Meeting 2-22-17
Bert West brought us Kristopher Goddard who goes by Chris. He is currently attending UT but came to us with stories of what It’s like to be a medic in the service. He received the “Angel on the Battlefield” Award for 2015 and they only award one. He began his military career at Sheppard Air Force base on his 21st birthday and spent the next 8 years of his life in the military, with 3 tours in Afghanistan. He pointed out that along with the soldiers they also treat the enemy and in one case this was a nine-year-old boy who had blown off the front half of his foot planting a bomb. He cursed and spit on him and tried to get his weapon (they are now allowed to carry weapons to defend themselves if it becomes necessary); he says they are taught from the cradle to hate us and never believe anything we say. Hard to win a war under those circumstances. After 8 years and 3 tours he returned home and was diagnosed with PTSD. He is recovering and is certainly one American we can be proud of.
Report on the board meeting: Finalized plans for St. Patrick’s Day, talked about plans for Don’t Walk in Silence and discussed whether we wanted to participate in the Biscuit Festival. In other words – same ole, same ole.
Chris Hoosier gave us an update on the Veterans Memorial at Sharps Ridge. One of the persons responsible will be a speaker next month and hopefully will bring pictures. In the meantime, Chris says they have built both hiking trails and bicycle trails.
Next Week: We will have Doug Bitzer, a deacon with the Immaculate Conception Church who will discuss Lent.
Attendance has been down of late, however, this week we had a return of Janet Bigelow, John Cogdill, and Rick Murphree was in town and came by and had lunch with us. Now if we could get some of the other “slackers” to join us we would be back to normal.