Honoring a Lost Hero

Today I learned that one of my soldier contacts in Afghanistan was killed by an IED last Thursday. I am in shock from this news. He is the first person I've lost in five and a half years of sending packages to the troops, and I always wondered how I would react. I feel like I've lost someone dear to me, even though we had never met.
Jay was a Sergeant First Class in the Army, married with 3 little boys ages 6, 5, and 2. He was born in Alaska, raised in Kingsport, TN, and currently living/stationed back in Alaska before deploying to Khost, Afghanistan--right on the Pakistan border, one of the worst places in the country. He was a combat engineer, a member of a "Sapper" group whose job was to clear roads of IEDs, build towers and bridges, and "destroy anything in our way," he wrote in one e-mail. He was also a paratrooper. He wrote, "Being paratroopers, we have to rely on each other a lot and be ready to parachute into any hostile area in the world and kick butt."
The packages and letters he and his guys received from home meant so much to him. "Thank you from the bottom of our hearts, and may God bless everyone a thousand times over. We are truly grateful for everything you have done for us. It is really hard to imagine what it is like here for us, and when we receive care packages from people such as yourselves, it means the world to us." He showed what he was made of when he later said, "My dad was a Vietnam veteran, and the things he told me about his return trip home almost kept me from joining the military. But I wanted to follow in his footsteps and serve my country, and be part of something bigger than myself."
The last package I sent to Jay was before Christmas. He was home on leave in early December, and I'm not sure how long he was back in Afghanistan before he died. Last summer he e-mailed: "I can't wait to get back to Alaska to take my boys camping and fishing. I plan on taking them to Disneyland next spring." He would have been home for good in March.
If I find out more information about a memorial for him and his family, I will post it here. The main message I want to convey besides honoring this brave young man is that we ALL can make our troops' time away from their homes and families more bearable by showing them that they aren't forgotten and that we care. E-mail me if you want to know how you can get started. The one thing consoling me right now is that Jay knew there was a family in Wisconsin who appreciated his service and cared for him until the end. I hope it helped.