"Thank you for your service."

[KDCat]

No. I live in a base town. I greatly value my friends and neighbors, but I don't bug them at the grocery store/dry cleaners/Target. Seriously. I've seen people who are just trying to grab a gallon of milk get chased down by some guy in the grocery store who wants to say "Thank you for your service." Dude, that's great, but the person you are thanking really needs to get some milk and get the kids from aftercare before it closes. Quit bugging him/her.

It's different on Memorial Day or when people are just coming back or when they are deploying or when our town has its picnic for military families. I always say something then.

A few of the people who do the grocery store thing just ooze smugness, too. (Not everyone, but a few.) It's very off-putting. I want to ask them if they do anything else for military families. Do you tell your Congress critters that long wars without a draft are really hard on families because the kids and the parents have to go through multiple deployments? Do you tell your representatives that military families need better VA benefits? Do you tell your representatives that the quality of schools in the communities are bases are very important to military families and that they should do something about education in their state? Do you tell your representatives that a new bomber program is great, but military families could really use better pay? Do you tell your representatives that military families could really use better psychiatric care for returning soldiers and that we don't have enough psych counselors for these people? Do you tell your representatives that military families that are leaving the military really need more help transitioning to a civilian job market?