Remembering Michelle

As long as I live, I will NEVER forget the dread I felt when I heard the first words of that voice mail message, “Jami, it’s Lori Witmer.” I really don’t think the message said much more than to call, but it was in Lori’s voice that I heard what I knew I did not want to hear. Something bad had happened in Iraq.

A few years earlier, I was honored to be invited to a going away party for Rachel and Michelle Witmer. They were being deployed to Iraq. I remember I wrote Michelle a letter, in which I told her I did not understand how the government could send 13-year olds to fight a war. See in my head Michelle and all my other junior high students from Heritage were somehow frozen in time as 13-year old versions of themselves. I could not imagine how she was old enough to go off to fight a war, but the strength and courage in her eyes told me she was.

Now it was the Saturday before Easter, and I had spent the day at the zoo with three little boys. I walked through the door ready to collapse and checked the voice mail messages. After retrieving Lori’s message, I quickly called her back, and my fears were confirmed. Something bad had happened. Michelle was killed in action while on patrol in Baghdad. Most of the details of those next few days are hazy because of the sorrow that clouded my head and the fact that 5 year’s time has passed. I recall crying so much that I thought my tear ducts would shrivel up and close for business. I remember wanting desperately to reach out and touch the Witmers to help ease their pain, but knowing full well that there was absolutely NOTHING I could do to ease the pain of losing their dear sweet Michelle.

Here five years later, I have fresh tears in my eyes recalling Michelle’s death. I cry not for her, for she is walking the streets of Heaven with our Savior, but I cry for John, Lori, Rachel, Tim, Charity, and Mark left to navigate the not-so-gold-lined streets of this earth without her. Yet even in the sadness of this day I am able to find hope. I am able to glean a lesson from this terrible, gut wrenching experience.

The number one lesson I learned from April 9, 2004 was, “Cherish EACH and EVERY moment you have with those you love.” Take every chance you get to tell them you love them. Strive hard to never walk away angry. Enjoy your loved ones no matter how much they might irritate you, even when you don’t see eye-to-eye, and not just in spite of their weaknesses but because of their weaknesses. Remember to thank God for the privilege of having this day with your husband, wife, son, daughter, mother, father, sister, brother.

I will NEVER forget Michelle Marie Witmer (KIA 4/9/04).