CAN WE GO AND BE WITH DAD

A tribute to the dad's who wont come back to be with their kids after the August 6th 2011 attack on the US troops in Afghanistan

Jessica Nichols said she couldn't find her son Braydon for a moment. He had disappeared in the house. She was yelling for him looking for him crying hysterically She found him in a closet, curled up on the floor, crying, going through a box of photo albums.

The boy said he wanted to take one of the photos and put it in his wallet.

He asked her, "'Can we go to be with Dad?'"

"It was just so devastating that a week ago or so Braydon had that worried look on his face, thinking about his dad," she said.

"When is Dad coming back so we go camping?" he asked her.

Soon, she assured him. "Your dad is off fighting for this country."

The boy replied, "As soon as he gets home, we're going to go on a camping trip, just me and him."

Jessica Nichols cannot stop replaying that scene in her mind. That's because only a few days later, on Saturday night, she was cradling her boy who was crying once again. Except this time she could not tell him that his father was coming home. She had just received a call informing her that Bryan Nichols was one of the 30 Americans who died that afternoon when their Chinook helicopter was shot down in Wardak province in east-central Afghanistan.

On Sunday AUG 7th  morning, Jessica and Braydon Nichols watched the national news broadcast the first reports about the downing of a Chinook helicopter. They listened to reporters say that 38 U.S. and Afghan service personnel were killed, including 22 Navy SEALs. It was the single deadliest loss for American troops since the war in Afghanistan began in late 2001.

"Their loss is a stark reminder of the risks that our men and women in uniform take every single day on behalf of their country," . "Day after day, night after night, they carry out missions like this in the face of enemy fire and grave danger."

the simple question from a 10 yrs old boy "CAN WE GO AND BE WITH DAD" will haunt me for the rest of my life