Mood:
downTopic: "Kiss a Girl Goodbye"(2)
Captain Kenneth Hutnick, Company H, 121st Infantry, Georgia Army National Guard, is a business friend of Frodo. This week he kissed each of his three daughters and his wife good-bye as he returned to Iraq for his second tour of duty. Each of these four young ladies has a different perspective on why Ken is leaving them again. Frodo felt it was important to merely reiterate what he was told about each of them.
Katie is 5, she doesn't remember Dad's first deployment, and after hearing Dad's promise that he would be back to walk her to school on her first day, she accepted the fact that he was merely "going to work."
Erin is 2, and proving that there is nothing terrible about being young enough to be oblivious to the comings-and-goings of people who love you so much.
Ashlyn is 27 days old, and Ken has timed his furlough to be here at this time. He holds and holds and holds the little one until he has to turn and go.
Suzanne kissed her husband good-bye on the front porch of their home in Alpharetta. She watched her father-in-law drive her husband to the Subway station, and she turned back to manage the tasks which would be her sole responsibility for months to come.
Ken is a big fan of Major Dick Winters, the true-life hero of Easy Company (101st Airborne) immortalized in "Band of Brothers." He and his father, a two-tour Vietnam Vet, talk military banter on their drive together. When the car stops, Ken steps out and looks back long enough to say "I love you Dad." His father immediately responds, "If you're going to be like Dick Winters, remember that he came home."
Frodo and his friend Ken might disagree a great deal about almost everything associated with this Pre-emptive War, its' management, its' consequences; frankly, Frodo does not know, and it would make no difference to him if he did.
Ken Hutnick is a good man and a good daddy. If anything happens to him, it will be an unfathomable loss to us all. To Frodo, this damn war is not worth that. To Ken, leaving is merely the first step in coming home.
Posted by loveysdaddyga
at 8:04 PM EST
