MORE THAN COINCIDENCE Patriots tied together through military service

Hope and Jerry Lucas’ paths were seemingly destined to cross. From matching moles on their wrists, to March birthdays they had much in common from the start. If life was a puzzle they were the pieces. What brought them together, after knowing their story, seems like more than coincidence.

The military, the Army to be exact, allowed their worlds to come together. It started off with Jerry Lucas, a young teenage boy dedicated to the JROTC at his school. He had an older brother that he looked up to who enlisted in the military and from a young age new that he was going to take a path that would lead him toward the military.

Jerry Lucas’ path led him to enlisting in the Army in 1985 right out of high school. He did basic training where he was training to operate the HAWK Missile System, which was an air defense system. Around the late 80s there was talk of phasing out the HAWK missiles, as they were becoming outdated. He was stationed in Germany at the time from 1986-88.

As his field was being phased out of the military, Jerry Lucas had to go back to training where he decided he would become a military police. He went to train where he did his basic training, at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.

After several stops he found his way to Belgium in 1994.

Hope Lucas took a different route into the Army. She was enrolled in college while being enlisted in the reserves. A shift took place for her three years into her college career. She originally enlisted in the reserves because she wasn’t sure she wanted to make a fulltime commitment, but had become unfulfilled in college and was in some ways going through the motions. She says it was an old Army commercial that pushed her into enlisting as active duty.

“So I went down the next day to the recruiting office, and told them I wanted to enlist, to go active duty,” Hope Lucas said. In the reserves she was an accounting specialist but they didn’t have any open slots, so she reclassified as an administrative specialist. She went to Fort Jackson, South Carolina in January of 1991 until she transferred out to Shape Headquarters in Belgium in August 1992. She was there two years before Jerry Lucas arrived.

Jerry and Hope Lucas first crossed paths there in processing. Hope Lucas said it was an unassuming encounter. She worked there at headquarters and part of her job was welcoming in new arrivals.

“I guess I happened to be walking through and I was just saying welcome to Belgium and welcome to S.H.A.P.E. (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe), and that was pretty much it for our first encounter,” said Hope Lucas. “But, of course I wasn’t looking at him like that, I was just welcoming him as a new soldier to Belgium.”

Their next encounter came when Hope Lucas’ mother was in town and planned to make her a special meal. She was on the hunt for some barbecue sauce and was told that if she went to Terry’s room they may find some. On the way upstairs she came across Jerry Lucas coming down and asked him if he knew where Terry’s room was. Jerry Lucas replied that he was Terry’s roommate and they had a conversation where she explained why she was looking for him. Unfortunately Jerry Lucas didn’t have any barbecue sauce but he had something of value­–an eye-catching smile.

“When I saw him that second time, I was like ooh!” said Hope Lucas. “He had a nice smile and I thought he was handsome.”

After that first encounter they would see each other frequently in the barracks which they described as much like a college dorm.

The turning point in their relationship came when Hope Lucas, on a telephone call with her sister, made a life changing decision.

“He had come down the stairwell and he nodded hello,” said Hope Lucas. “I did, too, and he went on down to the first floor. Then I told my sister, she said I told her to hold on, and so I dropped the phone and I went to the window like right by the stairwell. It was like a big bay window so I could open it up, and I said, ‘Hey!’”

“So he turned around and looked up and I said, ‘Do you know my number on the second floor?’ And he was like, ‘No.’ And I said well, ‘Here’s the number. Can you call me later?’” Hope Lucas laughed as she recounted this bold move.

Jerry Lucas shared his thoughts the moment that Hope Lucas reached out to him.

“When I met her I thought she was nice, but the day she was on the phone, and I was walking by, I was going down the steps and when I passed by her upstairs I said, ‘Man, she’s a nice looking young lady,’” Jerry Lucas remembers. “It was just something about her that day. She had a glow to her and when I was looking at her on the phone I was thinking, she’s probably talking to her boyfriend or something.”

There were unseen circumstances that allowed the relationship to bud. Hope Lucas was scheduled to change posts and was in the process of leaving Shape and leaving Jerry in Belgium.

“He came in June and I was supposed to (change station) in August,” Hope Lucas said. “Everybody kept trying to get me to stay and talk me into staying. I was like no. The Army is saying it’s time for me to go so I have orders.”

