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Thanks Grannie Annie, McCook community
Dear citizens of McCook,
I am Chaplain (Capt.) Keith Saare of the 204th Military Intelligence Battalion stationed at Fort Bliss, TX, in the City of El Paso, and I wish to thank you for your generosity in supporting our troops throughout the duration of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Three years ago I left my wife and four little children crying in our family car at Fort Drum, NY, while I went on my first deployment to Paktika Province in Afghanistan, next to the border with Pakistan. To get there I had to take a very nauseating flight on a C-130 into FOB Sharana, and then I took another miserable ride in a Chinook helicopter to my new home for the next 8 months: FOB Orgun-E (obviously I don't like flying). I had just literally dropped my ruck-sack on the floor of my living space when the mail clerk came to my room and informed me I had a lot of care packages with my name of them waiting in the mailroom. "How can this be?" I said to him, "I just GOT HERE! Nobody back home even knows my address over here." "Well, sir, they're all addressed for 'Chaplain Saare'. And there's about 30 boxes for you."
Of course, you all know where these boxes came from, and as I began to open them, that was when I became acquainted with Granny Annie and all of you wonderful citizens who team together for making the lives of service members far away from home a little more pleasant. With the plethora of care package items sent in that shipment and several subsequent shipments, I was able to serve the needs of the Soldiers, Airmen, and contractors deployed alongside me in Paktika Province. Your generosity made their lives a little more comfortable in the harsh living conditions of war.
Fortunately, since that deployment, I was able to keep contact with Mrs. Ann Trail and her husband Dick, mostly by using FaceBook to stay in touch, and I'm glad we have remained connected over these years. After Afghanistan, I was given a new assignment to change battalions and duty stations, and thus the Army moved me and my family to El Paso, and once again I was sent overseas to minister to Soldiers and Airmen in need of religious support.
Thinking to myself, "How can I better serve the needs of the Soldiers in my battalion?", the idea came that I needed to contact Granny again for more care packages, and she was eager to get started right away mobilizing all her enthusiastic donors for the outreach.
Some three months later, she and Dick loaded their SUV, drove all the way to El Paso, and delivered 40 large boxes of goodies! With so many care packages, I decided to split the load to distribute through two shipments flown to SOUTHCOM on C-17s out of Fort Bliss.
The second shipment was just delivered, and as you can see in the photo of service members rummaging through the boxes, everyone was very happy at what you did. As I write this letter tonight in a foreign country, while it is the 4th of July and our nation is celebrating another birthday, just know that you have been a blessing to some service members who have to spend this holiday far away from home.
Today we had our own celebration for the holiday and ate the chips and taffy you provided, and truthfully, we're having a great time!