Happy to have you here in such an honor to host this event. My name is glenda childs, i own the bookshop. We are happy to be in a community that supports our local businesses as well as local nonprofits so this is a special one today so it is my honor to introduce you to the authors of this book. I will start with ryan marion who dedicated her life to supporting the nations military, veterans and families, she was inspired by the character, leadership and sacrifice of her brother, travis, who made the ultimate sacrifice iraq on april 20 ninth 2007. Ryan leads a National Movement focused on assisting veterans and families of the fallen to take the next step in their personal journeys and inspiring the next generation of leaders. In 2015 she received the president s Lifetime Achievement award for volunteer service. In 2016, ryan marion took an official appointment to the remember an explosive committee and for the Advisory Committee at Arlington National cemetery. She also serves as board member of the National Association of veterans serving organizations as well as on the Advisory Board for the global war on terror Memorial Foundation so ryan marion resides here in doylestown where she continues to serve our community as township supervisor since elected in 2011. [applause] Heather Kelly is the coauthor of this book, the surviving spouse of lieutenant robert kelly who was killed in afghanistan november 9th, 2010, west Region Program manager for the Travis ManionFoundation Heather works closely with veterans returning to civilian life, surviving family members of those who make the ultimate sacrifice and fostering americas next generation of leaders. Ryan and heather will be in conversation with derek morgan. Derek is the director of marketing for the Travis Manion foundation and coowner of monkeys uncle store. Please join me in welcoming ryan, heather, and derek. Welcome, everyone. What we will do this afternoon is i am going to ask ryan and heather to read their favorite excerpts from the book, they will elaborate a little more, we will go through a few of those and lead into the actual book signing portion. What i really want to do is start with you. Obviously we are here in doylestown, the knock at the door for you happened in this community. Your brother travis was so well known that the community did feel that ripple effect. With that your family really made a decision on how to move forward and honor travis. Do you mind elaborating on that a little more . Sure. Thank you all for coming out today, truly appreciate it. I was just telling glenda, heather and i are so excited to be here. We have been in new york all weekend we are so happy to be with people, we have been sitting in hotel rooms all weekend it is great to be in doylestown for this today and yes, for those that are not familiar, our organization was founded in 2007 after my brother was killed in iraq and i will tell you when i got the news that travis was killed, i was standing in front of coachs. I actually was about to open a store right there where now i think it is the Holiday House grooming and i was standing with the landlord about to sign the lease on my second location. I own a Small Business in avalon, new jersey and my phone raining and it was my aunt on the other line telling me to come back to my parents house, so i drove 5 minutes down the road and learned that my brother had been killed and it was on the day of traviss funeral my dad pulled my mom and my husband into the bedroom and said from this day forward we continue on making sure that we live to honor travis, that we continue his legacy of service and we committed that day to do just that and that was the birth of the Travis Manion foundation. I said all the time. We have become a National Veterans serving organization across the country but the roots of our organization are from right here in this community, to this day when i travel across the country and they say where are you headquartered, pennsylvania. We have eight regional offices across the country and operate with over 130,000 members, staff of over 50 employees across the country but the community here really played such a large part and still plays a tremendously large part in helping us to do the work we do to support veterans and families of the fallen. What i want to do now is go into a little more of ryan and heathers favorite excerpts from the book. First excerpt you picked out if you wouldnt mind reading that through. This is from our introduction. A little more about talking about grief. None of us know how to do grief right and none of us believe there is only one way to do it. We know how to do it wrong. We have lashed out at loved ones and checked out of daily life. We have self medicated heavily, slept too much and exercise and eaten too little. We have known and are in depression, abandoned friendships. You name the tragic flaw or unhealthy coping mechanism and we have all done it. But we have grown to. We found forgiveness, healing and peace. We realized how much fight there is left innocent how much opportunity has been afforded us. We have been challenged to embrace those moments of opportunity and fully expect to continue to learn. Our individual journeys dont all look the same and they wont look like yours but despite our differences we have learned one universal truth that applies to each of us. Every human will struggle in this life. Our challenge is to struggle well. Because after all, struggle is the antecedent of growth. It is only when we embrace the pain, heartache and discomfort that punctuate our lives that we can ultimately find the strength we need to grow from those moments. This is a fact of human existence and it is true at the molecular level as it is at the celestial one. Our muscles dont grow unless we literally damage our muscle fibers by exercising them strenuously. Only when those fibers have broken down can our body go through the natural process of repair and strengthening. That is it. Perfect, thank you. [applause] i had