Surprises abound in happy homecoming held for Air National Guardsman Gunderson
by Beth Kraft
Periodically the story of a U.S. serviceman or woman returning home from overseas will make headlines by tying in the homecoming with a public surprise for the family.
The touching, emotional story that played out when Mike Gunderson of Surprise, Ariz., came home on Oct. 10 after spending seven months on the Bagram air base in Afghanistan was similar to many other happy homecomings that have taken place, yet it was still uniquely special in its own way.
Gunderson, a 1995 graduate of Mondovi High School, conspired along with his wife, Stacia, to surprise their children by coming home a few days before he was originally scheduled to arrive.
First came a stop at the airport where Gunderson, who works in logistics as a Staff Sergeant with the Air National Guard, and Stacia surprised their two daughters, four-year-old Selah and three-year-old Clara.
To conceal the surprise, Stacia told the girls they were going to Phoenix’s Sky Harbor International Airport to meet one of her friends that afternoon. The sisters had no idea they would soon be seeing their dad walk into the terminal with 13 other National Guardsmen, and obediently held up two signs which read “Welcome Home” when put together.
But when Selah and Clara picked Gunderson out of the crowd, they gleefully dropped the signs and ran toward their dad for big hugs.
Still riding that emotional high, the surprises kept coming in Surprise.
Next stop was a flag football game where the Gundersons’ eight-year-old son, Luke, is a member of the CCV Stars, a youth sports program of which Gunderson is a leader.
When it came time for the game’s coin toss, Gunderson, who had donned a mascot’s costume to conceal his identity, stepped out to midfield where his son had no way of knowing what would come next.
After the “mascot” flipped the coin, Gunderson removed the head of the costume while all eyes were fixed on the coin that lay on the field’s center stripe. He then took the coin when his unsuspecting son handed it back to him.
Caught completely off guard, Luke simply stared as his father for a few seconds before the realization sunk in for the young boy. The tight hug and tears that followed were truly priceless as television cameras captured the moment that brought the Gunderson family together once again.
Mike Gunderson is the son of Ed and Ginny Gunderson, Mondovi.
Video clips of Mike Gunderson’s reunions with his children can be found via the following link: http://www.abc15.com/news/region-west-valley/surprise/national-guardsmen....
