Middle schoolers feast on food and conversation with service veterans

MILLBROOK —  For the 17th year, Millbrook Middle School physical education teacher Joseph Carbone hosted a breakfast for U.S. military veterans and Millbrook middle school students Thursday, Nov. 9.

Some of the 19 veterans being celebrated were asked to attend by their children or grandchildren who are student, and some were there solely to share and enjoy the food and camaraderie.

While Carbone himself is not a veteran, both of his grandfathers were. As part of commemorating each of them, he says, he feels that all veterans should be paid homage for having defended their country:

“It’s the right thing to do,” he said.

The visiting veterans and eighth grade students sat at tables decorated with flags and handwritten thank-you notes to vets. Veterans told their stories, answered questions and shared tidbits from their military lives. The youths were respectful and engaged, paying their guests close attention.

After breakfast, the veterans went to the auditorium where the students from the sixth through eighth grades were assembled. As the veterans marched in, they were announced individually, and a cheer went up, loudly, for every one, led on by Carbone and Principal Steve Cabello.    

When the veterans were seated on stage, eighth grader Gabriel Gosselyn played taps on the bugle and the Pledge of Allegiance was said.

Carbone gave a short history of the holiday and this particular event. The students then directed questions to the veterans.

“What was the food like?” 

“We got used to it.”  

“What did you miss the most when you left the service?”  

“The camaraderie, the sharing, the work.”

Asked about the benefits of having served, most answered that they learned to be part of a team, they learned to work hard, and they acquired skills they would not have gotten elsewhere.

Asked to explain what “service” is all about, one said, “It’s about freedom—giving up your freedom to give freedom to others.”

Another, asked to recall the best moment of his service, he said, with a wide grin, “When I got my discharge papers.”

The sole female veteran who attended, Doris Zerafa of Millbrook, answered the question, “What was the most difficult thing you had to do in the service?”

She responded that as a woman, getting accepted as a soldier and a comrade was the hardest part. Because she is a woman, she said, she always had to work harder to prove herself.

After the event, Carbone told The News that one day, a former student had come up to him and told him that, as a middle school student, she hadn’t understood Veterans Day, but had asked her grandfather to participate one year. Before he died, he told her that one of the best moments of his life had been attending the veterans’ breakfast with his granddaughter at the middle school, and how proud he had been that day.

The veterans and the eighth grade students at the Millbrook Middle School enjoy breakfast and conversation together at the 17th annual Veterans Appreciation Breakfast at the middle school Thursday, Nov. 9, organized by teacher Joseph Carbone. Photo by Judith O'Hara Balfe