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Active Duty
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There are a great many anxious American children waiting for a parent to come home from Iraq or Afghanistan. For some, both parents have been deployed and other family members must help care for them. That is another kind of call to active duty. |
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Active Duty – Story:
It’s been almost 30 years since Tom and Hazel Irwin had someone this young and with this much energy living in their home. When their daughter Leigh Ann and son-in-law Lawrence, both in the Army, were sent to Kuwait, their daughter Jade needed someone to watch over her. Now she’s in Grandma’s and Grandpa’s house.
Tom Irwin: “I wouldn't want it any other way.”
A retired United Methodist pastor, Tom and his wife thought they had also retired from raising small children.
Hazel Irwin: “I was footloose and fancy-free.”
Now, Hazel has returned to the world of sleepovers, playing checkers, catching the school bus, baking with a precocious 6-year-old. Jade adores her grandparents, but misses her home in Oklahoma and her friends.
Nat Snd (Jade reading a letter she’s writing to Mom): “I miss you.”
Jade: “I don't get to see my mom or daddy or my friends.”
While her grandparents keep an eye on the news, Jade hasn’t asked a lot about the war.
Tom Irwin: “She’s begun to include it in her prayer that Mommy and Daddy would not get hurt.”
The Irwins try not to worry too much about Jade’s mom and dad, but they know they’re in a dangerous part of the world.
Tom Irwin: “The exact same thing as when she was baptized, or went off to school or when she went off to basic training. You’re in God's care, kid.”
Part of that care, at least for this couple, is showing little Jade the love of a parent at a time when her own parents can’t—a time when sacrifice and duty is required of more than just the soldiers on foreign soil.
Active Duty – Tag:
The Irwins have taken care of Jade before, when training required both her parents to be in Europe, but that was just for a month or two at a time.