Jimmie Foster, a former Marine turned career soldier, is the first National Commander of The American Legion from the State of Alaska. He has a very simple focus for The American Legion this year: "SAVED", which stands for "Serving America's Veterans Every Day." In his acceptance speech He said "I don't care how you do it, but I want you to ensure that you take care of our Veterans in any way possible. It does not have to be something monumental. Just say 'thank you for serving our country.' That will work."
There are some 33,000 Veterans in Sonoma County. About 10% of these live in the Healdsburg, Windsor and Geyserville area. They are our neighbors, friends and family members. They are strangers and shut-ins. They are people we have talked to for years and, yet we have no idea they are Veterans.
One of Post 111 (Sotomoye American Legion Family) member's has been helping a blind neighbor for 15 years. Another makes 2-3 trips from Healdsburg to Geyserville to help an 88 year old WWII Veteran with dementia and his wife who is nearly blind. He takes them shopping, the doctor or other errands. Sometimes he just sits and talks with them. As Jimmie said, "it does not have to me monumental.
If each of us contributed just one hour a week to helping another Veteran we could have a major impact on their lives and ours too. One thought. We need to brag a little about what we do. It doesn't have to be from a soap box in the middle of the Plaza. At the end of the month we need to let our adjutant know what we did. All this information gets reported to our National Office and it becomes part of our public record, showing we are living up to our charter.
Veterans Helping Veterans
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