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December 24, 2018: Approximately 8:30pm; Here are some quotes from around my house:
“Thank God they finally went to sleep.”
“Is this everything or are we missing a bag?”
“Are you sure Santa has to wrap all these presents?”
“Are we sure we got the kids enough?”
“Holy crap we spent too much money! These kids are spoiled.”
“Grab the damn elf and send him back to the North Pole. Four weeks of moving him around is exhausting! I never thought I would ever say this but thank God for Etsy.”
“Move out of the way so I can take a picture to Snap…should I post this or is it too much?”
“We are never going to bed…what time do you think they are getting up again? Christmas on four hours of sleep is going to suck.”
“Don’t forget to eat Santa’s cookies.”
And finally…“I think we are good.”
After a deep breathe, the only thing I can think about is the fact that I wouldn’t change a thing. This is right where I need to be.
December 24, 2002:
Rewind back 16-years ago to a young, single 23-year old lieutenant spending his first Christmas away from home after almost 100 days in Afghanistan. Due to a terrible phone situation (nine lines most days for about a thousand people) and my lack of patience, I had limited contact with home and was lonely and homesick. The day’s work was done and all I could think about is trying to get ahold of my mom. Her birthday is Christmas day and my family would be all together, so I was trying to figure out what time I had to get up (Afghanistan is 9.5 hours ahead) to get through the phone line to make sure that I could talk to her and my family gathered for Christmas. In those days, we also had to rely on the Defense Switch Network (DSN) to connect us to a morale line so that added another ripple to my concerns. At 23, not embarrassed to say, all that I wanted for Christmas was to talk to my mom.
After 17-years of the Global War on Terror, over 2.77 million Servicemembers have participated in 5.4 million deployments (https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2018/03/20/2-77-million-service-members-have-served-on-5-4-million-deployments-since-911-infographic/#5e18134b50db). Today, there are currently almost 200,000 Soldiers deployed overseas to 177 countries abroad (https://www.businessinsider.com/us-military-personnel-deployments-by-country-2017-3). This is the lowest total of deployed Servicemembers in over 60-years, but that doesn’t mean anything to each individual Servicemember who isn’t home. For this reason, I want to personally say “thank you” to three different people.
First, I want to say thank you to the young, single servicemembers without kids who is me from 16-years ago. Thank you for your service, your sacrifice. Thank you for your contribution to this country and all our freedom. You truly are a blessing to this country.
About The Author
Ben Warner--Blogger at 20 Year Letter
A Celebration of Service--The US military has done more to shape me into the person I am today than any other factor in this world, except maybe my mother. For all the items written in history books about our experiences, the full story is not known. Most don’t know or understand what it means to be a service member and how it galvanized us. I recently saw a statistic that only about 558,000 of 16 million World War 2 veterans are still alive. How much history has been lost with the 96% of this group who has been lost? I decided to create 20 Year Letter as not only a place to tell my stories, but also to hopefully encourage others to share as well. Although 20 Year Letter is a slang term for retirement eligibility, I want to encourage all veterans to share (mystory@20yearletter.com).
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