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Oct. 3--BLUFFTON -- Susan Fridley is proud to be an American, a message she prominently displays in the window of her second-story condo. But not everybody is happy about her public display of patriotism, which violates a rule stating all window coverings in Plantation Point must be white. Now, Fridley's love of country -- and family members fighting for it -- costs $10 a day, the fine imposed by the development to force her to take down a banner featuring an American flag wrapped in a yellow ribbon. She's already racked up $130 in fines. Fridley's 19-year-old son gave her the banner on the day he was deployed to Iraq, along with a simple message. "He gave me a hug and a kiss and whispered in my ear, 'Please don't forget me Mom -- hang this where you can always see it,' " she recalled. She decided everyone else needs to see it as well, and she says she won't take it down until her son and her husband -- who also recently enlisted in the Army -- come home. And even then, she'd be inclined to keep it up. "When 9/11 happened, flags went up overnight and slowly they've gone away," Fridley said. "There are people dying (in Iraq), and people are forgetting about it. I may not believe in the why of this war, but I believe in my son and my husband and all of the other soldiers putting their lives on the line." Her son, Jordan Erwin-Fridley, is very much in the forefront of the fighting in Iraq, driving armored vehicles in the northwestern part of the country near Tel Afar and Mosul. He recently was hospitalized with heat exhaustion after a mission. The family anxiously waits for sporadic e-mail messages, a sign that he's alive. Her husband, Casey, joined the Army this summer, with the ultimate goal of becoming a physician's assistant. The 34-year-old quit his job as a science teacher and athletic trainer at a Catholic high school in Ohio and now is training at Fort Benning, Ga. Fridley pleaded her case to the development's board of directors on the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The board refused to budge. "Rules are good, but there are times when they need to be bent, changed or broken," said Fridley. Board members Woody Williams and Steven McCauley did not respond to numerous requests for comment. Joanne Johnson, a member of the board, declined to discuss the board's decision. "I just had knee surgery and I'm just wiped," she said. "I can barely talk right now." The complex's rules and regulations state that window coverings must be white in order to "preserve the uniform appearance of the community." An employee of the development who declined to be named said allowing American flags would open the door for others like Confederate, Mexican or even Iraqi flags. While Fridley wouldn't be happy if a neighbor displayed an Iraqi flag, she thinks people ought to be able to. "... (T)hat would be their right in this country." Contact Daniel Brownstein at 706-8125 or dbrownstein@islandpacket.com.
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Copyright (c) 2006, The Island Packet, Hilton Head Island, S.C.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.
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