We’ll never forget you, Blair Emery
Another young man from Lee was killed in Iraq on Nov. 30. Blair had been a student of mine at Lee Academy. His sisters grew up with my children. This tragedy has hit our small town especially hard. We have paid a steep price in this war. Here are some news links to read about it followed by a letter from me that the Lincoln News published this week. Rest in peace, brave soldier. Your mission is complete. May your friends and family find comfort in your absence.
http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=153894&ac=PHnws
http://bangornews.com/news/t/penobscot.aspx?articleid=157299&z..183
http://bangornews.com/news/t/penobscot.aspx?articleid=157497&z..183
http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=153578&ac=PHnws
To the Emery’s:
To the Emery family,
I know that in this moment how insignificant well wishes and words seem. The cards, the food, the heart-felt offers to do something, anything, for your family, and yet it all doesn’t quite add up. The only thing you want people to do, they can’t do. The only thing you want to hear is Blair’s “Hey, I’m home safe!” I am so sorry, Bill, Quie, Betsy, Hillary, Cho, Gramma and Grampa. I am so sorry.
I wish I could be there with you to do something, anything. I wish I could say or do something to take away your pain. Having just passed the 5th month anniversary since my son Sgt. Joel A. House was killed by an IED in Taji, Iraq, I hope to offer some gliimmer of hope that you can get through this tragic time and, that while I haven’t found that the pain, emptiness, or shock ever disappears, I would like to share with you some thoughts that (sometimes) help me:
Alllow yourself to grieve. Burying a local, state, indeed, national hero will be taxing on your already fragile psyches. The military, the decisions, the press, the anti-war Bush-bashers, the politiciians, the phone calls, the hundreds of thank you cards to wriite can stress you out with their day after day demands. I know you have to put on a strong face to honor the sacrifice your son made, but you are Blair’s family and you miss him so much and every time you find yourself in a family place without him, the reallity of loss overwhelms you. Everyone really wants to help, so let them take some of the tasks off your hands and you go spend some time with your memories and Blair whether that be in the woods, in your family photo albums, or a Lee Academy basketball game. You’re allowed to be crazy or sick or sad. Your feeliings are your feelings, so don’t worry about what everyone else thinks.
I remember once I was at the drive-thru at the Hogan Road McDonald’s in Bangor. When I looked up, I saw the Armed Forces Recruiting Center looming in the background. I had to spend some time there. I regretted never having spent tiime with Joel when he was being recruited. I needed to see this aspect of the military–where it all began. I parked my car in front of the center door. People came in and out regularly. Many teenagers. Mostly uniformed recruiters.
I became discontent sitting in the car just watching the military pass by. I needed to get inside. I desperately wanted to touch a soldier who had been to Iraq and returned. I needed to know that although my son died fighting for a cause larger than himself, that the cause continued. I hung outside awhile pretending to look at the recruting posters. But I had to get inside. What could i do? I couldn’t just walk in and say, “Excuse me, Sergeant, but could you please hug me?” Then it dawned on me. I went inside and asked, “Can I have some Army stickers? You see, my son just died in Iraq and we’re making a scrapbook of the thousands of cards and letters we’ve recieved, and the stickers would look cool.”
Those soldiers–trained for battle, proficient in warfare with guns and ammo–were rattled in that moment. They didn’t know how to react. Was I going to have a scene? go crazy? start crying? go ballistic? Soldiers don’t do emotions very well. “Anything, anything you want, M’am,” they ran around finding the Army stickers, pencils, brochures, buttons. They couldn’t do enough for me. I had mixed emotions. Part of me felt a little guilty for creating that uncertain tension. “I really am crazy and should see shrink,” I thought. “It’s not these guys’ job to make me feel better!” Yes, I was guilty but the bitter Mom inside me also felt remarkably vindicated and wicked. These warriors–squirming, running helter-skelter for an emotional foxhole–were sons, and but for the grace of God, looking into the eyes of their personal futures.
I am so proud of our nation’s military, the mightiest in the history of the world. Led by our democratiic ideals of individual rights to life, liberty, and freedom, it’s not designed to conquer, oppress, or repress but to protect our inalienable rights and bring our way of life to other people when they call us.
It was therapeutic and powerful standing there while high school recruits who were weighing the career choices of Army life looked on: “Take a good look at me, boys,” I said to myself. If you choose what you considering and follow it through to the inthinkable possibilities, it could be your mother standing here wishing these uniforms contained her son! But thank God that Maine has raised such children as you who do choose to defend and give us freedom!”
You know, we did not get to choose the loss of our “boys”. If given the opportunity, we would have willingly sacrificed our own lives rather than let this happen. Our deaths would have been more bearable than our sons’. We did not get to chose this path, but we do get to choose how we will honor their sacrifice with life that God still offers us. Blair and Joel faced fear every day while they patrolled in a hostile land assailled by centuries-old turmoils and conflicts that will probably never be resolved. Within a year of graduating high school, they went from playing sports and hunting deer to trying to comprehend the history of the Arab-Isreali conflict, the distinctions between various Muslim sects, and the United State’s role in the midst of all this strife. Living through one suicide bomber after another improvised explosive device had to take an incredible amount of courage. I always sensed in Joel’s voice his awareness that everyday could be his last.
