Letters for Veterans Campaign Shows True American Spirit

Thousands of District 308 students, and numerous area adults, joined in to send notes of gratitude and encouragement to our Veterans living in our Illinois Veterans Homes and some of our area nursing homes. 

This Friday, Nov. 11, will be a special day for almost 1,100 Veterans.   They'll receive little bundles of cards and letters that were sent by many caring people.

I'll be visiting Bickford to drop off batches of some of these cards to their resident Veterans and I'm looking forward to seeing their faces when they receive these cards from total strangers.  

Monday, when we received the final letters from Oswego High School (1,480), and from Lakewood Creek Elementary (450), there was no time to really read them because they needed to be counted, sorted, set-up on a table in assembly line fashion along with the over 2,000 cards already received.  I needed a count so I would know how many cards/letters each little bundle would have.

After running out to get an additional 480 envelopes, I was ready to assemble the packets......oh, no, that's not right, first I had to stamp each one of those envelopes with a blue or red star to decorate the front!  I didn't actually realize how hard it was to handle that many pieces of mail.  Wow!!  

As I was assembling them, someone knocked at my darkened front door to bring over a card to add to the bundle!  On Sunday, a lady came by with her two little girls to drop off homemade cards to add.  What a lesson for our youngsters when our adults encourage them in these small acts of kindness that make such a big difference to the recipient.    

Also, as usual, my wonderful son, Bryan, helped stamp, fold, insert letters and fill boxes for me.  He always gets pressed into service. 

One very special story comes from the Boulder Hill Elementary School where Daniel, a second-grader who is visually impaired, made a braille card.  I knew I wasn't going to let that card go to waste, so after 11 phone calls, I found someone to send it to at Hines VA Hospital's Blind Center.  They have a 34-bed facility with a portion of their participants graduating each week.

Jerry Schutter, the head of that facility, told me that approximately one third of those could read the braille card and that he would share it with all of them.  Daniel's one little, very special, card will cheer many other sightless Veterans!  Note: (tear in my eye right now!).   

The cards and letters going to the VA facilities were sent out early Tuesday morning to Anna Veterans Home, LaSalle Veterans Home, Quincy Veterans Home and Hines VA Hospital.  My wonderful ex-husband and his wife Gail (yes, you heard that right....we have a great relationship - shouldn't that be a reality series?) is going to deliver the cards for the Manteno Veterans Home because they live about a block from there. 

The cards for Tillers and Bickford in Oswego, Countryside Care and Jennings Terrace in Aurora, Hillside Rehab in Yorkville and Alden/Waterford in Aurora will all be delivered by me.  

I mailed one little packet to my friend's husband, Wayne, who is disabled from his exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.  I also have four other individual packets that will go to my brother, Bob, who lives here in town and three other Veterans that I know personally.  My brother Bob served in Germany in 1967 while my late brother Jerry was serving in Vietnam as a helicopter gunner.  

I'm also excited to have been invited to speak to the students at Plank Jr. High School at their Veterans Day assembly on Friday to talk about where their cards/letters went, etc.   Speaking of schools, we had many schools who participated in the this program: Oswego High School, Eastview, Traughber Jr. High, Plank Jr. High, Bednarcik Jr. High, Lakewood Creek Elementary, The Wheatlands, Grande Park Elementary, and Somonauk Middle School.

I have found a rich resource of patriotic spirits within our school system and feel encouraged by the level of participation and caring exhibited by our young people.  What we're teaching them about citizenship and compassion is priceless.  Thank you everyone who particpated - you made a difference to someone who made a difference to our country!

It's never too late to thank our Veterans so won't you please take just a moment out of your busy schedule to do just that on Friday (and every day)? 

As usual, live an inspired and patriotic week!