Tonight on SBTR's LIVEWIRE, we'll speak with Dana Canedy about her book, A Journal for Jordan.
In 2005, First Sergeant Charles Monroe King began to write what wouldbecome a two-hundred-page journal for his son in case he did not make
it home from the war in Iraq. Charles King, forty-eight, was killed on
October 14, 2006, when an improvised explosive device detonated under
his Humvee on an isolated road near Baghdad. His son, Jordan, was seven
months old.
A Journal for Jordan is a mother's letter to
her son-fierce in its honesty-about the father he lost before he could
even speak. It is also a father's advice and prayers for the son he
will never know.
An excerpt from the book:
And then there was the journal. Writing it would be a way for
your dad to help guide you through life if he did not make it home
to us. He wanted you to know to pick up the check on a date, to
take plenty of pictures on vacations, to have a strong work ethic,
and to pay your bills on time. He wanted to tell you how to deal
with disappointment, to understand the difference between love
and lust, to remember to get on your knees and pray every day.
Most of all, he wanted you to know how much he loved us.
So, late into the night in Iraq, after he had completed dangerous
and often deadly missions, your dad returned hungry and exhausted
to the relative calm of his room and wrote to you before he
slept. His grammar was not perfect and his handwriting at times
suggested that he was tired or rushed. But he put so much thought
into the beautiful messages he wrote, things like:
Be humble about your accomplishments, work harder
than the man next to you, it is all right for boys to cry.
Sometimes crying can release a lot of pain and stress.
Never be ashamed to cry. It has nothing to do with
your manhood.
Your father mailed the journal to me in July 2006, shortly after
one of his young soldiers was killed in an explosion eerily similar to
the one that would claim his own life. He was so shaken after
pulling the young man's body, piece by piece, out of a bombed
tank that he sent the journal to me, unfinished. He had more to say,
but that would have to wait until he came home on a two- week
leave to meet you, six weeks before he died.
Dana's blog can be found here.
Our show begins at 8:00 p.m. EST. Click here to listen live. And don't forget to join us in the chat room.