to stop right there. I cant tell her what to do. So in that section with what you detail it really does not speak directly to anything related to the military or loss as goldstar family members. It sounds more something anyone can relate to in different types of a knock at the door. Can you talk about that . Heather, amy and i can our coauthor amy is not with us today but she had her first child eight weeks old, took that baby grace up to new york with us all week so we gave her the day off today and said we gave her the weekend off i should say but heather, amy and i all lost our loved ones in service to this country and while we obviously felt it was important to share our stories, more than that, we wrote this book because each and every one of us will get a knock on the door which could come into forms which he could come from the death of a loved one. It could come from divorce. It could come from heart ache, it could come from a cancer diagnosis and what we talk about a lot in the book is not so much about what happens when that knock comes but how you respond when you get it. We talk a lot about through that process and im very up front that it took 12 years to be able to put pen to paper and share my thoughts on this. If you had asked me five years ago to write this book it would have been a different story and not terribly uplifting. But i feel like we have all come to find that we are in a place we are not selfhelp experts, so, but we also feel that we have some good professional experience in grief and loss and how you move forward. We kind of put our tricks and tips and what works for us and what didnt work for us into this book and it really is for anyone. This book is for anyone not only who has gotten a knock at the door but those who havent. We always say for those who havent gotten a knock on the door yet be the best version of yourself today. I want to ask you to read your first excerpt and i will preface it by ryan did a tremendous job of setting the table for what her knock at the door was like and she will explain how her experience was with that. You are on. Can you hear me . This is kind of the story of how my knock started, tuesday november 9th, 2010. My knock at the door came at 3 am. I was in deep sleep and when i heard the rapid the front door it felt far away. I was still coming out of the drowsy haze. I didnt recognize the noise for what it was. I thought the knocking i was hearing was part of a dream. Eventually i realized the sound was real and was coming from my own front door. I wasnt expecting company at that hour so i hesitated before answering. I got to the door and looked through the peephole to see three sharply dressed marine standing together. Immediately had a sinking feeling in my gut. My husband rob had been deployed to afghanistan 6 weeks earlier. It was arthur diploma together and i noticed the appearance of marines in uniform was rarely a good thing but i remembered something i heard in a meeting for servicemembers that gave me some hope. If you receive a notification Family Readiness officer had instructed us before rob left 2 or 3 marines will come to your house no earlier than 8 00 in the morning. I recall sitting with other military families at the meeting where we learned important things we would need to know to get through the next 7 months. A strict protocol involved notification of a loved ones does. Ringing that comes me. If this were bad news but not come for another 5 hours least. I wondered how long the marines had been standing outside trying to get my attention which after concluding was unlikely they were there for rob i figured they were there to ask where another marines family lived which i felt sorry for whoever they were planning to visit later that morning, regardless who they were seeking to visit i knew they were bringing bad news for someone. I had been halfasleep a moment ago but i was wide awake now. One of the marines served as notification officer. He began his formal scripted speech telling me my husband, lieutenant robert kelly, was dead. On behalf of the president of the united states, he began, the rest was a blur. My head fell into my hand and my brain completely shut down. I heard the remainder of the script as though i was underwater something about the honor, the duty lieutenant kelly had been performing, something about how he had sustained injuries from an ied blast that resulted in loss of his leg and some closing, extend our deepest sympathies and then silence. When he finished reading the speech the notification officer looked up and stared at me. I imagine waiting for a storm to erupt. I felt the gaze of the two marines on me and then looked at the chaplain who had accompanied them. I dont think they were sure what to make of my reaction or lack of reaction. There was nothing on the surface to observe for me. I was in total shock. No bellowing screams or agonized cries, no torn questions for them to field. They would have preferred if i had. Instead i sat down dumbfounded staring straight ahead. All that stood between me and them was a deep quiet sadness that made me feel empty. The news that rob was dead didnt seem real that was real enough to leave me hollow. Unlike some people i didnt immediately conclude there mustve been some mistake, this notification couldnt have been meant for me. I knew this wasnt the kind of thing they were going to screw up. Rob is gone forever and it was clear to me. There was nothing to be said so i said nothing. Thank you. You mentioned in their your knock came at 3 am. Can you talk a little more about why it happened at that time . Like i mentioned in the book it was very out of the ordinary that they came to my home at 3 am. At the time my husband was serving overseas my fatherinlaw was an activeduty marine and they knew when he went into work that he would have found out the news immediately. He would have signed onto his computer to see the list of casualties. I was notified. I was living in california at the time and still do. I was