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As he moved about he briefly chatted with a few members of the growing throng of neighbors spilling out of his yard and into the next and frequently pulled his left wrist out of his shorts pocket to check the time on his gold wristwatch.

"It has been a long day of waiting," he said. "I hope I can hold it all back."

The moment he had been anticipating for more than a year came a short time later when he stepped out onto the street and was embraced in a giant bear hug by his son Edward III.

"I love you Dad. I love you Dad," Lenard III, 38, said as the crowd of about 60 people cheered and clapped.

Sgt. Edward J. Lenard III, a pharmaceutical technician with the U.S. Army, was home from his nine-month deployment in Iraq.