Hope was determined to follow orders and leave but the vast number of people telling her to stay caused her to have second thoughts. “I would think back to how God sends person after person that helps you to see really you need to stay and not go,” said Hope Lucas. “I don’t know how many people tried to talk me into staying.”

Hope Lucas estimates it was at least 10 people that talked her into staying instead of following her new assignment to Virginia. When she decided she would stay it opened the door for her and Jerry Lucas’ serpentine career paths to come together and stay together in Belgium.

From the point that Hope Lucas called out to Jerry Lucas from a window to when they got married was an accelerated process. They began dating in early summer of 1994 and were married by December of that same year.

There was a bond, a friendship that Hope and Jerry Lucas shared and it brought them from acquaintances to friends to family.

She says that a sense of family brought her to love and adore not only Jerry Lucas but the military as a whole. Hope Lucas spoke about the camaraderie she felt while in the military.

“What I loved about it, the military, and about being around it is that sense of, like Jerry was saying, it’s like a family,” said Hope Lucas. “You know, I think it kind of gave me a glimpse of what heaven could be like.”

She also recognizes there’s a sense of honor that comes from having served.

“It was just, that sense of I’m a part of this. I’m a part of safeguarding our country,” said Hope Lucas. “Even though I know my (position) was not military police, but I’m doing my part, I’m serving my country and just what it stood for.

“And I always say we had this actually before we came into the military. We were decent people, good people, had good upbringings and the values that your parents taught you. (We had) things like that and what you learned in church and Sunday school and all. I think what the military did was just like build on that, because they were always about things like honesty, integrity, those kind of things and selfless service. Those were some of the things that I valued before I came into the military. With that, it was kind of something that really said, yeah, I know this is where I belong, you know?”

Jerry Lucas talked about the ROTC instructor he had in high school. He gave him a perspective on what it meant to serve in the military that has always stuck with him.

“He looked around and we were in our cadet uniforms and, he said, ‘No matter what you go in for, whether you go in for college or whether you go in for economic reasons to better yourself, or whether you go in to see the world, he said, you know, the main purpose of our military is to fight a war, to defend the country. That always stuck out for me when he said that. When I went into combat in Afghanistan, or when I went to Macedonia and Somalia, I always kept that in my head. That’s the main purpose (to fight in a war).”

Jerry saw combat in several places one of them being in Afghanistan in 2005 almost 19 years into his career. During this time he had found the love of his life and built a family with her. Life for him began to wind down eventually leading him out of the military after 20 years of service.

“I was planning on retiring,” said Jerry Lucas. “And then we went down to (Afghanistan) like the last few months (of my career). We called it Rocket City, because we got rocketed all the time. And you know I never told Hope about that until I got back.

When you hear a rocket in the air you know or artillery, when you hear the, ‘woooo,’ as soon as you hear it you’re supposed to fall flat on the ground. I’m like looking, still standing up looking like where is it coming from? And then you hear this explosion. And I was like, you know what? It’s time to retire. You know, I was supposed to have been on the ground. You know you get slow, it’s time to go ahead and retire.”

Jerry Lucas retired in 2006 while Hope Lucas retired in 2000. He was deployed for over a year there in Afghanistan. The world had changed so much since 9-11. And what made this combat mission different for Jerry Lucas was the loss of a brother.

“We lost a soldier about eight days out,” said Jerry Lucas. “That made the whole time real. His name was Shane Cooley and I had to escort his body back from Afghanistan. That was a time where I’ve been in combat situations before but never been in one where we actually lost a soldier.”

Jerry reflects on the sense of patriotism he feels that sacrifices like Shane Cooley’s represent.

“What it represents for me, the military definitely, going to see other countries everywhere you go, you look at great things about those countries, but then it’s like, there’s no place like home. So, I think that for that, I think the military gives you, I won’t say it gives it to everybody, but it gave me a great sense of patriotism and love for the country, that everything that you can put your mind to that you can accomplish, you know? I don’t know if those things are allowed in other (countries) and I’m sure the other countries have (positive) things too, but, for me, that’s the biggest thing.”

Thankful to have been brought together by the military Hope Lucas reflects on what the military means to her and her three children, Faith, Joy and Emmanuel.

She says she tells her children that the lifestyle they have is because of the military.

“I always tell people, ‘no,’ we’re not wealthy, we are spiritually wealthy, but what I’m saying is what we have is what the military provided for us. The lifestyle that we have now and being able to take care of our family and, just everything. It’s because of the military.”