notified the same time he was. One of his best friends that he went through training within the marine corps went to his door at 6 am and notified him in the marines also came to me at 3 00 in the morning so we would both find out at the same time and we were able to communicate immediately. That was the reasoning behind my unusual notification time and why it did not go along with what i had been told it would be like. We are going to come back to you and have you read your second excerpt if you dont mind. This is from the third paragraph called a few months out my drug of choice. Second, i had some takeaways at the end of the chapter. The first takeaway was second, embrace your support system. Relationships are everything. Family, friends and loved ones can get us through the darkest and saddest moments. We just need to let them. Our friends and family speed are wild ambitions and nourish us. When we share with them some embarrassing fantasy that is well beyond our reach they always say go for it and if youre lucky enough to have friends and family like mine they may even say i am in, lets do it together. They gently and lovingly protect us from our own selfdestructive habits. They lift us up literally when we cant go another step and cheer us on when we look like frankenstein. With a loving support system we can afford to be a little naive, be bold, be fearless but dont do it alone. You are human and you are only one person. Allow yourself to be carried forward by those who love you. Finally, dont wait. I beg you please dont wait. I had no idea how tough i was was why did i wait until my brother was dead to find out . My only regret of running the marathon in 2007 was that it didnt take place in 2006. You know who would have loved to run and train with me . Travis. Something like that which required focus and discipline was far more up his alleys in mind. He would have been so proud and we would have had a ball together. There are so many things i wish we could have done together. Im not the same woman he knew when he was alive. Im better, i am stronger. Why did i wait for him to disappear before i became the woman i wanted to be . [applause] thank you. In that excerpt you talk about how you are better and stronger than the woman travis new. What is your thoughts, if travis were here today what would he think about what you have done and the person you are now . As it pertains to the Travis Manion foundation, he would be right beside all of us with the organization. He would be right in the mix. Im also clear to say the one thing he would hate is we named it the Travis Manion foundation. It was something we recognized but it was like a few years ago when my dad said i feel like travis wouldnt like that we named it after him. Maybe we should change the name. We are already committed, we cant change it now. I talk a lot in that chapter, a lot of those takeaways are because i talk about how i decided to run along with 100 family and friends, we decided to run the Marine Corps Marathon and one thing i say in the book is travis didnt ask me to run the Marine Corps Marathon, he called my dad because he knew it was something i wasnt going to do. It was just like as soon as travis passed away now i am saying im going to run a marathon and there is something to that where i finished that marathon and felt tremendously strong and proud and i honored travis so well but also why did it take him leaving for me to say now i am going to do it . That is a lot of what i battled with and wrote about in that chapter. I think he would be incredibly proud to be here beside us and i know if he had transitioned out of the military he would be doing everything he could to support his fellow veterans. Thank you. We will go back to you. The next excerpt heather is going to read is your dream may be taken away from you tomorrow but dream anyway. When my 17yearold self at Florida State university in 2002, we dreamed of spending our lives together. It was a fun dream that occupied the greater part of our adult lives every day thereafter. As the years went on the dream remained but involved becoming more mature and complex and adjusted whatever our circumstances happens to be at any time. We imagined our reunion after deployment, hosting parties as a married couple at our new house, we imagined holidays with her future family, we played the dream out in minute detail and gleaned as much pleasure as we could from it, we run get dry and one day in 2000 and i buried my fellow dreamer and was left to dream alone. There was no landmark on the mental roadmap i created for myself to account for this. Now part of the dream involved losing my husband at so young an age but navigating life is like driving through a snowstorm. You can see 10 feet in front of you. It is scary and treacherous but it is doable. You can make the journey that way. You may not know whether it is 15 or 50 miles down the road but that didnt stop you dreaming how wonderful it would be when you get there. Of rob and not i had known fate would separate us so early i dont think our dreams would have looked any different. We still would have had that carefree summer in tallahassee, florida, still would have spent our time marking down the days until our next reunion, still would have committed our lives to one another. Anyones dream can be ripped away in an instant and it hurts like hell. I wont pretend it doesnt. But dream anyway. The joyful anticipation dreams bring you will outweigh the pain in their absence leaves behind. Anticipation is half the fun. [applause] thank you for that. You talk about dreaming anyway. Can you speak a little more about the process for you in your own personal journey and how you went about being able to dream again and look forward to things as you started to take those steps forward. I think part of finding that anticipation in life again and things to look forward to was trying to find a way to find a purpose in having lost rob. I dont know if anything you say makes it worth it to have lost