It is not often at my ripe old age that I read or hear something that manages to jerk a tear. Today was one of those rare exceptions.
Way back late in the previous century, after I had moved to Texas, I got a call informing me that one of my longtime friends, going back to early grade school, was moving to Oklahoma, to a town named Ada. The call was from the friend's husband. He was calling to say hello, and that he was having trouble convincing Chris, the wife, to make the move, with their three kids, the oldest two, boys, in high school, and their girl, in grade school.
Well, they made the move. And it was not long thereafter I drove up to Ada for the first of many visits.
A couple years later I had returned from Houston, dead tired, when I got a call from a tearful David, Chris's husband. Their younger boy, Ryan, had died in a car crash. David said Chris needed me, so I drove to Ada the next day. I arrived thinking I would find Chris in bed. Instead, I arrived to find a house full of people, with more coming and going constantly. With Chris meeting and greeting.
I drove back to Texas that night, saying I'd come back in three days, for the memorial. I did so. I had never been to such a memorial. It was held in a high school high tech auditorium. The school was wealthy due to having oil wells on the property. There were over two thousand people at the memorial, for Ryan and the other boy who died in the crash.
A couple days prior, David and Chris had been asked for photos, for part of the memorial. They did not know how these photos were to be used. Well, it was a slide show, set to music, projected on a HUGE screen that hovered above the stage. I tell you this was not easy to watch, so many scenes of Washington, including the Prescott family on the Deception Pass bridge. There was so much sobbing, able to be heard above the soundtrack.
I first met Ryan and his big brother, Ian, when they were just little kids, the oldest probably not more than four years old. Chris had come for a visit with them to my new house in Mount Vernon. I did not see the boys again, until I saw them in Oklahoma, now with a 12 year old sister.
I do not remember when it was, maybe in 2004, when I met up with Chris at the WinStar Casino, when she told me that one of the things that made her okay with the move to Oklahoma, was knowing I was nearby, if needed.
In 2008 the Prescotts left Oklahoma, moving back to our old hometown of Burlington. Ian got married to a nice Okie girl named Carrie, and they proceeded to have four or five kids. Whilst Ian joined the military, eventually becoming a U.S. Army Sergeant First Class.
I do not remember how I first learned that Ian had been badly wounded. At some point in the last couple years I learned that the Gary Senise Foundation was helping Ian. I called Chris last winter, got updated on Ian's current condition, the house Ian and family are getting thanks to the Gary Senise Foundation, and confirmation of reports I had received telling me she had become a bit of a hermit.
The jerking of tears happened when reading the Gary Senise article about Ian, seeing a current photo of him, and remembering that little boy who visited me in Mount Vernon with his mom and brother, all those years ago.
And then I found a TV news article titled "Combat wounded Crestview veteran to be give mortgage free home."
In that TV news article you see photos of the house under construction, details about it being a smart home. Along with a photo of Ian and Carrie's kids, and Chris and David's grandkids, photos of whom, I had never before seen.
War and guns really need to be banned from the planet...
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