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A piece of the homefront on the warfront

GLENDALE — Kathleen Lewis wouldn’t stand out in a crowd. Everything about her screams average. She is average height, her clothing is modest, she speaks like the mother-next-door, and her personality is down-to-earth and unassuming.

Her daily life is anything but ho-hum. For the last four-and-a-half years, Lewis has spent seemingly every waking moment making sure complete strangers in the U.S. military receive care packages and letters from home.

Lewis, 57, is the founder of Packages From Home, a nonprofit whose mission, according to Lewis, “is to support our men and women in combat, and right now that would be Iraq and Afghanistan for the most part.”

Her workers collect supplies and then package and ship them overseas to members of the military serving abroad. They rely solely on volunteers and charitable giving from individuals to stay afloat. But Lewis is the engine that makes the train go.

Lewis started Packages From Home in March 2004, when she began sending care packages to her son Christian, who was serving in Iraq. After learning that no other soldiers in her son’s squad were receiving packages, she took it upon herself to “adopt” Christian’s squad.

The nonprofit has become a big hit with the troops. Lewis estimates her agency has sent 250,000 boxes overseas, including more than 200 tons of recreational items such as pool tables, foosball tables and sporting goods. It also brought one lucky soldier home last year to attend the Super Bowl in Glendale.

But why would someone undertake such a task?

“She’s a good person with good values and she’s very humble,” Jeff Surdakowski says.

Surdakowski says he first met Kathleen when he began volunteering for PFH just after it launched. He now works side-by-side with Lewis as its Director of Promotional Planning and Special Events Coordinator and works.

“It is a non-stop, 24/7 job that she’s been doing for five years and she won’t quit,” Surdakowski says. “She does what needs to be done. She’s not in it for popularity or to make money. She sees all the military as her family and she wants to give them support.”

Lewis was born in Phoenix as one of five children. Raised in a Catholic family, she attended parochial school at St. Mary’s High School in Phoenix. She still attends Mass weekly and attributes her religion to much of what she is today.

“I believe that my relationship with the Church, and especially Franciscans, taught me a lot about giving back to the community,” Lewis said. “St. Mary’s has led a real important part of my life.”

The Franciscans are the missionary branch of the Priesthood, Lewis said. According to their website, “The Conventual Franciscans work around the globe to improve the lives of the less fortunate.”

And on that doctrine, Kathy passes the test. She says she sees Packages From Home as a “mission from God.”

“You have to live the life to be a Catholic,” Lewis says. “You live the life and part of it is giving back to your community.”

She was president of the local Parent-Teacher Organization for five years, visited rest homes at a time when she described rest homes as “not nice places” and threw numerous parties for students at St. Mary’s. She has raised 12 foster children while raising two biological children of her own.

“I did all of those things and that was, obviously, in preparation for this (PFH),” Lewis says.

The turning point in her life was her first trip to Germany in February 2004, when she bid farewell to Christian as he deployed to Iraq. She was the only mother there and realized how dangerous the situation was going to be for her son and other soldiers.

She returned to Phoenix one month later and launched Packages From Home. She plans to continue it as long as the soldiers need it.

“I’ve tried very hard to be a good person so at the end of my day’s they can say, ‘She was a good woman,’” Lewis said. “I want to always gave given more than I’ve taken and I think that’s important.”

“I would much rather be a charitable person than a person who is a taker,” Lewis adds. “I would rather be a giver than a taker.”

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>>Email the editor at aklaw@zoniereport.com.

Lake to Bush: ‘Stay the course’

PHOENIX — Dawn Lake chose the Army over the Peace Corps as a way to see the world.

In 26 years, Lake has been to Korea, around the Pacific, Germany, and the Middle East. Her career as a colonel spanned the Gulf War, the Drug War, and the war on terror.

But after returning from Afghanistan in 2004, Lake was astounded by two things: how poorly women were treated in Afghanistan and how misguided America’s war on terror had become.

“I wish we had not gone into Iraq when we did,” she said. “It’s not to say though that I don’t support it. I really think that Saddam Hussein had to be taken out…I think that guy was absolutely evil, and I feel the same way about the Taliban.

“There’s a special place in hell for people like (the Taliban) for what they have done to the country — especially the women,” she added. “I mean women being executed for nothing more than being seen outside without a burkha on.”

She said the U.S. should have stayed in Afghanistan longer before shifting its attention to Iraq.

“I would have liked to have seen it be a more focused application of firepower and also to build a stronger coalition,” she said.

Any advice for President Bush?

“Stay the course,” she said.

Lake was born in Quincy, Mass., but raised in Boston with her three brothers. She was into literature, all sports and poetry — a self-described “Renaissance woman.”

She was a trained paratrooper from Fort Bragg, N.C., who moonlighted as a photographer on some missions. It was Lake’s trip to Afghanistan that inspired a collection of photos at the Tree of Life Gallery in Phoenix.

Lake snapped the shots with a beat-up digital camera while traveling 70 mph in ground convoys. Others were taken over the shoulder of gunners aboard Chinook and Apache helicopters. There are 10 cities in all, including scenes from Kabul and Jalalabad.

She used Adobe Photoshop software to make the pictures look like paintings. They were on display Nov. 16.

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>>Email the editor at aklaw@zoniereport.com.