CASEY'S LAST VISIT HOME BEFORE HIS DEPLOYMENT TO IRAQ

Last week, Casey drove down to Kentucky from Fort Drum in Watertown, New York. He has spent the better part of a week visiting with family and friends in the Louisville, Elizabethtown and Frankfort areas. Today he and his girlfriend, Jen, stopped in at our house for about four hours and we took them to lunch. We were babysitting Madi for Michael while he was in town, so we took her with us and then Mike met us for lunch. These are some of the pictures that were taken at the restaurant.

Lynne has been having a very rough and emotional time, knowing that this (including seeing him off at the airport tomorrow) will be the last time she sees Casey until he returns from Iraq. He deploys from Ft Drum in early November. Today was difficult for her because she wanted to be as supportive as possible, yet her heart was being torn and haunted by the spectre of uncertainty for the weeks and months to come. Being patriotic - as we have come to know, understand and define patriotism - and espousing a love of country is almost always an emotional and usually a thought provoking experience for most of us. However, from a personal perspective, that patina of patriotism takes on a somewhat different and perhaps more somber hue when a mother hugs her son for the last time before sending him off to armed conflict half a world away from home.

She is no more patriotic than she was yesterday, nor is she less so. Her sense of patriotism and love of country, however, has now been distilled into something that has a greater and deeper meaning for her. A more profound meaning. It has crystallized into something with more clarity and definition. It has now become a much more personal matter. Personal in a way that she couldn't have imagined or fathomed last year, last month, last week, or even yesterday. News of the war will now be listened to and watched with a keener insight, a more attuned ear and with a stronger and more fervent prayer in her heart and on her lips.