Southwest Asia -- A mother and son, both serving in support of their country, recently had a brief family reunion at an undisclosed location in Southwest Asia.
Maj. Colette cherished the opportunity to spend time with her son Senior Airman Christian as they had an opportunity to spend a couple of days together prior to his redeployment back to his home station.
“She surprised me,” said Senior Airman Christian, Expeditionary Aircraft Maintenance Squadron KC-10 crew chief. “I heard her voice and I just walked back into my office and sat back down.”
Surprising someone is not as easy as one may think in a deployed environment as you never know when you can be leaving to go home or forward deploy elsewhere.
“I let him know in advance,” said Maj. Colette, Air Forces Central Command chief of contracting. “I wanted to make sure he was still going to be here because I knew it was kind of close to his redeployment date.”
It has only been four months since the last time they were reunited but the future doesn’t look to promising for any upcoming reunions anytime soon.
Colette, who is currently serving a two-year tour at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, doubts that they will be meeting again while deployed unless he comes back here.
“I am trying to get him to go to Europe for Christmas but I don’t know if that is going to happen,” she added.
Whether it is another four months or four years before they see each other again, they both agree that they look forward to when the time comes they get to spend a little time together again.
Their time together this time was short and well spent together.
“We went to this buffet at an amazing hotel called Shang-ri La,” said Colette. “We got to see the mosque across the water, it was really pretty and fun.”
Both mother and son decided to join the military to serve their country just as so many other relatives did before them. With 23 years of service and seven deployments between the two of them, their total family history has about 153 years of service dating back to the Civil War.
“It is been kind of like a family thing and it seemed like the right choice since I was kind of bred for the Air Force,” said Christian. “I have been wearing the uniform since I was in the JROTC.”
Starting out as an Airman Basic with no college, Colette joined the military to make a better life for her and her son who was two-years old at the time of her enlistment.
“I wanted something more in life,” said Colette. “I joined the military because I knew I would have more options.”
It is not every day that a parent can say that their child has followed in their footsteps, so when Christian followed in his mom’s footsteps it made her that much more proud of him.
(Editor’s note: Due to safety and security reasons, last names and unit designators were removed.)