U. S. Air Force Captain Stasha Duck, a Samford graduate, is deployed to Afghanistan. A few days ago, she wrote to her home newspaper in Jasper, Alabama, regarding her early experiences with her new assignment. On her second day in Afghanistan, the troops were called together for a brief ceremony for a fallen comrade. "Everyone starts to walk off," she writes, "and that's when I made the mistake . . . I looked back and saw the flag-draped casket I had blindly saluted in the vehicle that was driving away. I shouldn't have looked. It was a cold reminder, on an otherwise perfect day, that this is not home. I tried not to think about it, but it was no use. I quickly made my way to the bathroom and wept. Not for the fallen really, but more for his family. I thought of his mom and I felt guilty--what if I put my mom through the same thing as his is going through right now? Those thoughts raced through my mind. I hope she would forgive me."
The world is better because of Captain Stasha Duck.