THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 26, 1996 TAG: 9605250188
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 10 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SERIES: On Memorial Day: Remembering fallen heroes
SOURCE: Rebecca Myers Cutchins
LENGTH: 54 lines
Before Terry Mays Hurley joined the Army at 18, Memorial Day was just another day off from school.
``But once you've been in uniform, it's more special,'' says Hurley, 32, a company commander at Fort Belvoir, Va.
``It's the memories,'' the Army captain said this past week in a telephone interview from her office. ``You remember things that have happened, things you've gone through, people you've known, friends you've made and soldiers you've been in charge of.
``All of it. You never forget it.''
Since graduating from Cradock High School in 1981, Hurley has served in Germany, South Korea and in Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Storm. It was while she was in the Persian Gulf that Currents readers got to know Hurley through letters to her parents, Bryant and Diane Mays, who still live in Cradock.
In a letter dated Dec. 28, 1990, Hurley wrote:
``I do not know what will happen here in Saudi, but I'm not afraid of death. I don't want to go to war; however, it is my job. When I travel around this country, many Saudi Arabians and Kuwaiti citizens who were exiled or escaped flash me a peace sign or wave. Today, someone said Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. It made me smile.''
Hurley said she sometimes reads the letters she sent home.
``It brings a tear to my eye. I get all choked up just thinking about it. I don't know. It's sort of like I was in a different world then. You wonder, `Did this all happen?' ''
Much has changed since Hurley wrote those letters more than five years ago. A second lieutenant then, now she's a captain. In 1993, she spent some time in Somalia, which she describes as ``kind of a biggie.''
``In Somalia, we rolled over off the bunks when the gunshots went off at night at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning.''
Two years later, she was married to Brian Hurley, an Army major due to be promoted to lieutenant colonel at the end of the summer. She now has three step-children, ages 5, 6 and 10.
The Hurleys plan to spend Memorial Day weekend in a cabin on the Shenandoah River. But Terry Hurley promises the weekend won't pass without some thought of what Memorial Day truly means to her.
``To me, it's a day to look back in time to where I was then - in Saudi, in Somalia, or when I was waiting for Brian to come home from Haiti. . . .
``I am proud that Brian and I are in the military. I am happy to be back home in Virginia, but I'll never forget what it was like, and I try never to forget that someone like me is still in danger somewhere.
``And that's why we do what we do for a living.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Memorial Day brings memories back to Terry Mays Hurley. by CNB