Have you ever thanked a veteran for serving our country? Veteran and ACIL board member, Jason Riley, Colonel, US Army (Retired), says thanking veterans for service is great but encourages people to think beyond the sentiment.
Jason served in the armed forces for 25 years before retiring due to a congenital form of blindness known as Retinitis Pigmentosa.
“My father was diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa when he was in his 60s so, I knew there was a chance I could be diagnosed. It came earlier than I expected, but I am fortunate in that I had warning and was able to prepare more than most. I am grateful that I was able to serve and live the life I have before my eyesight started to go,” said Jason.
While he first joined the armed forces to pay for college, the Army soon became a way of life for Jason.
“I am grateful to have served in the Army for many reasons. The different types of instructors and leadership styles I encountered in basic training forced me to adapt and learn to interact with people who had different personalities from my own. I had opportunities throughout my career to interact with people I never would have interacted with had I taken a typical career path. I had the opportunity to see parts of the world and develop lifelong friendships that I never would have otherwise. For instance, I have a friend who is a Brigadier General in the Botswana Defense Force,” he said.
Jason served in a variety of leadership roles throughout his two-and-a-half-decade journey in the armed forces. He attended The United States Army War College, an institution that provides graduate level instruction to senior military officials, from 2014 to 2015, earning a Master of Strategic Studies, and achieving the rank of Colonel, before retiring.
“Being in the Army helped me to truly understand the phrase ‘with great power comes great responsibility’. I truly believe that we have a responsibility to not only take care of and set an example for ourselves, but also for others,” Jason said.
The transition from military to civilian life was difficult for Jason, as it is for many members of the military as well as their families.
“I retired in 2020. Honestly, the transition was rough. I still feel like I am in transition and will probably always feel like I am in some sort of transition. Fortunately, disability advocacy has given me a new reason to get up in the morning,” he said.
While Jason has found a new purpose in disability advocacy, there are things about the way that some other people approach advocacy that puzzle him.
“It strikes me how much self-advocacy is going on and how much better off people would be if we worked together. I am a part of some age-related focused groups. A lot of the advocacy interests that people who are veterans, people who are aging, and people with disabilities have are really aligned. Those groups have many of the same concerns regarding things like how to conquer feelings of isolation and needing access to reliable transportation, yet our advocacy is separate. It would be better if we all came together and worked toward our goals. Self-advocacy has its place, but legislators tend to listen and pay attention to larger groups of people. One way to thank a veteran is to connect them with or bring them into larger advocacy groups,” Jason said.
When Jason retired, he and his family had to decide where they wanted to end up long term. Ultimately, wanting to be closer to aging parents brought them to Dayton.
“Dayton has the feel of a big city without really being a big city. There is so much here that it could really be a destination city for advocacy groups to meet, but it is not because the public transportation isn’t very good. The transportation companies say that they will invest in improvements when they see additional riders. The improvements would bring additional riders and ultimately more money to the area, but this won’t happen until people come together to help transportation companies see that they need to invest in infrastructure,” he said.
Jason recommends that people look up their local Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) organization and ask how they can connect with the organization to help veterans.
“There are over 30,000 veterans in Montgomery County alone. Many World War II Veterans are gone, so the older guys are from Vietnam. They tend not to tell their stories as much because they did not get the same kind of reception when coming home from Vietnam as other guys did when they can home from war. We need to change that. Connect with your local VFW, talk to a veteran, encourage them to tell you their story,” he said.
Jason’s final suggestion as to how to thank a veteran with your actions rather than your words is to become a sponsor through Onward Ops. Onward Ops is a program through the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) that allows anyone, whether a civilian or a member of the military, to serve as liaison and help a member of the military who transitioning to civilian life.
“The transition to civilian life is difficult. Before the internet you would be sent a welcome packet with information about schools, churches, and that sort of thing. It is a bit better now that you can look things up, but transitioning to a new place can still be difficult. There is a bit of training required for Onward Ops, but it doesn’t require too much of your time and a veteran will appreciate someone helping them to transition to civilian life a lot more than a free lunch or a handshake,” Jason said.
If you want to thank Jason and other veterans like him, please consider helping a member of the military transition to civilian life by becoming a sponsor in the Onward Ops Program. For more information and to sign up, visit https://onwardops.org/
