My Social Media-less Life

This one’s for you, Bekki. 😉

As I was trying to go to sleep tonight, I turned on my go-to “sleeping music,” K-Love 90s. A song came on that was big around the time we lived in Washington State, and it caused me to go through the whole timeline of what happened in the world during that time.

Y2K, 9/11, and the general end of the era of feeling footloose and fancy-free, as much as we may have been even at that time.

We lived near an Air Force Base, but not ON the Air Force Base, which in hindsight I realize suggested there was once an overflow of soldiers and airmen living in that area.

Either way, that’s beside the point. This area had been around long enough that some of the friends I made at the time had lived in their houses for as much of their lives as they could remember. When the family wanted to move, they had to put a request in… and one of these friends’ family moved literally across the street because that house was slightly bigger.

Because this housing area was near but not on the Base, after 9/11 happened, they blockaded all but one exit and put a guard up at that exit who would check IDs upon entry.

Now we get to the point of this post…

After they put up the guard house for those poor Airmen that had to check IDs of a basically “overflow” housing area, my mom started to think about the fact that these guys were out in all weather (even in a makeshift guardhouse, the elements were basically right there) just to help keep us safe.

My mom, being the Italian she is, ALWAYS made leftovers for us. Naturally, we would lessen those leftovers a bit by sending a plate or two (depending on how many people were there) to the guardhouse. We didn’t do it ALL the time, but we did it pretty often as a gesture of thanks, and also because people get hungry.

I remember especially that we did it for those first holidays; Thanksgiving and Christmas especially. I remember even asking them if they wanted something special from our Thanksgiving table and then running back to the house to tell Mom what needed to be on the plates.

We lived three houses away from the entrance, so running back and forth for an 11-year-old and an 8-year-old (my brother 😉 )was no big deal. Thus, we regularly were sent out to thank the gate guards in the form of food.

Sometimes we would bake them goodies, like cookies. I KNOW those went over really well. We rarely asked for the plastic containers back but the guards returned our kindnesses by also returning our plates. All we did was use them to give more food away.

I know my mom no longer owns those particular plates, so at some point they stopped being returned.

When we got orders to move in mid-2002, I’m not sure I said anything aloud, but I do remember thinking about the guards.

“Who’s going to bring them food on holidays and when it gets really cold again?” I wondered.

Funny enough… I soon forgot about this whole thing, as the mind tends to do if it’s not being actively engaged in the same thing for a long time.

It wasn’t until tonight that I had a core memory unlocked moment as if I had somehow just chosen to forget an entire period of time from September 2001 to June 2002.

And now I’m sitting here wondering if those guys (they were pretty much all guys at that time) still think of us from time to time, or if they have moments like I did tonight where I just randomly remembered.

I hope they’re doing okay.

It’s crazy what music can do to conjure up memories we thought we’d left behind.

Anyway, the point of the story tonight is to remember to keep an eye out for those people around you that are just “there.” They’re also people, and even a small kindness could change their lives. Heck, even making eye contact with them is way more than they normally get from everyone else!

Go be a superhero. Change a life.