From My Soldier Son in Iraq

I am so very sensitive when it comes to my kids. I just don't know why, but when I'm communicating with them or in their presence, now in adulthood I still see them as little children all helpless and vulnerable kids in need of protection. I guess that's just me being a dad.

That season of life is now here upon me....where my kids are all on their own....finding their way in the world. Coupled with the fact that they are thousands of miles away in other states or countries....if I let myself think about them too much....I'd become a babbling idiot....crazy as a loon with worry about them!

In the past few days I've communicated with all three of them. They all seem to be doing well and remain happy at what they currently do.

Josh, the marine, is in Iraq at this moment, but is preparing to return home to NC....with a stop here in the DC area before his next assignment begins in Texas June 1. He has asked me to take a road trip with him there to help him get settled and I agreed to do so. So, around May 23, he and I lieave for Dallas. Look out world! A road trip!

Today I received the following message from him. It did his daddy good to read it:

HEY!!!

I will still be home NLT the 22nd as of right now. I am going to pick up my car the first day I get back, I got some stuff I need to do to it. I have to be in TX, checked in, by the first of June. So I would like to take my time a little bit and leave a week early at least. So I would say at least by the 23rd or something like that. I will be home for your b-day, well I am trying super hard to make that happen at least. I got you a present that I think will make you speechless. It isn't much but it will have the effect on you as if it were something HUGE! I love you pops and even though I haven't acted like it, I want you to know you mean the world to me and I love you and I appreciate everything you have done for me. You are the best father a kid could ask for and I only hope I can do as well as you have when I have my own kids.

Josh


So even though this kid has at time plucked my last nerve....caused me at times to question the wisdom of having adopted him when he was four........getting phone calls from jail in the middle of the night........, notes such as this make it worth it all.

I just continue to shake my head.....and savor the love I feel from and for him. He and his sisters have helped me so much to rise from the ash heap of my marriage.

What more can I say?