Keeping Promises

Just days before Christmas Soldiers from Delta Company 2-149th General Support Aviation Battalion (GSAB) fulfilled their promises to groups of attentive children at Prairie Vista Middle School.

“We’ve been getting letters and care packages from Prairie Vista for about three months,” said SPC James Galford, Maintenance Mechanic. “A group of us decided to take the time to go and visit the school while we were home on leave.  We made a promise to the kids and we wanted to keep our word!“

Delta Company Soldiers are happily inundated with care packages and letters from supportive patriotic families and citizens back home. On a daily bases, several boxes arrive, seemingly weathered through transit from various hearts and homes to Joint Base Balad.

“We get many things in the mail, but we took a special interest to the children from Prairie Vista,” said Sgt. David Seay Delta Company 2-149th GSAB Aviation Sheet Metal Repairer.  “We met with one of Prairie’s 6th grades classes and the kids had tones of questions about what life was like in Iraq and in the Army National Guard.”

 “They wanted to know what type of punishment people can get for various things. Several of the students talked about family members that had already served in Iraq. As the school day was ending we had several students from the other grades say they wish they were doing something similar to support the Soldiers,” said Sgt. Seay.

Prairie Vista Middle School is the second school that Delta Company 2-149th GSAB has adopted while deployed to Iraq. The company’s work areas are filled with pictures and letters from students expressing their dreams, hopes, and concerns for deployed service members.

1Lt. Anthony Sims
D Co. 2-149 Unit Public Affairs Representative