"We just felt we had to do something."
Retired Sergeant Major Jamie DePaola of Coventry says there's a lot of pain this week in the tight-knit community of U.S. Marines.
Their anguish fueled a small but significant action: a four-mile run on a hot Friday afternoon. After two miles, the seven runners paused at the Connecticut Vietnam Veterans Memorial for pushups-- one for each service member killed in the attack on Kabul Airport.
"We're not here to do politics, or anything like that," says DePaola. "There is anger, there's confusion, there's all of it. But not today. We're going to honor our fallen."
It was a solemn statement of support for the victims, their families and even those responsible for informing those families.
"We know that there are Marines knocking on doors," says DePaola, "to tell the moms and the dads and the spouses and the sisters and brothers that they've lost a Marine."
DePaola helped organize the run on short notice, along with fellow Marine and Coventry resident Norm Potter.
Jamie does a lot of giving back. Currently, she's Program Manager at Backpacks for Life, which reaches out to homeless and at-risk veterans.