Check out your church, your club, your neighborhood. Chances are you know someone with a loved one in the military. That loved one may have been quietly serving all along, at home or abroad. They may have recently been deployed. Please remember them, wherever they may be.

"Helping out" doesn't have to cost a lot. A simple email, a letter, a card. A heartfelt prayer for their well-being, or a "Thinking of you," to their loved ones. Just so they know we care. Believe me, it means a lot to the troops and to their families. Every time someone asks after Soldier Boy, or asks how I'm holding up, it feels as if my burden is just a little bit lighter. And there are lots of moms and dads out there whose hearts are heavy right now. Lots of young men and women who may be away from their country and the comforts of home, for the first time ever. Anything we can do to brighten their day, will help.

A former neighbor, not much older than Soldier Boy, asked me yesterday if her sixth grade class could write to him or draw him pictures. I smiled what must have been a huge smile, and told her that when my boy was young, during the first Gulf War, he had written to a soldier. Amazingly, that soldier had found time to write back. Just once, one letter to and from. But I know my son held on to that letter for years. He may have it still. I told my young friend that he would probably love getting the drawings and notes, and would no doubt remember that letter from long ago, but I was afraid he would not be able to write back. They're out on missions most of the time. She said that wasn't the point, that the kids would feel good just being able to do something. A lady at the library recently made a similar offer; she wanted her Sunday School kids to make drawings for our troops. Things like this might not sound like much to you, but you have no idea how much they mean to people like me. And somewhere far away, someone will see that artwork and read those letters and smile.

And maybe for just a little while, they'll feel less alone.