Thursday, September 20, 2007

Beauty in Embrace

After too long, I am posting. Here's a story from my journal of something that happened to me while I was waiting to fly to KC from the Minneapolis airport.

...Waiting in the airport for my flight. Off to the right is a group holding flags and signs. The kids in the group keep running up to the window expectantly looking back to the rest of the group with faces of wonder.

I go back to reading. I'm distracted by the story of Mike Vick's confession and apology. I read some more.

Suddenly, cheers erupt from my right.

I look up to see the group standing on their feet waving their flags, whooping and hollering. Out of Gate F7 walks a woman in uniform. She is greeted with this scene of welcome.

Now all heads are turned in her direction, smiles on faces. What appears to be the mother jumps up and down and runs to embrace her. Then everybody in the group steps up to hug her.

I'm reminded of the father waiting for his son to return and then throwing a party when he does.

4 comments:

Sam said...

Love's a beautiful thing. Good to see you posting a little bit again. You're a good man.

Anonymous said...

Does that make the returnee a prodigal?

Brian said...

Your story touched something in me... could it be that these returning soldiers have become some of the marginalized of our society?

Josh Kleinfeld said...

Sam, love IS beautiful and it's good to be back.

Anonymous...not sure if the returnee is a prodigal. If so, the greeting was to repeat "beautiful". If not, it still was.

Brian, I do think they are more marginalized than in the past, although I've heard they get way better treatment than those returning from Viet Nam. But they don't get half the treatment of the troops returning from WWII.