rob but find the meaning behind it and what i can do to move forward purposefully, part of that was the foundation where i first crossed paths with my coauthors, i met them at different stages in my journey throughout the years and a way to honor robs activation service and continue service in my own way in his name was a huge part of that and being able to volunteer with the foundation for a few years was very early in my journey, very important to me and couldnt talk about it in the book but after volunteering for a while in san diego the foundation opened up and when i interviewed for that job. I will go today, he said okay, flipped the calendar and two weeks from the day i was sitting in that office on monday morning two weeks ahead was november 9th, 2015. My first day was the 5year anniversary. And rob sent me something special. It is a huge part of the journey and taking on a new career, really helped me see ahead, what that would look like without him there. And a 5year anniversary of joining the foundation, 9 years since we lost rob. [applause] we will ask you to read your third excerpt. This is from a section titled failure is a bruise. Before travis died i never bothered to think much about failure. Not because i was wildly successful at everything i tried my hand at. I failed at plenty of things. It is because i didnt care enough about anything to give it much effort. I was sometimes apathetic. Travis was ambitious, goal oriented, i was just coasting through life. After he died and then my mom died, a major wakeup call. Now i feel compelled to take advantage of the time i have left on this earth to lead a life they can both be proud of. I want to do this not for my sake but for theres. After their deaths, tension nourished me and i became obsessed with finding the next mountain to climb. I would let nothing stop me from getting to the top but as occurs with all humans i failed. I had no idea how to deal with failure. Since i never permitted myself to deal with it before. Failure can be crushing. It can make you feel worthless and disillusioned. The first few times i failed i was not prepared for the consequences. I was a program to forge again that i did not know how to handle a roadblock. For a time i allowed my failures to define me. Then i began to accept them as simply a stage in the process. Failure wasnt so scary anymore. When we recognize that our lives are a series of successes and failures we are more likely to also handle difficulties when they arise and they always do. Eventually, despite the inevitable failures we come to learn that our next success is never too far off. [applause] you talk about overcoming some of the challenges and failures and successes, having taken over leading the foundation you had big shoes to fill from your mom and obviously with carrying on traviss legacy going forward. For you, what really is your approach when it comes to just, almost like that goal setting and saying this is what we are going to do and how we are going to do it, how do you approach that, in your own mind you put yourself in a high position you feel you have to succeed at everything . Five years to the day after my brother was killed, at this point the Travis Manion foundation was at a National Scale and i worked at the foundation at the time. My position was executive director. But i was just janets assistant, she led the charge, i never had to make any decisions because she made the decisions. Whatever you need, i was just filling the gap. Our board met, i would be the president of the Travis Manion foundation and i felt a tremendous weight on my shoulders that i didnt fully comprehend until i got more into it. I was being talked into you are in charge, and you are running a multimillion dollar nonprofit and it is named after your brother and your mom started it. That was really scary. I jokingly say that seriously say the first thing i did was went out and hired some talented people who i knew would not let the organization fail and we brought in great leadership to help us but i think for me, the way i work through things is this idea of i cant fail at this and i cant let this, if i fail at this i dont just fail myself but i fail a lot of people including my mom and brother. I had to learn to not just look at setting goals in a way that next we do this. It had to be very intentional and i talk about intention and sitting intentional goals, not just setting goals for glory, and this is how we are going to do it, be very intentional about the fox behind it, and setting that goal and what the purpose of it is. And 7 years now running this organization. Outside of that i talk about the daily challenges of not just what i do at the Travis Manion foundation and being wife and mother, not letting those responsibilities fall to the wayside. A bit of a balancing act. A happy medium, fine balance, talk about this idea, dont let small things that you back too far. In the beginning i was letting small failures, when i talk about failures in the book it is small things, failures like getting the grant we are going to get, and this organization is ending. We are not doing what we are supposed to do and great, that one didnt catch but the next one will. It is all about changing your mindset and having a belief, and you are going to fail today but have the opportunity to wake up tomorrow. Struggle well. One last excerpt for us from section titled, you expect to see the good or the bad you will. There is a quote by henry ford because if you think you can or think you cant, you are right. Perspective is everything and so much of life is subject to becoming a selffulfilling prophecy. I think the way we deal with this works the same way. Not long ago i was perusing items for sale at a small antique shop in carlsbad California North of san diego. I stumbled on a bar set, one that said yours, one that said mine. And a matching pitcher that that hours. There was a time i would have considered, these days i find it depressing. I was feeling down about the turn