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For the past year, employees of the Military and Family Support Center on Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling have looked forward to the days when Garratt and Tiffany Bodge – the first mother and son volunteer team at the MFSC – came to help around the office.
The staff would be the first to tell you about his attitude and how helpful he is, and of course, nobody could miss the fact that Garratt’s smile fills a room with more glowing light than a 60 Watt light bulb.
It’s more than their personalities that will be missed though, as the team has amassed over 352 volunteer hours in the last year. Tiffany has been Garratt’s care giver for the past 21 years, and was looking to find somewhere that he could fit in and feel comfortable, she said.
“It’s a great opportunity, because the DC area is not easy,” explained Tiffany. “Having somewhere he can go, and that people accept him and are able to give him projects he can work to get a sense of accomplishment is huge.”
Garratt regularly assisted with putting together materials and helping to set-up for the Transition Assistance Program the center offers to transitioning service members.
“I put together packages and helped with the transition classes,” said Garratt. “My favorite part was to meet all the people here and getting to interact with them.”
For those people, getting to know Garratt was their favorite part too.
“He is charismatic, and we all just love him,” said Patricia Botkins, the MFSC’s volunteer coordinator. “He is truly a joy in our office. He has an awesome smile, loves to stop by all of our offices to see how we are doing and to let us know when he goes up to the ‘Hill’ with his dad to meet congressmen. He even goes to lunch with them. Garrett knows almost every airplane and jet in the military, and loves to watch the Osprey landing and taking off.”
Their personalities weren’t their only contribution though, as Garratt was responsible for helping reorganize the upstairs of the MFSC – a huge project – packing and moving boxes then helping to reorganize the material on storage shelves. Not to be outdone, Tiffany was instrumental in initiating, organizing and being the master of ceremonies for the Military Spouse Experience at the Bolling Club where approximately 250 spouses attended and enjoyed free refreshments, lunch and lots of prizes.
In addition, she created a Linkedin social media workshop that she presented at the Family Employment Readiness Program Workshop with outstanding reviews.
As they move on to a new duty assignment at MacDill AFB in Tampa, Florida, Tiffany said that the memories of their time and the way the staff truly accepted Garratt will resonate with them forever.
“It’s not always easy when you have extenuating circumstances and being special needs, sometimes people see that as a liability,” she said. “Being able to come somewhere that accepted him with open arms is huge.”
| Date Taken: | 01.06.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 01.09.2017 16:13 |
| Story ID: | 219734 |
| Location: | WASHINGTON, DC, US |
| Web Views: | 288 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, JBAB says tearful goodbye to first Mother and Son volunteer team, by Scott Pauley, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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