A Daughter's Pride

Yesterday a close friend of mine posted a lot of 'soldier tribute' videos this started to bring out the huge pride I feel for this country and the love I have for her soldiers. Another video was brought to my attention this morning of a soldier returning home and his disabled son walking to him for the first time. That one brought tears to my eyes, bringing back memories of the day James came home and how this soldier and his family must have felt in that moment. But this post is not about me and my pride in my soldier family.... This post is about Brynlee.

 Brynlee was watching that last video with me. I replayed the first 50 seconds about 3 times. After posting it to Facebook I tried to continue on checking mail and various things, Brynlee threw a fit. She started to cry and say "Daddy" and point to the screen. She thought the man in uniform on the video was James, and she wanted to watch him again. I told her that that was not Daddy it was another child's Daddy and she said "Oh" and was then fine with me closing the video. This act made me want to see how much she might remember of her own Father's home coming. She was less than 1 year old at that time but it sparked an interesting idea for me, that that memory had a deep impact on my daughter, I had to find out how deep.

I brought up the album of the day James came back from Iraq. This always brings back strong memories of pride and a strong mix of other emotions for me, but what do those pictures do to my daughter?

Brynlee watched each photo describing what she saw. When we got to the video of the soldiers getting off the airplane she cheered  and clapped like the people in the video and though it was never said in the video she yelled "Yeah Daddy!" We then watched the video of them in formation marching into the building before they where released to their families for a short time. She again cheered and yelled for her Daddy. I asked her if she remembered that day and she refused to respond to that question. She watched the video intently and made me replay it 5 or 6 times. The look on her face said though she may not remember the day or the moments in it she remembers the feelings mommy and everyone else around her where feeling and maybe she felt them too. The look on her face below says it all.

 The first hug she ever got to give James. There was no fear of him and she knew right away that that was her Daddy.

 Have you ever seen a happier baby? James was able to stay at the hotel with us that night.

 When James finally returned to NM I took Cowgirl to greet him.

 She was very happy to have her Daddy home too.

 Even today every time Daddy has to leave for a few days or a few weeks or even just to run to the store when he has returned from work, Brynlee cries and has to have love, hugs, and kisses before he can go and even then some days it's a battle.

 This little girl loves her uncles in uniform and loves her Daddy. When she sees men in the store in uniform she will point them out, not with aw or fear, there is no intimidation there like when I saw my first man in uniform but with acceptance and pride. When James has Drill on the weekends Brynlee is more than happy to tell you her "Daddy is playing Army" that day.When he comes home Brynlee helps him take off his shoes and the patches on his jacket, as if to say Daddy your home and that is where your going to stay. When he has to be away for more than a day or two we usually have to make bed time phone calls so she can say good night.

I asked Brynlee this morning as she watched the video again. "Brynlee are you proud of your Daddy?" She simply shook her head up and down and said "Yes."