Dear Family and Friends,
Wow, it has been so long since I have last posted. I have been home now 1 year and 7 months. I still work for the same company, but now support a FAA project.
What prompted this post? Well believe it or not, I still had a trunk in the garage from Iraq I hadn’t unpacked yet. The last time I tried I stopped, because it was just not the right time. Understand, there wasn’t anything in the trunk I really needed, but there was a finality in unpacking the last box.
One of the first things I found was a one inch thick pice cut off the bottom of the Christmas tree in 2007. Ann and the kids sent it to me in a care package with the words “Venable Christmas Tree 2007″ inscribed on the bottom. Wow, time stood still and memories flooded into my thoughts that had been pushed back by all of the other things I have experienced since then. Sorry if this impacts what you think of me, but my eyes welled-up as I pondered the words on the bottom of the piece of a Christmas tree from many years ago.
It was my first Christmas away from home, in a war-zone where everyday we went injury free was a gift. We all went to sleep at night not knowing if a rocket or mortar was going to take us out at night. In Baghdad, in the Embassy compound trailer where I lived on the night of 25 December 2007, I wrote a post I called the smells of Christmas. Here is the link to that old post: http://jlvenablejr.wordpress.com/2007/12/24/baghdad-122407-smells-of-christmas/ If you read the old post, you will understand why the old piece of wood hit me so hard.
I am so blessed to be home now. So many things have happened that I would have missed if I had still been in Iraq. This weekend our youngest child graduated from college. How many events did I miss while I was in Iraq? Too many…
The point of this post is not me, but those military members and their families that are now sacrificing for us. Please don’t go to sleep tonight without thanking God for them.
Love,
Jimmy
