These items from veteran Brian Diedrich who spent 10 years in the Army National Guard, including two deployments that he carried his grandfathers WWll dog tag, a Saint Christopher pendant that his Grandmother gave him before he deployed, an American Flag that was given to him by his parents and younger brother (He carried the flag with him on every mission, both deployments, every where he went.) Brian also gave it to his sister who carried it with her during her deployment.
Memorial Day weekend is here, and is a perfect time to reflect, learn and hear from the stories of our veterans (and I hope in days to come, and this series continues - stories from families of fallen soldiers and military family members in general). I had the pleasure of sitting down with Angie and Brian, two veterans who both served and were in active duty, and yet - had different experiences within their military service. That's the power of story I feel. To strip away the 'rights' and 'wrongs' and to talk about each individuals unique perspective and life experience. Both Angie and Brian inspired me with their stories and their lives and hope that this isn't the end to following along with their stories and hope to rope them into helping us here at Storycatchers to gather more stories.
I was able to share the radio versions of these interviews today on 91.1 The Avenue (with a re-airing Sunday, May 28th at 6:00pm). The hardest part of sharing your stories in our Storycatchers segment on 'Soul of the Cities' is deciding which parts to edit and to trim down for time constraints. We don't have to worry about those constraints within this platform, so I am so pleased to share the extended version of our conversations with you today.
You can listen to Angie's story HERE
You can listen to Brian's story HERE
Thank you both for your service.
