So There We Were…
How does an idea such as this come about? This project goes back to my tour in Iraq in 2006-2007 at Forward Operating Base Warhorse outside Baqubah.
Each night after long and stressful days of operations, the battalion leadership team would gather outside of our CHUs (container housing units) to process the events of the day. In our case, we had handcrafted rocking chairs made by local contractors that made decompressing from the events of the day a little bit easier.
Despite the chaotic, stressful, and horrific circumstances we often endured, those memories are some of my most cherished. And those simple rocking chairs served as a mechanism that allowed our team to form bonds of brotherhood that can never be torn apart.
Fast forward 15 years, and that leadership team has moved on to different places and roles in our lives. I retired from service, ran a non-profit, started a consultancy, and now run a single-maker furniture business. Recently my commander called me and asked me to build him a rocker. Immediately, those experiences from Iraq were brought back to life.
In that conversation, I was struck with how hard it can be for combat veterans to have an outlet to remember our stories. It can be difficult to talk with family and others about our experiences. More times than not, our stories are forgotten because we just don’t tell them.
However, in that conversation, we both remarked how good it was to just talk and remember our times together, remember our fallen heroes, and remember that we did make a difference.
And so an idea came to me…what if I built chairs for veterans and then recorded conversations with those veterans telling their own stories in their own words. And what if we digitally tagged those stories to the chairs. The veterans and their families would have a living heirloom where generations could remember and see the stories of their loved ones first hand. They would have a MOMENT OF HONOR, or Momentos Honos.
Thus, Chairs of Honor was born.
I don’t have everything figured out, and I’m not a master chair maker (yet), but I believe that this project is too important to not pursue. You see, I believe all our stories are threads that are woven in the bigger tapestry of Duty, Honor, and Country. And all our stories should be captured and shared both for our families and for the betterment of society.
So will you join me in Preserving Honor and Preserving Craft?
Click Here For our Opportunities and to Donate
