Henry: When I started volunteering,
I was a little concerned about, if I'm gonna start this,
I want to be able to do it on a regular basis.
It became evident to my friends, to my family --
if you're looking for Henry on Tuesday,
he'll be at the V.A. hospital.
Brad: About three years ago, my dad had passed away.
I'm not really an emotional person,
but I started sleeping in more and probably getting depressed,
but not realizing it.
And my wife was volunteering at the V.A.,
and she encouraged me to get out there and volunteer.
♪♪
There's good people in this world.
We see a lot of negativity through news and social media,
but there are good people out there doing good things,
and I'm a witness to that every single day.
I get to the V.A. about 9:00 in the morning,
review my assignment of how many Veterans I need to see.
Mandy: Brad's one of our great volunteers
in our Heroes Welcome program, and he's one of the leads.
And what that program is is Veterans serving Veterans.
We go in, and we talk to them, see how they're doing,
and anything we can do to make their stay better.
Is there anything we can do for you while we're here?
♪♪
Mr. Frank and Buddy are both Veterans,
and they volunteer on the same day, the same shift.
Henry: We help move patients throughout the hospital.
[ Telephone rings ]
Veteran's Hospital.
Mr. Frank's been here for, gosh, a lot of years.
He's here four days a week volunteering with us.
Henry: He probably has 15,000 to 17,000 volunteer hours.
And I think I'm coming up on 800.
You can't put a price tag on what they're doing.
You can't put a dollar value on a volunteer
holding a Veteran's hand.
It's not about me.
It's about the Veteran in the hospital bed,
it's about what other people are going through.
I said, "Now that I'm retired,
I want to give back," like a lot of people,
say "I will help lift these Veterans up."
I didn't get a chance to go to Vietnam, you know.
Your invitation got lost in the mail, huh?
Yes, sir.
I kept noticing every time when I would leave to come home,
I thought, you know, I feel better than I did
when I got there.
So it worked both ways.
♪♪
I was doing a media escort.
As we were leaving Baghdad, we were on a C-17,
which we know that's a very large aircraft.
And it just hit me right at that moment as I'm watching them
load stretcher after stretcher of these men and women
who are wounded of just how very blessed I was.
At the moment, I decided that when I retired,
that I wanted to work at the V.A.,
and I wanted to help take care of Veterans.
Being around other Vets gave me a sense of purpose.
And it's really quick to make friends
because we went through similar experiences.
I've had the pleasure of having a family
in more than one area.
The relationship with Frank
started through the V.A. hospital.
Buddy and Mr. Frank, they've just connected as Veterans,
and also as people who wanted to help serve other Veterans.
So with Frank, I made the observation
that he was taking a bus home.
It's only, like, eight or nine miles,
but it takes an hour and a half, three different buses.
I said, "I'm headed your way. Would you like a ride home?"
Mr. Frank would never ask anyone for anything.
Henry: And he said, "Oh, Henry, I would love it.
It would save me a lot of time."
So every time I go that way,
I would give him a lift.
Thought it was a way I could help out a fellow volunteer
to get home without having to ride three buses
for an hour and a half.
Buddy's just a wonderful person
and just wanted to do that for a fellow Vet.
It becomes part of my routine.
It's part of what I do now.
♪♪