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In a Pound of Coffee, Comfort of Home
From left, Amanda Bernazzani, Helen Dodderidge, Linda Pretty and Catherine Hoska are some of the Starbucks employees donating their coffee.
(By Tracy A. Woodward -- The Washington Post)
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The coffee drive came to life in February, when Tom Leonard was stateside and visiting his parents before taking off in March for his second tour; he also served in the Persian Gulf War. At Starbucks one morning, Ed introduced Tom to employee Linda Pretty, who offered to send him her coffee allotment and recruit others to do so, said Ed Leonard, 75.
The first batch they sent was whole bean, sending Tom Leonard on a frantic hunt for a grinder. "It's always ground now," Pretty said.
Later, after a query from Mike Moye, the Starbucks crew signed up Joe Moye as its second recipient.
"They've got great people who work there; they're very personable and friendly," said Mike Moye, 60, a retired bank employee. "Starbucks is a version of the old [television] series 'Cheers.' "
The care packages bearing Starbucks java -- and the instant e-mail communication about them -- reflect how times have changed since Ed Leonard and Mike Moye, both veterans, were stationed overseas.
Leonard, who flew Air Force helicopters from a base in Danang, Vietnam, in 1967-68, said he did not have it so rough: He lived in an old French hotel, complete with ceiling fans and maid service. But e-mail was nonexistent, and phone calls were rare. Leonard said he relied on frequent letters from his wife, Dolly. Son Tom, then a 12-year-old with an aversion to letter-writing, taped audio messages for his father. A care package containing canned trout in wine sauce, perfect for heating on a hot plate, was a special treat, Leonard said.
"I looked so forward to care packages, and now here I am sending care packages to my son," Leonard said.
Mike Moye, who spent 18 months in Okinawa, Japan, as a Chinese linguist with the Air Force, relied on "snail mail" to bring him letters now and then -- or his mother's banana bread.
"Sometimes it would get to me just right," he said. "Because mail was spotty, sometimes I'd open the package and there'd be this green mold all over it."
Even during the Persian Gulf War, Tom Leonard said, correspondence with home resembled that of his father's era. Without the Internet and with only occasional phone calls from home that were arranged weeks in advance -- calling out was "horribly expensive," he said -- letters and packages dominated. These days, troops have access to cell phones and e-mail.
"Now we've got things so much different and so much better," Tom Leonard said, referring to his father's days in Vietnam. "But in many, many ways, they're still the same. You look forward to the care packages; you look forward to the letters from home."
Joe Moye said those comforts are not squandered: He plans to ration his coffee, breaking it out just a couple times a week -- once he gets it, that is.
Meanwhile, the Starbucks crew is happy to keep sending it, Pretty said.
"Anything we could possibly do to help them over there is what we would do," she said. "This is something small, and if it brightens their lives, boy, we do it."
