Deployment's Effects On Families

Deployment's Effects On Families

By Senior Correspondent Devon Maloney    
After the massive snow storms in February, the Fraley family could be found with several other families shoveling themselves out of their homes. The recent deployment of their father, David Fraley, the family has been getting support from other families in their neighborhood.

The Fraley’s street is now lined with yellow ‘Support the Troops’ ribbons on trees, mailboxes, and basketball hoops. Organized by a group of neighborhood women the night before David Fraley’s deployment, they arranged for him to see the ribbons as his family drove him to the airport on January 20^th.
David Fraley will be gone for a yearlong tour in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait. “We get to see him in his two week leave time this summer,” David’s daughter Alexandra Fraley, a Langley High School freshman, said. “He is give one two-week vacation time. In August we’re going to spend it with him in Europe; we’re going to try to visit a lot of the countries out there.”

Alex also has a younger brother and sister, David and Jacqueline. While the possibility of deployment for their dad was still being verified, Alex and her parents told her younger siblings when they received formal notice. “I personally think that my brother and sister are living in the moment almost as if that they haven’t actually realized it yet.” Once they were told, “they acted as if it wasn’t going to happen,” Alex said.

A little after David left, Alex said: “At the moment we are just in shock almost, but we are cooping. We are trying to keep up with all of the things we did before [my dad] left: sports, schoolwork…everything.”