A welcome home
By John Joyce
Published in News on March 25, 2016 1:46 PM
Joshua Wilson did not go straight home when he arrived back in the states Wednesday night, having spent the last seven months pulling a remote tour in South Korea.
His mother, not his wife, picked him up from Raleigh-Durham International Airport.
Not that Wilson wasn't eager to see his wife, Tabatha, and their two girls, Emilee, a student at Spring Creek Elementary School, and Kamryn, 2. He just didn't want to ruin a surprise that was four months in the making.
Emilee did not know her daddy was coming home.
"We had a plan," he said.
Wilson said his wife wanted to make it a surprise for their daughter so she kept it from her and orchestrated the event at the school.
"I have known since November I was coming home now," Wilson said.
Although he has to go back -- he is only on a break from his commitment overseas -- the Wilsons said they could not pass up the opportunity to give this gift to their daughter.
"I'm still there, I am on a mid-tour right now. I have been there for seven months, I've got to be there a year," he explained.
Wilson, a U.S. Air Force technical sergeant assigned to Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, surprised Emilee in front of her entire school during an assembly Thursday morning at Spring Creek Elementary.
Mrs. Wilson and Kamryn were seated in the front row.
"It was amazing," she said. "Especially that our little girl ran up the stairs to go get him as well."
In the moment after Wilson tapped Emilee's shoulder -- he sneaked up behind her on stage as she read an award for community mentorship with his name on it -- Kamryn waddled up the steps to join the embrace, but tumbled over as she reached the top.
In a flash, the whole Wilson family was locked in an emotional group hug. A single student, a little boy, stood and saluted. A sea of third- and fourth-grade bodies stood up behind him, and the auditorium erupted into a standing ovation.
Spring Creek principal Nicole Barrette handed out tissues to the teachers and to Mrs. Wilson.
After the program, Mrs. Barrett had to console another student with a parent who is still deployed, a common theme throughout Wayne County Public Schools. She said each family, each child, suffers when the families are forced to separate for long stretches at a time.
"It is almost a feeling of loneliness," she said. "We have our mentors who provide a lot of one-on-one for those children. And we do have a lot of adults here, and we do have military support here as well."
Both Wilson's mother and Mrs. Wilson's mother were also in attendance. His mom, Emma Mathews, and her mom, Cindy Jones, helped keep the surprise on the hush-hush.
"I picked him up," Mrs. Mathews said. "I did the airport run."
She said Wilson's deployments are always difficult for the family, but that makes the returns all the more sweet.
"You try not to think about it. You don't watch the news, unless you have to," she said. "I mean, the bombing in Brussels, he's flying in on an airplane," she said.
He was in the air on 9/11, too, Mrs. Jones said.
A mother's anxiety aside, Wilson, surrounded by the many women in his life who love him, searched for the right words.
"I'm excited," he said. He then described the well-orchestrated surprise being pulled off in front of an entire school as "awkward."
But, for the next week or so, he is leaving his worries back in South Korea.
"We're going to Busch Gardens one day for (Emilee). That is what she wanted to do for spring break."