tweeted all about himself too. happy memorial day, here's how awesome I am, right? odd way to honor our fallen heroes
This Veteran's Day, I swear I'm gonna post some WWII photos of my Daddy in Naples. I still have his Truman letter and he actually saved every single piece of paper to do with his service because he was so proud to be American. Will post that as well come November. Anyway, who cares if The Bixby Letter was written by John Hay (had a couple of old John Hay avatars because I'm a Lincolnphile and a Hay fan). It was still great. About 10 years ago while on a run during my lunch hour at work, I noticed what looked like letters and pictures in a bunch of different zip-loc bags stapled to a tree. The tree was right on the street line in front of a nice house. Apparently this guy was in his early 30s when was killed in Iraq, and his wife, kids, parents, and his family had left him notes and stuff over the years. I figured it out after a few months because sometimes they would shift and shuffle the letters and pictures around, maybe to do with Birthdays, Anniversaries, etc. All of the bags were stuffed to the brim and were re-stapled into new bags to protect it all from the rain or snow, so I could only see what was closest to the front and I certainly wasn't about to desecrate anything by touching any of it. One day I made sure to take my very own staple gun with me from my Studio to work (yes, day jobs are necessary). I hand-wrote a note that was very short and concise but it had a ton of thought behind it. I stuck it in a zip-loc bag as well and stapled it to that tree. A few days letter, I ran by there again. My note was gone with another in its place, and on the envelope it said in small writing, "To the person who did this, please take." I looked around like Robert De Niro in 'Taxi Driver': "You talkin' to me?" All the the note said in a big fat block letters was "THANK YOU." I was so moved, because obviously it meant a lot to them that their loved one wasn't just a statistic to a stranger. It was so Boo Radley, lol. I still have it.