I got to Greensboro, which was teeming that morning with military.
I couldn't bring myself to do it.
I don't know why, I'm not a shy person, it's just that I would have had to be an interruption to them, or maybe I felt I would get some sort of retort which I wouldn't understand, I simply don't know why I couldn't find the words at that time.
I went on to Atlanta and there, on an escalator going up, with service men and women beside me, above me and below me, I somehow manged to blurt out a heartfelt and simple...."please excuse me....but....I would just like to thank you for your service."
There was a moment of delay, but then a crescendo of slow developing smiles, and a heart warming volley of "you're welcome sir", and "think nothing of it, sir", and "my pleasure, sir".
The result was so self-propagating that I found it difficult to stop from there on. I thanked them in the hotel that day, and in both airports on the return to Lynchburg.
I say this because I have never SEEN anyone else do this, I have heard of people giving up first class seats, etc., but I've never seen this happening.
I truly loved this commercial, but the truth is, what is depicted in the commercial is at best not happening enough, and I'm afraid, probably not happening the way the commercial depicted it, at all. I know that a lot of people feel the same way I do about the military, but until you try to blurt those words out, it is a very difficult thing for most of us to do.
Maybe the best result of the commercial will be to give us all more confidence to thank them when we see them, because if I'm right, the commercial simply won't get the job done, our soldiers deserve a thank you which is not staged.
Great story.
I'm reading your comments, the hair is standing up on my arms, my throat is closing and tears are falling.
You have given me confidence. I was truly moved by your experience. I've met a lot of deployed soldiers via mail so far but not yet as they are returning. Same as you, I usually have no problem going up to people I want to speak to, in fact I'm more prone to do so than most but in this case I feel tongue-tied, maybe trite. But I really am thankful.
Actually, something like what was depicted in the commercial happened to me when I returned from the Persian Gulf War.