27 May 2012 - As a boy, Bob Weinger played soccer and was on the school wrestling team in his hometown of Round Lake, Ill., north of Chicago. He rode motorcycles and drag raced his car as a teenager -- a “crazy kid,” said his mother, Susan Weinger.
“He always wanted to be a GI Joe,” she said.
In 2006, Bob joined the Illinois National Guard, went to boot camp and then straight to Iraq. There, he guarded prisoners. His mother later learned that one of them was former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
Bob came home, but after trouble finding a job, signed up for another tour of duty, knowing he was heading to Afghanistan.
On March 15, 2009, Sgt. Robert Weinger was killed when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle in the village of Kot, in eastern Afghanistan. He was 24.
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“The last four to five days for me is just getting to the 29th, Betsy Schultz said. “And it’s really hard. I feel like I’m putting the breaks on. I don’t want May 29 to come. It just brings it all back very fresh.”
For many mothers, as time passes by, public service helps them through the sorrow.
“We’re not a grief organization,” national American Gold Star Mothers president Norma Luther told msnbc.com. “We are here to support each other. We do that by banding together and working for veterans in the hospitals and nursing homes and just stepping in wherever we see that they have a need. By doing that we begin to heal.”
“At the bottom of our list are barbecues and picnics and the like,” Luther said. “We hope everyone can try to remember what this day is for.” read more>>>
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