By Frederick R. Bedell Jr.

Two days before Christmas in 1973, it was cold and beginning to snow when I set out from Great Lakes ILL. at 6.a.m. to get home to my boys on Long Island. I was in the U.S. Navy then. My boys, Tommy, and Bobby were in a foster home in Levittown because my wife had left us.  I was in the Navy and hadn’t enough money to fly home. I had always kept my promise to my boys and didn’t want to disappoint them.

Roger, a naval buddy had a car and could get me as far as Ohio. I could get a Greyhound bus there, which costs less. The roads were starting to get icy. All of a sudden Roger’s car skidded and hit the back of a truck. We were lucky and escaped unhurt. Now I was forced to hitchhike. As I was hitchhiking in the snow, I recalled a poem by Robert Frost, which went in part as follows,” The woods are lovely dark and deep, but I had promises to keep and many miles to go before I sleep.” Which I really had to do.

I was fifty miles from Indianapolis. I had gotten a few lifts from strangers, Now, one man seeing me in my dress blues, picked me up and said that he rarely picked up hitchhikers but being it was Christmas he decided to do so as an act of kindness. He dropped me off in front of the ramp going into Indianapolis. Just then another man driving a snowplow on the ramp told me to jump aboard and to throw my seabag on the back of the snowplow. He told me the bus station was a mile away. I thanked him and wished him a Merry Christmas.

I was walking about with my seabag in about six inches of snow on my shoulder when a young couple offered me a ride to the bus station.  I thanked them and also wished them a Merry Christmas. The station was crammed with homebound soldiers and sailors. There were more people traveling than buses. I struck up a conversation with a young woman who was going home to see her daughter. She told me Greyhound has a plan where couples could go first together, we took them up on their offer and got aboard as a couple.

I finally, got to the Port Authority in Mahattan at 7 a.m. Christmas Eve. I then got on a subway and took a bus to Queens Village where I was greeted by my ex-father-in-law Charlie and my mother-in-law and was invited to stay with them for Christmas. My Mother-in-law was suffering from terminal cancer. After Breakfast we picked up my boys at the foster home. I rang the bell, and the oldest boy Tommy saw me and said “new daddy is here” which is what they called me to demonstrate the difference from their foster parents. We later had dinner and after dinner I opened my seabag and gave my boys their presents which I said Santa had given me when I was at the Noth Pole, they jumped up at me and gave me a big hung and a kiss and told me they loved me. That was a Christmas I will never forget.

May God bless and protect all our service men and women who are trying to get home this holiday season. Now, on a personal note my boys were adopted because I was still in the Navy and could not provide for them. If they are able to read this letter, I hope they would understand that I still love them. Tommy is now 55 and Bobby is 54. Merry Christmas sons.

Frederick R. Bedell Jr. is Grand Knight of St. Anastasia Knights of Columbus Council #5911