I recently discovered Card Gnome, an online greeting card store that has created Cards and Heroes, a two-fold holiday program that is focused on sending holiday greeting cards to our military, while also allowing military to send cards to loved ones if they cannot be home for the holidays.
For active military: Simply sign up with their military email address, select any card, include their personal message and Card Gnome will take care of the payment and shipping. The first 10,000 cards sent by military members in this manner are free.
For non-military: The American Red Cross “Holiday Mail for Heroes” program, allowing individuals to send a holiday greeting to a member of the military. Each participant will select a card, include a personal message and hit “Send to a Hero” at checkout and Card Gnome will relay the greeting to the American Red Cross who will then distribute to it to the military member.
Want to learn more? Visit the Cards and Heroes page now. The program ends December 9.
The gift of freedom, opportunity and choice that is…
Why is it that young children seem to get this, but we as intelligent adults so conveniently forget? My son’s 6th grade class wrote letters to send to Veterans this week in honor of Veterans Day. Nearly all began with “Thank you for the sacrifices you have made…,” now here’s the important part, “for me.” Yes, that’s right “for me.” These children get that this is personal, not just a day off from school or platitudes we utter and parades we watch once a year.
This is about a personal sacrifice that has been made by millions, 21.9 million veterans as of the end of 2009 to be exact. These men and women had or have families, careers, hopes and dreams. They are our brothers, parents, friends, spouses, children, people on TV, in the office next to yours, the mechanic who fixes your car, the nurse who meets you in the emergency room, the elderly man in the nursing home that no one remembers to visit and even more sadly the homeless man begging for food on your city street.
It’s also personal to many of these children and should be to the rest of us “civilians.” The entire class cried with the young boy who wrote his letter to his Veteran grandfather to place on his grave. They offered sympathy and support to my son as he shared his letter to his Veteran father, currently serving in Afghanistan, through the fog of painful tears of separation. Sometimes children have such an open honesty and a clear understanding of simple things that we adults try to complicate.
Veteran’s Day is not just about “Yeah, we’re free!” though that’s certainly worth celebrating. It is about making difficult, often horrific personal sacrifices for the good of something greater than ourselves.
So, today and every day, I continue to be grateful for all those past, present and future that I am proud to call “Veteran.”
Busy day. This morning is even more rushed than usual, because I have to drop Elijah at school an hour early for jazz band practice. It takes a herculean effort to get us both ready to leave on time. I am stressed because I have to remember to bring everything I need to work from my laptop and I’m sure I’ll forget something. I drop Elijah and Joey off at school and head straight to the dealership to drop my Chevy Equinox off to hopefully get the annoying creaking noise fixed. They have arranged a rental car for me for the day since I have a doctor appointment 30 minutes away. I wait and I wait getting more anxious by the minute until finally the rental company guy arrives. I have no idea what his name is so I’ll just call him the rental guy from now on. He takes me back to the Enterprise office and things are looking good until… I can’t find my driver’s license. You have got to be kidding me. What is wrong with me? How did I not think to check that? I must have left it in my little wallet the last time I went to the craft days, which also means that I have been driving around without my license for weeks now. Cripes. They can’t give me a rental without a valid license. Now what.
To my great relief they arrange to have the rental guy drop me off at my appointment since they need to pick up some papers at another Enterprise office and come back and get me when I am done and bring me back. We have a nice chat talking about the job market, the weather, working for Enterprise Rent-A-Car, what I do for a living. It’s sort of surreal, like having my own personal chauffer, except he drives a Chevy Aveo instead of a limousine. As it happens by the time we get back to the dealership my car is just getting done and I am suddenly free of my morning ordeal. It’s lunchtime, so I decide to go to the local Panera’s and work for a while anyway. I get my soup, some tea and a cookie and settle into a booth. I have food and the internet. Life is good!
I work for a couple of hours and head home for the second part of my life. It’s drum lessons, a rushed dinner and then up to mom’s house to landscape in the dark. Did I plan to landscape in the dark? No, but that is what I end up doing. Elijah and I plant pots, clear grass sod, dig holes and spread stones. It must have been a rock quarry under there because it feels as though it’s all clay and rocks, but eventually we get it done. The bugs are eating us alive and we end up working by moonlight, but we manage. By the time I get home, Elijah and I talk with Anthony for a few minutes via Skype and I fall in bed.
I recently discovered Card Gnome, an online greeting card store that has created Cards and Heroes, a two-fold holiday program that is focused on sending holiday greeting cards to our military, while also allowing military to send cards to loved ones if they cannot be home for the holidays.
Find me!