my life had taken and the reminders of my grief followed me everywhere. The song we considered our song Better Together by jack johnson. And in a nearby booth. It was still with me, i understood the pain i felt and no matter what i would never be alone. It is true. Reminders of our difficulty and sadness are everywhere. We dont have to look hard to find them but reminders of happier times are everywhere. We can feel reassured and take pleasure in little gifts of joy when we need them most. Sometimes we have to be more intentional about speaking out. [applause] thank you. In the book you also speak a good deal about how you use humor. I wonder if you could elaborate on that a little more. One of my earliest coping mechanisms after using losing rob was trying to find dark humor in situations that came after and my brotherinlaw was in that. It is pretty surreal, lost your husband and sitting at funeral homes, my brotherinlaw tried to lighten the mood. And what he would have wanted for that funeral, what he would have wanted you to write, the most absurd thing you can think of, he would have and it became our joke for that first week when he reminded me when bart to materialize it. He gets very indignant where is my elephant. That is my joke for the week between he and i, get that elephant here. It sounds so absurd and ridiculous, but take us out of that moment. John and i reconnect and have a moment of lightness. I didnt want to cry every day, couldnt cry every day. It carries me through still and rob was really funny and sarcastic and cracking jokes. And the earliest ways to cope that i use. We would like to open it up to some questions between the audience. If you could raise your hand the girls would love to answer a few questions. Go right ahead. Audiobook versions are recorded right now. They havent given us a final date but audio version forthcoming. At the time, my brotherinlaw john mentioned it is an active duty marine, station two hours away. And we needed to see john and talked in the car immediately the first day, and take care of those things and sat with me. And he was the closest one when i got the news. It is not so much a comment as a question on how when people are gone forever they are there. When my mother passed away ten years ago i had spoken, and the next june, and the penny was 1959 and pretty much every other day my stepdaughter died two days ago from suicide on october 13th and randomly stopped it so i just think,. The other we are talking about, stuff like that. How is this foundation funded . Our foundation is funded through individual donors, corporations, private philanthropic funds and private foundations and grants and everything. Those who are not familiar with the Travis Manion foundation, you are a nonprofit, our mission is to empower veterans, in the next generation, we are a community of likeminded individuals, and we do everything in the midst of operation legacy across the country in the month of november. All of our Service Projects are named in honor of a fallen servicemember who will bring out thousands of people in the month of november to do that. Character does matter and we train veterans to go into schools and deliver Character Education for our youth. Ages 1218 and constant engagement to our veterans, programs happening each and every day in cities and states across the country, making sure they have an opportunity to continue to go outside of uniform. Going to get all emotional. I want to thank you for giving me an extended family. Im not among the people you know today but being an educator who benefited, and with suzy cook, i thank you for the what you have given me. I thank you so much, you are all responsible for that. And in my middle school. Do you turn the tide for getting administrators and local officers. I help you with your administrator. Charlies counterpart in san diego. Wordofmouth has been so popular. If i go to a middle school and say their fellow principal, we have been there and can talk, the proof is the experience they get. Any other questions, folks . At this point what we will do is ask our authors to make it to the signing table. Christie is going to come up and give directions on forming a line and everybody getting their books. Nobody fight over each other. Heather and ryan, thank you so much. Four seconds to play, caroline is going to win the eighth in a row and this one is even sweeter. It is part of the culture, at North Carolina a lot of the people that come here come because they want to be part of carolina basketball, womens basketball, caroline athletics in general, part of the community, in the acc and in North Carolina. Cspan cities tour on the road exploring the american story. This weekend we take you to chapel hill North Carolina with the help of spectrum cable partners. Today at noon eastern on cspan2s booktv, local authors on the citys history and culture including the scandal involving unc athletic programs. For many years we had all on this campus imbibed the myth of dean smith, the paragon of virtue, the master of doing athletics right and we convinced ourselves a scandal of this kind happens at unc. On American History tv on cspan 3 we learn about the citys history including howard lee, chapel hills first africanamerican mayor. Finally because one person who said to me you shouldnt run for mayor it isnt right. I have been hearing that all my life in the south and growing up. The time wouldnt be right, lets make it right and that is when i declared i run for mayor. Watch cspans cities tour of chapel hill as we take in the history and literary scene. Working with cable affiliates as we explore the american story. Good evening, welcome to the American Enterprise institute. I am yuval levin and it is my great pleasure to welcome you to a discussion of land of hope an invitation to the Great American story the one volume history of our country by the Great American historian wilfred mcclay. It is a book that comes at a time when questions of who we are as a people have unifying