wfn.org | Army family copes with mom serving in combat zone

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

Aug. 12, 2002  News media contact: Kathy Gilbert7(615)742-54707Nashville,
Tenn.   10-71BP{357}

NOTE: Photographs are available with this story. Two additional reports on
chaplains are also being posted: UMNS story #358 and #359.

A UMNS Feature
By Kathy L. Gilbert*

"Please add my wife, Capt. Melody J. Charles, to the top of your prayer
list. She is now a clergy spouse in the combat zone."

Chaplain Maj. Michael D. Charles made that simple e-mail request as his wife
flew off to the war zone near Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring
Freedom. Melody Charles, part of a contingency contracting unit for 18th
Airborne Corps at Ft. Bragg, N.C., will be far away from her three children
and husband for eight to 12 months as she "safeguards, harbors and shepherds
the money" needed to conduct the war against terrorism. She is an
acquisition officer who prepares the way for soldiers in the war zone by
buying or contracting for goods, services and real estate.

Melody and Mike had just celebrated their anniversary a few days before she
left. Son Alex, 12, is old enough to understand why she had to go. Baby
Jonah, 9 months old, is too young to understand. Jacob, 2, is having a hard
time.

On June 16, the night before she had to leave, Melody went into Jacob's room
to try and explain the unexplainable. "He ran screaming from the room
crying, 'No, Daddy, no, Daddy!' We held him until he fell asleep."

On the morning she had to leave, Mike had to officiate at the funeral of one
his soldiers who had been killed in a motorcycle accident. He could not help
Melody or go to the airport to see her off. He also had to leave the boys
with their nanny.

"Jacob woke up at 6:40 a.m., Mel left at 6:30 a.m. He walked into the
bathroom with his blanket and lay down on the plush rug Mel stands on when
getting ready in the morning. Her smell was still in the air. He hugged the
edges with his little hands and moaned. Alex came in and lay with him. They
stayed there for about two hours," Mike remembers.

As an Army couple, Mike says he and his wife are used to being deployed to
different locations. "We know how to be apart, but being apart in the combat
zone brings a different element to it."

Mike first heard about Army chaplains when he was 19 years old. He decided
then that he wanted to be one. He also had always wanted to be with the 82nd
Airborne Division at Ft. Bragg, and he served with that unit in the Persian
Gulf War.

"My dream must have been planted in me by the Divine," he says. "I tell
people I have an ordinary ministry in extraordinary locations with
extraordinary individuals."

Since he has been in the Army, he has served Holy Communion on top of Mt.
Sinai, and been to places like the Persian Gulf, Thailand, Alaska and
Hawaii. He met Melody in Hawaii.

"If you can't get romanced in Honolulu, you need to get back to the house,"
he says, laughing.

Melody joined the Army as an enlisted solider and was a Russian linguist.
She is a graduate of the Green to Gold program and was a finance officer
when she was in Hawaii. 

Now, Melody is in the kind of danger anyone would be in when they are in a
war zone, where live rounds are being fired, Mike explains. He remembers a
recent casualty in Afghanistan, a master sergeant from Ft. Bragg who was
ambushed by al-Qaida forces while on the road. "He had five beautiful
daughters ages 3 to 9. Loss of life tends to occur in these small actions,"
he says. 

The terrorism attack on Sept. 11 continues to affect families. "The dominos
just keep falling," Mike says. "She would not be over there if it hadn't
been for Sept. 11. She would not be in the combat zone where she could get
shot."

Mike points out that many good and faithful families have taken the vow to
protect the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic.

"They are on one path and the 9-11 story is another path," he says, "and now
the paths are joined."
# # #
*Gilbert is a news writer in United Methodist News Service's Nashville,
Tenn., office.

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United Methodist News Service
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