Darlene and Micah Witherspoon will be reunited with husband and father Sgt. Brian "Spoony" Witherspoon on Wednesday. Witherspoon was deployed to Afghanistan for nine months.
Guard wives prepare
homecomingsFamily eagerly await the
arrival of troops on Wednesday
When Sgt. Brian "Spoony" Witherspoon shipped out to Afghanistan nine months ago his wife decided it would be easier for her and their 6-year-old son to move in with her parents in Kailua.
"It was just easier having them around while Brian was gone," Darlene Witherspoon added, "and it was only three blocks away."
But once Bravo Company of the Hawaii Army National Guard's 193rd Aviation (Forward One) finished its mission servicing helicopters in Kandahar, Darlene Witherspoon knew that she had to go house hunting again. Her husband Brian, a member of the Hawaii Army National Guard for seven years, is a helicopter electrician with the 193rd.
"I was driving past my old house and noticed that people were moving and I called my old landlord and it was available," she added. "It's just a blessing. Everything is falling into place. It's almost like he hasn't left."
Yesterday, Darlene Witherspoon like other spouses and family members were preparing for Wednesday morning's homecoming for Bravo Company -- the first Hawaii Army National Guard unit to be sent overseas since the Vietnam War.In Waialua, Larry Sagaysay also was making plans for a family homecoming celebration probably next weekend for his son, Staff Sgt. Chad Sagaysay, 23, a 193rd supply sergeant.
"I am going to give him one or two days to catch up," Larry Sagaysay said, "then I hope to do whatever is necessary to put together a family celebration."
Sagaysay said his son, a 1999 Waialua High School graduate, didn't write too often about his nine months in Kandahar.
"But he did say it was really hot, like 105 degrees when the unit go there in August," the senior Sagaysay added.
At that point Sagaysay said his son had to acknowledge that joining the 193rd's supply section was a better choice than enlisting in the Hawaii Army National Guard's infantry or field artillery units.
This is because the elder Sagaysay had been a recruiter for the Hawaii Army National Guard for 15 years before he retired. "It really wasn't a hard sell," said the elder Sagaysay who now works for state Rep. Michael Magaoay. "He pretty much knew what he wanted to do and I got him into the program which allowed him to enter during the summer of his junior year in high school."
Larry Sagaysay said his 27 years as a citizen soldier is nothing compared to his son's enlistment. "I was really surprised," the elder Sagaysay said, "when he was mobilized last summer. When I was in the Guard we never did anything like this. This thing is pretty major."
Darlene Witherspoon, a 1990 Kalaheo High School graduate, said although her husband had served for seven years in the Navy, she never experienced such a long separation "since we met just after he got out."
"It was really hard being away from him," she said, "and not being able to communicate with him. It also was very scary. Watching the news every night was hard. Reading the newspaper and the stories the wives and families told was hard. Every time I read those stories I got sad even though I knew that Brian being in Afghanistan was not as bad as being in Iraq. It was still very scary."
Witherspoon said their son Micah had just turned 6 when her husband left Aug. 10. "He's learned to read. He's grown four or five inches. He's just sprinted. That was the hardest part -- Brian not being there and seeing all this."
She said that Micah wants to go to Kailua Beach, just a few blocks from their home as soon as his dad gets home. "That's their thing," she said.
There also is a trip to Disneyland and visit with her husband's family in Portland planned.
Witherspoon said her husband was a jet fighter mechanic on the aircraft carrier USS Independence during the 1991 Desert Storm war.
"He knew that there was a possibility that he may have to go to war again," she said as the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan escalated. "He went there to do the best that he could do, but he missed his family really a lot."
The soldiers returning Wednesday were replaced by another 60 members of Bravo Company who departed from Wheeler Army Air Field on May 5.
Other members of the 193rd -- 200 aviators and mechanics belonging to Charlie Company -- have been in Balad, Iraq, since April 14 attached to the 1st Cavalry Division.
Also in Iraq and assigned to the 1st Cavalry are nearly 600 Army reservists from the 411th Engineer Combat Battalion. Of the 600 soldiers, 300 are from Hawaii.
