Touchdown: Fallen soldier’s wife embodies dedication of military families

We’ve written several times here at TD&F about the delicate notion of communication amid public grief. Sometimes, when people who normally are never in a public role suddenly find themselves there as a result of some kind of tragedy, they opt not to grieve purely in private, but to seize the opportunity to send a message. There’s no right or wrong to this – it’s purely a matter of personal choice. This week, Mischelle Brown of St. Catharines decided to stand in front of the cameras and microphones shortly after learning of the death of her husband, Canadian Forces Warrant Officer Dennis Brown, who was among the three soldiers killed this week in Afghanistan by a roadside bomb. She was powerfully eloquent through her tears, telling how she and Dennis had actually discussed his possible death in action, and how she and their children would deal with it and carry on, should it come to pass. She spoke of how he wasn’t asked to go to Afghanistan, but that he went voluntarily because he believed so strongly in the mission’s goals. And then she responded to Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s CNN comment about how the west will likely never be able to completely put an end to insurgency in Afghanistan: “We may not be able to beat the Taliban. There's lots of things in our life we can't beat. ... But do you give up? Do you stop? Absolutely not," she said. "One person can't make a difference. But if we band together, we can." Powerful, from the heart, and a testament to the dedication of military families, even when mourning their loss.