I was going to write this column this week about something that was bugging me. What something was that? Take your pick.

My allergies are acting up. Gas prices are through the roof. Trying to understand the County’s proposed tax increase is tying my brain in knots.

I was going to write this column about one, or maybe all, of the things that I was annoyed about. I thought I had a pretty good list going. That is, until last Thursday.

The phrase “21-year-old widow” is heartbreaking in just about any context. But the story of Clara Ritzberg is a little more than that.

Ritzberg, who lives in New York, is the young widow of Spc. Brian Ritzberg, the fallen soldier profiled on the front page of today’s Powhatan Today.

Clara and Brian met and fell in love when they were both in the reserves. They were both eventually placed on active duty and had celebrated their second wedding anniversary just days before Brian was killed.

After her husband died, Clara was released from active duty. The first few months were very, very hard, she told me when I spoke to her last week, but she has finally begun to move forward. She has gone back to school, and she has started making new friends.

I asked her Thursday if there was a chance that she could be called back up, since she was still in the reserves.

“It’s a possibility,” she said quietly. And that was all she said.

That same day, I later found out, Clara was called back to active duty.

I don’t know, to be honest, which was more difficult to fathom. That a young woman who had lost her husband in one of the most difficult ways imaginable just one year ago could be asked to uproot the life she had just started to piece back together, or the quiet dignity with which Clara Ritzberg accepted that reality.

I know that people look for life lessons in stories like these—I often do—and I dare say there is more than one to take away from the story of Clara Ritzberg.

She doesn’t talk very much, and even when she does it’s in a near whisper, but what she does not say speaks volumes.

Clara didn’t ask for media attention, and, though I only spoke to her briefly, I doubt she would spend much time railing about the unfairness of her situation.

In her very quiet, exceedingly courageous way, she embodies the spirit of sacrifice that so many of our young people have displayed.

So many people, so many unimaginable sacrifices. So many quiet displays of courage that will never be known.

I was never fortunate enough to know Brian Ritzberg, but I can only imagine what he would think of the way his wife has handled this turn of events.

I doubt her courage would surprise him, but I’m sure it would make him proud.