I have about a hundred blog posts to write to document our three week excursion to North Carolina, the beach, Connecticut, New York, etc. I have over 700 pictures from the trip to sort through, so be ready for some very photo dense posts in the near future.
But today I wanted to just document a little experience we had in Wal Mart while doing our restocking shopping trip, post month long sabbatical from home.
Austin has always had such an incredible respect for men who have served in the military in any capacity and talks a lot about how much he wishes he could have done something like that.
So today at the store we saw an elderly man wearing a World War II veteran's hat.
Austin was kind of lagging behind me near him, and I said "why are you acting so weird?"
He said, "I really want to say something to that guy to thank him for his military service."
Me: "You really should! Go say something."
Austin: "I feel too dumb. Ugh, why am I such a wuss?"
We continued to wander around the produce section while the man looked at oranges. I continued to try to build Austin's courage with things like "it would mean so much to him" "you'll never feel bad saying something nice to someone". Finally I said, "do you want me to say something?"
He refused to be shown up in bravery by his wife, so he started to walk toward him. The sweet old man then looked up and asked Austin if the oranges he was looking at were grapefruits. He said no, and then I pointed him toward the grapefruits.
Then Austin put out his hand and said "Sir, I wanted to shake your hand and thank you for your service because I noticed your hat and I just wanted to say thank you."
The man had the most genuinely surprised and appreciative look on his face and said "I truly appreciate that."
I was of course trying not to start bawling. After we walked away a woman came up to Austin and said "Did you just thank that vet for his service? You are so nice, people don't do that enough anymore. Thank you for thanking him. I am so impressed."
By then I was like on the complete verge of tears and couldn't say anything. I was so proud of Austin for being so appreciative, and for that woman for being willing to thank Austin. We both agreed that we will always express our gratitude to military men and women whenever we get the chance.
