It's been ten years since Seth was injured, and almost ten years since I've posted on the blog. This is because Seth's story is now his, and he gets to decide with whom to share it. But I want to share a small miracle that happened today.
First a little update: I returned home in April of 2012 and Seth stayed at Walter Reed until summer of 2013. Upon his return to Utah, he bought a house in Salt Lake City where he still resides. There have been lots of ups and lots of downs since then, including several surgeries and emergency hospitalizations (thankfully, SLC has a wonderful VA). But the rest is Seth's to tell.
The ten-year anniversary on July 1 hit me harder that I anticipated—maybe because of the added stress of Covid, maybe because it's unclear how to acknowledge and commemorate such anniversaries—I don't know. Then the withdrawal from Afghanistan happened, and that brought up so much emotion, so many questions, so much regret, so much frustration, and just so much sadness. And then came the 20th anniversary of 9-11, which not only brought back the events and feelings of 2001, but of the 10th anniversary in 2011, which we spent at Walter Reed.
So back to my miracle. In these intervening ten years, I have never revisited or read the blog. It was just too hard. But recently, I wanted to remember some details, so I started reading. I was reminded that on November 10, 2011, we, with a group of other wounded warriors and their families, got a private tour of the White House. At the end of the tour, Pres. Obama surprised us with a visit. He spent a few minutes with us, speaking encouraging and hopeful words, and shaking hands and hugging folks. I am not ashamed to say that I teared up when I got to shake Pres. Obama's hand. Then we had a group photo taken.
Our group leaders told us we would get a copy of the photo in a week or so, but we never did, and there was always so much going on that I never got around to tracking it down.
So here we are today, ten years later, and it seemed very sad that we didn't have a copy of that photo. I did some digging—OK, I went straight to the Obama Library website—and I found a place where I could order photos from the site. Unfortunately, even armed with the date of the photo, I could not find it. So I emailed the archivist, including all the information I had about the day and the event. And, you may have guessed by now, he found the photo and sent it to me today! So here it is after ten years!
I wish I could remember all the names of the familiar faces I see here, but it is just good to be reminded of the people who were there going through the same things we were. And good to remember a bright spot in that difficult time.
So that's our 10-year-aniversary miracle!
The original post about that day
Fluff and Mumbo Jumbo
That was what Seth called my reflections on the blog, so here are some more. In reading the blog ten years later, I have some regrets. I wish I had included the names of more people and I'm not sure why I didn't name everyone who served us. I think I was afraid of giving someone attention they didn't want or naming someone and forgetting to name someone else. I don't know, but I regret not acknowledging by name every single person who sent us something, showed up to visit us, or helped us out in any other way.
I wish I had stayed in touch with more people. I wish I had reached out to more people who were going through what we were going through.
But I am SO glad I kept the blog and documented our experience. We think we will remember, but we forget. I've been reminded of so many things that I had forgotten—some good, some bad—but all worth being remembered. Seth's experience and that of the many others like him deserve to be remembered.
