"That's a When I Get Home Story Mom"

Pokey never told us much about what was going on in Iraq of a personal nature. He would mention little things or funny stories. I think he told his father more than he told me. He would often say he took pictures or this or that happened but "That's a when I get home story". Obviously he never got to tell us his stories. His band of brothers share some. They are still careful about what they share though. I don't think they quite yet understand that no matter how scary they think it is for me to hear I have faced the scariest part. And also they have put those stories away so they can adjust back to life here. Some day they will pull then out again when it is safe for them too and share them with me then.

It is hard for me to know there was a facet of my son I will never know. I will never know the combat soldier. The man he became while he was in Iraq. Not saying he wasn't a man before but I know being there and fighting for what he believed in, gave him a strength of character and a perspective on life different than anything he could have had here in the civilian world. In fact in our last conversation he admitted, in his way, he had changed and he was scared that his friends here would not understand who he had become. He had grown up in a way that most will not in years and years of life. I know it was being there and the " when I get home" stories that made him into the man he had become.

But regardless, there is a part of me that wants to know what it was like there for him. Oh I know I will never fully understand because I was not there. But I want a better insight. I need to know what his life there was really like. I think, just may be, that gift has been given to me. There is a movie coming out "Brothers At War". when I first heard about it was leery. Hollywood is not kind to our military. But investigating a little told me the producer was a man who loves our troops and I knew this was going to be a good film. Having seen the trailer and clips it hit me.. these are my son's stories that he was going to tell me when he got home. No not his personally but his all the same.

I have to stop now and then when people touch my life these days or things happen to me. I have to stop and realize that all my questions, all my need to know, is slowly being answered. I have to think Pokey is asking God for a special favor of letting him put the right people and events into my life as I am ready for them.