The world is a giant place full of places and sounds and people we may never see.
So in 1967, a young girl in Michigan who had seen nothing outside of her hometown, got a chance to send a letter to any soldier serving.
The care package made its way to Vietnam and by random chance was given to Col. Ned Felder. And from that moment on, both lives were changed forever.
The unlikely friendship spanned years, different locations as well as cultural divisions during a time that often didn’t embrace that.
Felder was a 30-year-old Black man raised in the poor part of South Carolina. Kristina Olsen, who was white, went to a school located in an apple orchard and played the piano and French horn.
Their letters, they both said, gave them a glimpse of a life neither had seen before.
Some of the memorabilia collected by Felder. Photo by Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post
Olsen said Felder’s letters came with unique stamps and were long and full of amazing stories. She said they were written so well that she would work extra hard on her letters back to him.
“I couldn’t just jot a note back to him,” said Olsen, now 68. “I had to compose a good letter.” Her life was sheltered, and she was grateful for the glimpse at a larger world, as well as his kindness.
He made me want to be a better person.”
For Felder, having someone besides his family care that he was serving overseas meant so much to him.
“For someone who did not know anyone over there to be so kind to a stranger — that’s heartwarming,” Felder, now 86, said this week from his home in Fairfax County, Va. “That means a lot. That’s what life is all about.”
And for 10 years, the friends exchanged letters. But life, with its ebbs and flows, carried them both in different directions and the letters became fewer and fewer.
Felder went home to his wife and children. He served as an associate judge for the Army.
Olsem married and had a son and daughter. Eventually she began working in real estate. Then a series of tragedies struck her life – her mother died; her father became ill and had to live with Olsen for more than decade until he died; her husband was critically ill for several years and she was the primary source of income, working two jobs.
Then tragedy struck again – Olsen’s husband died. Then she lost her 27-year-old son to fentanyl poisoning.
Kris Olsen and Col. Ned Felder hug at their first meeting, with his oldest son in the background. Photo courtesy of South Carolina State University
As Olsen took stock of her life, and the moments in them that had made her who she was, it was suddenly important, she said, that she find Felder.
“At many times in my life when I had a lot of difficult things to get through myself, it was just good to reflect on a person like that, who cared enough to do things like that,” Olsen said.
He sets a pretty good example of how to live a good life. Be respected and be respectful. Appreciate things.”
So Olsen searched and finally found Felder’s address and then, just like she did nearly six decades ago – she wrote him a letter.
Felder said when he got Olsen’s letter he was stunned. “I was so happy! So happy. This one is more meaningful than any of the others (letters)” he had received from her.
It just so happened that Felder would be at the state university in South Carolina where Olsen lived, for a Veterans Day event. He invited her to meet him there.
Olsen said that she couldn’t stop the shock when she saw him for the first time.
“It was surreal, like the space-time continuum shifted,” Olsen said. “Someone that was 10,000 miles away and then all of a sudden in the same room, physically right there.”
The pair hugged and then hugged again. The years just melted away, they said.
And now that time has passed since the meeting, Felder said the fact that two people from such different lives and different ages could be so happy to see one another, and so comfortable together, was “divine intervention”.
Also, an example for others. “If we can do it, everyone can do it.”
Watch the amazing reunion below.
Sources: People | Washington Post
