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NANTICOKE — Military personnel, family, friends and public were able to hear about the work of the Wilkes-Barre VA Medical Center at a Veterans Day ceremony Thursday during a service at Luzerne County Community College.
Alberto Morales, a U.S. Army veteran of Operation Desert Storm and a counselor with the center, talked for about 25 minutes, talked about the suicide crisis department, where he’s been for eight years.
Morales began his speech by using the Charles M. Province poem “It is the Soldier,” which reminds people that veterans fought for every right American’s have.
“It’s the veteran, not the lawyer who has given us the right to a free trial,” he quoted.
Standing near the American flag and staff sergeants Edward Rudnesky and Christopher O’Day, from Battery B First Battalion 109th Field Artillery Color Guard, Morales told those in the room that while most people and the federal government think of Veterans Day as a day off, veterans remember it as a “day of service.”
“You have black lives matter, police lives matter.” he said, “For us, every life matters.”
Morales touted the Wilkes-Barre VA Medical Center as the first in the country to have what once was a suicide hotline and is now the suicide crisis line.
He called veterans and their healthcare issues, “unique.”
“They have stuff going on that people don’t know,” Morales said noting that “some struggle, but others find success.”
The program highlighted Justin Schell, 28, a United States Marine Corps veteran, who is now in the automotive program. With his wife, Tiffany Harris, also 28, and two children, Alexandria and Tanner, there for support, he talked about his time in the service as well as his future ambitions.
“I hope to one day open my own garage,” Schell said.
The service also corresponded with the LCCC Student Government Association’s Be Kind Day. Students and staff were able to write a letter to a veteran, a stranger or a patient at a children’s hospital.
LCCC President Thomas Leary said he thought “there’s a connection between military service and kindness.”
He noted that on some days, he enters the school’s rotunda and looks at the pictures on the wall, which happens to be photographs of LCCC students who “paid the ultimate sacrifice.”
“It reminds me how close to home all of this really is,” Leary said.
