Sustenance

While I was in Iraq, many kind folks sent me treats for Soldiers once I determined that I wanted to bring M&Ms to the aircrew members on whose aircraft then-SFC McG and I flew on. A number of friends have continued that practice since I’ve been here. I am grateful to one and all for your generosity!

(Since I’ll be home in the States quite soon, please don’t send *me* any more treats! However, if you wanted to send treats to the next Task Force Aviation (TF AVN) Chaplain, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind!)

Irrespective of where the Aviators are from, they seem to like those treats.

Until this year, I’d never eaten a Gummy Bear. It turns out that a number of the Aviators really like those things. However, there’s at least one pilot (younger than yours truly, by the way) who eschews Gummy Bears “because they’ll pull my teeth out.” Just the other night I overheard another pilot telling his co-pilot, “Yeah, I saw Mr. E’s teeth in a glass by the sink last night. That was pretty gross.”

My parents have sent me 18 pounds of Black Forest gummy bears in the past month, once I learned of the hankering of Crew Chiefs (in particular) for those goodies. I’ve lost track of how many snack-size packs of M&Ms I’ve given away over the past two years, but if you consider there are at least four crew members for each flight, and I did over 160 missions in Iraq via air, that was a lot of M&Ms while I was Down Range, at the very least!

There’s an ancient spiritual maxim which states, “Go where you’re fed.”

I figure the sustenance might as well be sweet.


Blessings and peace to one and all,


Fr. Tim, SJ

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