A man’s act of goodwill and generosity caught traction after several other people realized what his action meant for families who do not get to spend Christmas with their loved ones, specifically, members of the military.
On Saturday, Ed Roshitsh, a CEO at Dude Solutions, wrote on LinkedIn that he is going to pay for the plane tickets of five members of the military so they can be with their families for Christmas.
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“Active duty US armed forces member who can’t afford to fly home for holidays? I will personally pay for five random service member’s airfare home. Share and have the hero DM me. I will pull five names out of a hat on Dec. 3rd,” he wrote.
Active duty US armed forces member who can’t afford to fly home for holidays? I will personally pay for five random service member’s air fare home. Share and have the hero DM me. I will pull five names out of a hat on Dec. 2nd. #Army #airforce #marine…https://t.co/DXX6XKVGoc
Roshitsh said there were no replies at first but it suddenly caught traction and he was surprised to hear from 13 people. Not only did he receive DMS from military members or their families but he also received notices about ticket donors.
“Sunday 6PM. Wow. 13 heroes in hat. 7 ticket donors for total of 12 tickets,” he updated on Sunday and on Monday, there were 28 names of “heroes” in his hat and 11 ticket donors plus his five, which totals to 16 tickets. On Monday, Roshitsh picked the lucky 16 winners. But the number only became higher as more ticket donors stepped in.
“I am shocked. I am not making this up. The number of donors and the number of names perfectly matched. 64 of our troops headed home…This is amazing. Thank you all…So amazed,” he shared.
On Saturday I posted an offer to personally fly 5 active military service members home for the holidays. The post took off. 1,000 or so shares. 15 additional donors came through and we now have 20 total tickets pledged. At noon…https://t.co/BecwpjB7E7 https://t.co/ky01Is2JwT
Talking about the random act of kindness, Roshitsh, who in airforce veteran, told WRAL TechWire that his offer “just blew up”. He intended for just five but as the list of military names grew longer so did the number of ticket donors. He said he won’t stop drawing out names as long as the donations keep coming. He also encouraged others to do their own act of kindness and help bring the soldiers home to their families for Christmas.
“Anybody could do this. Sponsoring one military person to get back home from the holidays is a real tangible thing,” he said, adding that he “had no special power” and only had a keyboard and five sentences to get the thing rolling. But if there’s a will then there’s a way.
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