Posted on 11/29/2006 8:36:31 AM PST by XR7
HAVRE DE GRACE, Md. — When they called her name, she could not move. Sgt. Leana Nishimura intended to walk up proudly, shake the dignitaries' hands and accept their honors for her service in Iraq — a special coin, a lapel pin, a glass-encased U.S. flag.
But her son clung to her leg. He cried and held tight...T.J. was 9, her oldest child, and although eight months had passed since she had returned from the war zone, he was still upset by anything that reminded him of her deployment...
The faraway move to live with his grandmother. The months that went by without his mother's kisses or hugs, without her scrutiny of homework, her teasing humor, her familiar bedtime songs.
Nishimura was a single mother — with no spouse to take over, to preserve her children's routines, to keep up the family apartment.
Of her three children, T.J. seemed to worry most... "He went from having one parent to having no parents, basically," Nishimura said, reflecting. "People have said, 'Thank you so much for your sacrifice.' But it's the children who have had more of a sacrifice."
When war started in Iraq, a generation of U.S. women became involved as never before — in a wider-than-ever array of jobs, for long deployments, in a conflict with daily bloodshed. More than 155,000 women have served in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Among their ranks are more than 16,000 single mothers, according to the Pentagon, a number that military experts say is unprecedented.
How these women have coped and how their children are managing have gone little noticed as the war stretches across a fourth year...
"I tell [the children] that if God needs Mommy to go ... then Mommy's going to have to go again and they're going to have to let me."
(Excerpt) Read more at archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com ...
No sweat. We all make the leap sometimes.
Pray, what wisdom do you have to impart to us that she was on 'public assistance'? She was married when she had the children. Do you have records on her past that would lead you to believe she spent her prior life on public assistance? Or are you just being a good 'conservative' and assuming based on name, race, etc.
Before Iraq, Nishimura had worked as a teacher and cheerleading coach at a Christian school in Prince George's County, Md.
Well another one that didn't read the article I see.....They don't let folks on 'public assistance' teach at Christian schools do they? Well so much for your theory....See if you can sling a little more mud why don't you on this good woman's name?
I agree with you 100%. Truth is - we do not know the circumstances of her life. For all we know - her husband could have been a casualty in the war. However, we do know that this fine lady is a courageous veteran who served us in Iraq and did so at the expense of her children. We owe her a debt of gratitude.
dmz wrote:
Single mother does not equal out-of-wedlock mother, ace.
My dad died in 1963. My mom became a single mother. It happens a lot.
It does boggle my mind that people can act this way. And do it regularly.
Sucks to be them. ;-)
In other words, you're saying that either we need to surrender the initiative--and, eventually, the war--to the enemy, or we need to return to the broken army of the 1960s, simply because you and people like you are singularly unwilling to enlist.
Filling the ranks with women is a short-term solution fraught with a host of long-term ills--including situations like what is described in this article.
OK, fine. So why aren't you doing your part to correct the problem?
Again, my point is:
1)Widow=Widow
2)Divorcee=Divorcee
3)Single Mother=catch all phrase to cover the un-wed mothers to legitimize activities contrary to traditional values.
(The article, by the way, only states that the woman is divorced, but uses the "politically correct" term "single mother", which is a universal-cover-all-the-bases effort to give cover to un-wed mothers in its application)
The individual in this article elicits little sympathy for those who become "mothers" without the benfit of a marriage and a father in the marriage itself. This "career move" of unwed births is being given the blessing of acceptability in society today by coinage of such terms as "single mother", and that is undeniable.
benfit = benefit
They're small people who have to butt in and judge other people's lives in order to feel good about themselves.
We can be glad we don't have problems like that. These posters aren't good enough to lick your niece's boots, believe me.
Unfortunately this has been the trend for a long time. The election failure just put it all into focus.
People here (and other places) just don't think before they post. They don't realize that talking from behind a keyboard IS READ by those who could use such ammo, for lack of a better term, to paint all conservatives into this corner.
I don't understand why FR tolerates it.
And that's why THEY behave in such a socially maladjusted manner.
High five! And thank you for your service.
So are a lot of the soldiers defending you--and many of them are women. You could replace one of those women. You choose not to, and rationalize your shirking your male duty as "doing your part."
I'm sorry you perceive that to be an inferior calling.
In my father's day, that line of excuse-making was called "malingering" or "dodging the colors." A lot of fathers went off to war in his day. A lot of them wound up being buried here and there in Europe. I'm sorry you perceive that to have been an inferior calling.
I don't think you can answer that with a simple yes and no. The answer to both questions depends on the quality of the people you've banned from serving, and has to be that the military would be stronger in some areas and weaker in others.
I don't disagree. I have profound respect for those who server honorably in the military. But to put service in the military above motherhood (or fatherhood) when it comes to the nobility of the calling is just incorrect. Without mothers, fathers, and intact families, the number of individuals willing to become soldiers, sailors, marines, etc. would dwindle. Indeed, it is dwindling.
Hence the need to take advantage of all those who do choose to serve, regardless of gender, regadless of whether they are a parent or not. If women want to serve and can serve then let them serve.
My question for you is this: if you disdain those of us who didn't serve so much (the vast majority of your fellow countrymen, btw), then what exactly was your reason for serving? To protect a bunch of worthless cowards?
No. To protect your right to choose to be a worthless coward.
And fathers were exempt. But in my father's day, we didn't have summer soldiers and sunshine patriots, either. They went out and enlisted.
If drafted, I'd serve without thinking twice.
And you'd never be drafted. Funny how that works.
But for a 35 year old man with 4 kids to enlist with no foreign army on our soil?
Now you're moving the goalposts even further, I see.
"I have not yet begun to fight, and I have no intention of ever doing so."
BTW, about your age...
My oldest grandson enlisted in the Marines this summer. I went to Parris Island for the graduation ceremony. The visitor center at Parris Island is named for a man who enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1942, at 50 years of age, with minor children dependents, completed boot camp, and proceeded to rack up an impressive combat record in some of the toughest fighting in the Pacific. And in 1942, 50 was pretty damn old.
I guess my father's and grandfather's generations were made of much sterner stuff than today's.
I apologize; I did not read the article either before commenting, as it appeared that all the pertinent info. was presented in the excerpt.
But why could not the more descriptive term "divorced mother of three" have been used to better describe her situation? I do NOT mean to be overly judgmental; it's just that I've heard of several cases right in my own "circle" here where an unmarried girl just chooses to go on welfare instead of marrying the father; kind of like an "either/or" type choice? The concept of "family" just seems to be forgotten; no regard for whether a father is needed even seems to be considered.
The comments I made were probably based more on what I've seen around here lately than what was facing the woman in the article.
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