On December 25, 1990, I was deployed to Desert Shield/Desert Storm. A few months later, I received a VHS tape from my brother-in-law, capturing the Christmas I missed. I remember thinking, What am I going to do with a VHS tape in all this sand? So I tucked it inside one of my socks to keep it protected.

Fast forward to September 14, 2015—I became a FOREVER Ambassador, and that VHS tape was the very first thing I had digitized. Five of the people in that video are no longer with us, including my brother-in-law Kenneth Judia Drew, Uncle Bill, Auntie, Bookmama, and Leon Richardson Jr.

Thank you, FOREVER, for bringing this treasured memory back to life so I could share it with family and friends.