300 Words, One Life: Mommy on a mission

All through high school, she dealt with hearing her mother’s announcement.

“Pack up your things, Nicole,” she says. “We are moving out of the country.”

Moving from Detroit, Michigan and hopping from Florida, to Italy, to Germany during every year of high school was not easy, but she would not trade those experiences for the world.

“I see the world so much differently having lived in so many different places,” Kelly says. “My mom works incredibly hard.”

High school graduation time, and she wants to receive her education in the states. Mommy remains in the service, a decision not easy to make.

Mommy assures that school back in Michigan is the best plan. She’s squeamish to the idea. She will go months to year without seeing or talking to her.

“How would I talk to her,” Kelly asks. “Would I ever see her again?”

She remembers the promises mommy made to her on the first day of college.

“I’ll never leave you, I’m always here and I always will be,” mommy said.

Thus far, the promises are kept. Conversations on skype, care packages with her favorite colored scarves, and even the occasional visits when mommy can. Everything possible to remain close, mommy does it – the promise continues.

“Her voice makes me happy and seeing her makes me happier,” Kelly says. “But nothing makes me more happy than that proud feeling I get when I think of what she’s actually doing.”

She is a fighter. She is a friend. She is strong. She is wise, and she sees to it that her family has everything they need.

She is Ms. Apryl Kelly, mother of Nicole Kelly, and a fighter for this country.