The Arabs are some of the fiercest warriors known in history. Their skill kept the Europeans out of their lands during the Crusades for centuries. I cannot imagine facing them upon the battlefields, and yet that’s just what they did every day after blood-stained day. I tell myself everyday that if Joel could face that, then I can face the challenges of the day. My son is a hero, and I am now a hero’s mother. I choose to honor his life by continuing to live mine to the fullest potential I am given.
Blair was my Spanish student at Lee Academy. I don’t remember if he was in my class or not on 9-11, but I do remember sharing the unfolding of that day with my students. Between my 1st period class and 2nd period class, my world, our world as Americans changed forever. Before that day, I naively walked through life thinking that I was safe and that America could never be touched. Indeed, in conventional ways, our country could never suffer the extent of these casualties. But seeing fully fueled airplanes used as bombs to attack our very symbols of government and economic dominance, I knew that the enemy had devised a new warfare–one that could touch us. And even while our politicians and generals scrambled to bridge the learning curve that happens with all innovations, our boys’ souls were stirring to do their part to protect America, Maine, Lee, their families, the land they called home. For Blair, he wanted to follow in the brave footsteps of his older sisters, Betsy and Hiilary, who were already in the military. For Joel, he wanted to follow in the footsteps of Papa Pete, Aunt Kathy, Uncle Josh, Uncle Phil and cousin, Jeremy.
I teach in Monterrey, Mexico.. When I share my mourning with my students, the first question my high schoolers ask me is, “And why did your son have to go to war?” I answer them that the United States has a volunteer military and that young men and women do volunteer to do their part because they understand that it is the price for freedom, for safety, for living in a county that values “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” The enemy came to our land and hurt us badly on September 11, 2001. Innocent people, people not ready to die, people who had not said “good-bye, I love you, Momma” that day, people without guns, not trained in combat, who had not volunteered for war died simultaneously in the World Trade Center with generals and admirals in our United States Pentagon. And our boys sat at Lee Academy vowing to protect their family and keep their friends from that pain ever again. And after graduation, they voluntarilly enlisted in the United States Army.
As your family and my family continue to live our lives, as we go forward with each painful day, we are going to meet people. We’re never going to know which people we meet who will be alive because our sons went to a foreign land to fight to keep men and women, boys and girls , people passing through some building or bridge at the wrong time free from terrorist attack. People will live because our boys died, just as we owe our gratitude to a generation of young people who went to Vietnam, to Korea, to Europe. As Joel’s mom, I wouldn’t have traded him for the entire east coast full of lives. He was my baby. He was my world. And what do I care about all those strangers compared to him? Joel and Blair didn’t think that way. On Joel’s tombstone it reads, “No greater love hath this, than a man lay down his life for his friends.” Neither Joel nor Blair wanted to die, wanted to sacrifice their lives. But both of them chose to accept the possibility that that could happen.
I grew up around military bases through the Vietnam era. I never personally knew one family whose dad or mom had been lost in a war. Compared to the American loss of lives in the Vietnam War with the American loss of life in the Gulf War, I never believed I would personally know anyone who died in this war. I still can’t believe that Joel died in Iraq, but I thought wrongly again that lightening would never strike twice so close to home. How can a little town like Lee lose two boys in the same year? It isn’t fair, and I don’t know why.
There are no words to explain that to me or to you. As a mom, I don’t think I will ever understand “why?” I do understand that there are no finer, more deeply committed young people in our land that those who come from the Pine Tree Belt. When I see the way our community supports us–whether they agree with the war or not–I do understand the source of American values that is our region’s heritage. Our community passed on ethics and commitment to an American way of life to our sons. When families line Main Street in 90 degree and 20 degree weather to express their gratitude and remorse, I understand from where our young people derive their dedication. We have paid a high price in this war because we raise the best children.
Eventually, the outpourring of sympathy from our community, Veterans groups, the state, the Soldiers’ Angels, the military families, the Gold Star Families will comfort you like wrapping one of Grandma’s afghans round you, sitting next to the ram-down, and waiting for the 20 below cold snap to pass so spring can arrive. But right now, you got some dark days ahead, and I wish it wasn’t so. You’re going to be coming up on your 1st month anniversary during the Christmas holiday, and that’s going to be rough. God sent His son into the world during the darkest days of the year, so that we might live forever. Blair and Joel went ahead of us to that city of eternal peace where families will never have to say good-bye again. Joel and Blair have fullfilled their mission. Now it’s up to us who are left behind to complete ours.
Six months from now you’ll be just starting to come out of the zombie-like trance that you’re going to walk in for awhile and be trying to figure out what you can say or do for some other Gold Star family who just learned of their son or daughter’s death. That’s what I’m trying to do here for you. So even though I couldn’t be in Lee this week, I hope that you can feel my love for your through these words that just can’t do what I want them to do: take away your sorrow.
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