It's likely that everyone who will be in the room when George W. Bush signs a $286 billion transportation funding bill today has constructed a little imaginary scenario � just in case.
When you're in the same room as the president, it's inevitable that you let your mind consider the possibility: What if he approaches me? If he happens to walk by, what would I say?
St. Charles resident Jim Frazier was invited, so of course he's considered the "miraculous" possibility that the president pauses nearby.
"Don't we all?" he said. "We fantasize about winning the lottery, don't we?"
But Frazier is not your average spectator; he's already lost something much bigger than the lottery.
On March 29, 2003, Staff Sgt. Jacob Frazier � Jim's son � and a handful of elite Air Force members were working as part of a special operations team tracking Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan. Four gunmen riding two motorcycles ambushed the U.S.
troops, killing two Americans, including the former free safety for the Burlington Central High School football team, 24-year-old Jacob Frazier.
"It's been devastating," Jim Frazier said of the time since then. "Here, in this house, every day is Memorial Day."
But when he got the invitation from U.S. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert's office to see the president, Frazier immediately accepted.
"I think being there, listening to the president of the United States is an honor and a privilege," he said. "Plus, I want to see how tall this guy is," he added, laughing.
Frazier doesn't agree with everything the president has done since the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, but like most of the local military families, he supports the commander-in-chief.
Gabe Garriga, whose family has suffered serious financial hardship since he sustained burns on more than one-third of his body in a gasoline explosion in July 2003 in Iraq, said he doesn't regret his military service and continues to support Bush and the war.
He would urge the president to enforce better programs to help GIs transition to home life, and to provide better financial assistance to veterans and their families.
Still, all Garriga's struggles have not changed his support of the war and the president's actions.
The same goes for Joe Caruso of Naperville, whose son David died last November in a firefight in Fallujah, Iraq.
"We have to stay there. We can't desert people that are counting on us that are living there," he said.
He finds reassurance knowing that his son, who graduated from Waubonsie Valley High School in 1998, had dreamed of serving his country since his young teenage years.
"He was doing what he wanted to do, being where he wanted to be," Caruso said.
Matt Woodin, who returned home to the Fox Valley last August, is proud of a picture he took with the president while serving with the 101st Airborne Division in Kuwait, which is displayed on a bookshelf in his Yorkville home.
Despite any hardships Woodin has endured since his return home, he said he has no regrets about his service and continues to support the United States' mission in Iraq.
"(President Bush) sits in a higher position than me, and he has more privileged information than me, so I have to trust him and our leaders," he said.
Alex Villareal returned to Aurora last March after working as a military police officer at a prison in Umm Qasr, Iraq, and continues to support the war at his new station in Wisconsin, where he trains and evaluates troops' security before they are deployed.
Although they have suffered, the military families put the blame on America's enemies, not America's president.
But if Frazier gets to extend his hand to the most powerful man in the world, he's not planning to talk about pavement:
"I'm a Gold Star Dad, and I want to be sure all our troops are taken care of," he'd tell Bush. "Let's never forget the sacrifice our young men and women are making. Let's always give them 100 percent."
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