Come Home

"December 7, 1941--a date which will live in infamy…"

As Jim Collins heard President Roosevelt utter those words on the radio, a sense of obligation coursed through him. His wife, Eloise, observed his expression with resignation. She knew the words he would say before he voiced them. “It is my duty to go.”

Nearly three years later, Jim huddled alongside a muddy tank in northern France, a tattered letter from  Eloise in his hands. He held it up to his face as if he could inhale the essence of Eloise from the soggy paper. Her closing words burned in his brain, “Come home to me.”

***

Joe Collins opened the official letter with trepidation. “Greetings from the President of the United States” leapt off the page at him. He smiled bravely as his parents watched him anxiously. “I won’t be running away to Canada, Dad. It would not be the honorable thing to do.”

Joe had done his duty in Vietnam. Now it was time to go home. He ran for the open doors of the evacuation helicopter and squeezed in among the refugees there. His last sight of the smoke over war torn Saigon would stay with him for the rest of his life.

***

Lt. Jaime Collins watched her television set in horror as the planes hit the World Trade Center. She started packing – she knew what this meant - it wouldn’t be long before she stepped off a military transport onto the sand of Afghanistan.

Her five year old son watched her with wide open eyes. “Why do you have to leave again, Mommy? Why can’t you stay?”

While she comforted him, her husband regarded her with concern. She came to him and he held her tight in his arms. He whispered, “Come home to us.”