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Last post 4 years ago by delta1. 7 replies replies.
Memorial Day again . . .
bs_kwaj Offline
#1 Posted:
Joined: 02-13-2006
Posts: 5,214

Not really a 'Happy' Memorial Day thing.

It's all about this.

But I'll still be having beer and cigars later.... No BBQ for me though... I'll be working, watching the blinky lights and listening for the beepy things out here on Kwajalein for the Space and Missile Defense Command.

Of course, I reckon this won't be posted up until after the fact....

Sad

memorialday.jpg
izonfire Offline
#2 Posted:
Joined: 12-09-2013
Posts: 8,642
SO sad.
Wishing you the best
dstieger Offline
#3 Posted:
Joined: 06-22-2007
Posts: 10,889
5 February 2007:
Once a month, Laura Youngblood takes her 6-year-old son Hunter to Arlington National Cemetery to visit "Daddy's garden."

"We bring stuff, pictures. He runs out first to his daddy's stone," she said. "He runs to his stone and gives it a kiss and says 'I love you, Daddy,' and gives him the gifts."

Hunter was 4 and Youngblood, 28, was eight months pregnant with her second child when she learned her husband, Travis Youngblood, a Navy medic, had been hit with an improvised explosive device in Iraq in July 2005. Though she'd at first been told he was expected to recover, she found out five days later that he'd died.

At first, she said, she lost interest in the baby she was carrying and started losing weight.

"I didn't even want my child, and I know it sounds sad. I didn't want anything, I wanted to take care of Hunter and I wasn't thinking about the child," she said. "And then I kept thinking, I still have this part of him inside me."

She drove herself to the hospital for a cesarean section. During the surgery, she kept her husband's portrait on her chest. She called her daughter Emma, a name her husband chose in his last letter home as "fitting for his little princess," and placed the portrait in Emma's bassinet.

Fifteen months later, Laura Youngblood now lives in Columbus, Ohio, where she and her children can be close to the base of those who served alongside her husband. Laura, who spent five years in the Navy and is currently in the reserves, grew up in Long Beach and remained there with her family for months after her husband's death, but said she could not afford to stay in New York on her Social Security and husband's disability income.

"I'd love to, I grew up there and I know where everything is, I have friends and family there to help me, but I can't afford it right now," she said.

Raising her children alone is difficult, she said, but she has dedicated her life to them and to his memory. "I live my life in honor of my husband, I raise my kids in honor of my husband. I'm still married, I'm happily married. All I do is take care of my kids," she said. "We talk about him every day. We have pictures in everyone's room. He's still my husband, he's still their daddy."

For Emma, who will never meet her father, Laura has made 15-minute videos of photographs and home movies. "She'll point to the pictures and we say, 'Daddy,' and she'll say, 'Daddy.' "

Laura said she hopes to return to school eventually and get a job, but "right now I don't have the time and energy to do anything."

"Hunter knows how his daddy was killed, and he knows where and by who, and he knows everything," she said. "I'm not going to lie, I'd rather he know the truth before I lie to him. He'll always tell people that his daddy's a hero, and then sometimes he cries and says he wishes Daddy was alive, and every time he'll make me make a wish."

"He says, 'I know what you wished for. I know you wished Daddy was alive.' I cry, of course. All the time, but it's our life, and I'm proud of my husband and I stand behind him for everything he did and what all of our troops did."
izonfire Offline
#4 Posted:
Joined: 12-09-2013
Posts: 8,642
The reality is tragic.

I'm going with my older neighbor to the VFW for dinner tonight.
He flew the F4 Phantom in Nam. Went through some pretty heavy chit.

We'll be toasting all those who sacrificed tonight.
And another, for you bs_kwaj, Stieg and all on this forum.
Whistlebritches Offline
#5 Posted:
Joined: 04-23-2006
Posts: 22,127
Truly sad...…...even more sad there are thousands of wives and children out there in the same predicament.All I can do is drop a prayer for each and everyone of them.


RIP Petty Officer Youngblood


Gene363 Offline
#6 Posted:
Joined: 01-24-2003
Posts: 30,669
Pray Pray Pray
delta1 Offline
#7 Posted:
Joined: 11-23-2011
Posts: 28,754
this scene is replicated thousands of times throughout the US...

Petty Officer Youngblood was killed after "Mission Accomplished"

we should remember each and every one of our fallen, like their families do, before we decide to engage in unnecessary war...
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