When my father, Odysseus, and his men sailed off to the Trojan War, they were confident their gods favored a quick victory. Instead, the siege of Troy lasted ten years. After Troy fell, the survivors made their way home to Sparta, Mycenae, Pylos, and elsewhere in the ancient Peloponnese. Neither my father nor any of his troops arrived home with the rest. We waited for years as the news grew worse. Odysseus was dead, we were told,or imprisoned, or, worst yet, he had married another woman and abandoned my mother Penelope, my brother Telemachus, and me.


If he is alive somewhere, his thoughts may wander to Penelope and Telemachus, but he won’t be thinking of me. I am the daughter he doesn’t know exists. Odysseus went off to the Trojan War when his son, Telemachus, was barely old enough to walk. His wife, Penelope, was a teenage bride, and is now a young wife, mother, and queen who has to try to rule Ithaca without him.


I was born seven months after he left. I am a hero’s daughter and a princess of his realm, but I have lived my entire life without a father. I’m nineteen now, and still waiting.


All over the world, and throughout history children grow up as I have. This website will focus on the children of those men and women who have gone off to fight America's wars, and provide information and resources for all who care about military families and want to help.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Tell Me a Story


Let me tell you a story.  Once upon a time, not very long ago, the Military Child Education Coalition started a program called Tell Me a Story.  As they put it on their MCEC web page, the coalition wanted “to empower our military children by using literature and their own stories in a way that fosters skills for resilience, strong peer and parent connections, a sense of pride and accomplishment, and a caring community.”
Tell Me A Story events revolve around a pre-selected book.  Parents and children listen to the story together, then go off in small groups to discuss it with a facilitator. At the end, every family gets a copy of the book to take home.
What’s particularly nice about this program is that the books that are chosen don’t necessarily have anything directly to do with military children in particular.  They are just good stories, enabling any issues and concerns, military-related or not, to come up naturally in conversation.  Some of the books used at recent or upcoming events include Mercedes and the Chocolate Pilot by Margot Theis Raven, Night Catch by Brenda Ehrmantraut, How to Bake an American Pie by Karma Wilson, Verdi by Janell Cannon, and
The Remarkable Farkle McBride by John Lithgow.
Tell Me a Story Events are always free to the families. The cost per family is around $14, mostly covering the cost of the book. Local individuals, service organizations, and businesses underwrite the costs, and MCEC provides marketing materials, training, and some supplemental materials.
For more information about Tell Me A Story, contact TMAS@MilitaryChild.org or phone the MCEC world headquarters office at 254-953-1923.  If you live in the San Diego area and would like to sponsor one of these events, I would like to help!
Posted by About AART at 6:57 AM

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