The signatures of hundreds of Calgary students will be headed overseas to the Middle East in the coming days on greeting cards destined for “any given soldier” who won’t make it home for Christmas.
More than 700 cards were picked up from Coventry Elementary School on Friday afternoon, handwritten by young students at that school as well as Winston Heights and Thorncliffe elementary schools.
They’re on their way to CFB Trenton where they’ll soon be sent to soldiers, along with thousands of other cards that have been written in the week since the Canadian Armed Forces put out a call to Canadians on Twitter.
“It was great,” said Bruce Winston, president of Sandstone Pharmacies, which helped make one Calgary parent’s dream to participate in the program a reality.
Winston said he was approached just a few days ago by a mother named Donna Roth and asked if his company could help with providing the cards and making sure they got sent off. He and his management team were touched and quickly jumped on board.
“With very little notice, the school was really an eager participant, and especially coming in the month of Remembrance Day, where their kids were involved in the assembly and they were very excited about it,” Winston said.
“I think it shows overwhelming support and I’m really excited about it.”
Winston said that while many of the students who wrote the cards weren’t at the school when he went to see them get picked up by CanPar, the impact of their efforts wasn’t lost on him.
“It was pretty overwhelming to see the stack of close to 700 cards that were put together over just a couple of days,” he said.
“I’m just hoping that when they receive a card from a student back home in Canada, that it just plays some role in reminding them that they’re missed.”
Winston said he hopes the cards will “bring a spot of brightness” to each person who gets one.
He also hopes this can become a yearly thing, and that next year more students and schools will get involved so even more letters can be sent overseas.
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